This is the tradeoff WSJ opted for, and it really doesn't make sense for it to work both ways. Web crawlers can't index content behind a paywall, end of story.

This is the tradeoff WSJ opted for, and it really doesn't make sense for it to work both ways. Web crawlers can't index content behind a paywall, end of story. Where WSJ has a big advantage is that they already have brand name recognition. From the stats in the article it appears that this was a profitable choice for them, however, a lesser know content publisher seeking to monetize using paywalls is bound to have a much more significant challenge attracting users without decent search result rankings.