For me it's less an issue of paying for news, than that the presence of money in news gathering and news publishing creates a conflict of interest about what is

For me it's less an issue of paying for news, than that the presence of money in news gathering and news publishing creates a conflict of interest about what is shown to readers. The news organization and its reporting will be controlled by whoever controls its finances, which for mainstream news is usually some oligarch (I guess we can use that word here now). So the org publishes the oligarch point of view, as noted in the soubriquet "Bezos Post". In the case of ad-supported online news, it's the clickbait point of view, and so on. It is hard to stop any organization from morphing into this over time as it gains resources and recognition and sees those as a goal to pursue. The Wikimedia Foundation is another example that gets discussed here now and then. The other thing is that news stops being news almost immediately. "Madeleine Albright passed away earlier today" was news this morning but now it is olds. I might be willing to pay for news but it's harder to tell myself I should pay for olds. Then I ask what value I gained in finding out about Madeleine Albright earlier instead of later, and the answer is: not much, so there is more payment resistance.