Gordon Crovitz, ex-WSJ publisher and co-founder of start-up Journalism Online, joins paywall panel on 29th October

Arguably, the Holy Grail for newspapers has been how to get consumers to pay a reasonable price for online content. An increasing number of publishers in the US and internationally think that Gordon Grovitz and his partners at the technology start-up Journalism Online may just have found it.

In August, four months after setting up business, the company announced that more than 500 newspapers, magazines and online-based news sites in the United States and around the world had signed "Letters of Intent" with them. “Just one month later, we have passed 1,000, reaching more than 100 million online users, and the pace is accelerating," said Crovitz in a company statement.

On 29th October, Crovitz, who had walked out of this jobs as Publisher of The Wall Street Journal, Executive Vice-President of Dow Jones & Company, and president of the Company’s Consumer Media Group, when News Corp took over, will discuss his new project in greater detail when he contributes to a panel discussion about online paywalls at the 13th Journalism Leaders Forum in Preston.

Other confirmed panellists are:

• Frédéric Filloux, editor for the international division of the Norwegian media giant Schibsted ASA and co-author of the Monday Note .


• Martha Stone, director of the World Association of Newspapers-IFRA’s Shaping the Future of the Newspaper project


• Robert Andrews, UK Editor of paidContent.com.

François Nel , director of the Journalism Leaders Programme at UCLan, will be in the chair discussion on, 'Paywalls: build them, break them - or look beyond them"

To attend the open Forum at 6pm in Greenbank Lecture Theatre - as well as the reception from 5pm - please register soonest. There is no charge, but seating is limited.



If you can't be there in person, you can also participate online. The Forum will be Webcast live. More details here.

WAN-IFRA's Martha Stone joins 13th Forum panel for paywall debate

Paywalls: build them, or break them - or look beyond them?

That's the theme for the next Journalism Leaders Forum in Preston on 29th October 2009. Kicking off that discussion will be Martha Stone, director of the World Association of Newspapers-IFRA's Shaping the Future of the Newspaper project. Charting the panel will be the director of UCLan Journalism Leaders Programme, François Nel, whose paper on innovations in online business models featured at the recent Future of Journalism conference in Cardiff.

To attend this free programme at 6pm on Thursday, 29^th October in Greenbank Lecture Theatre in Preston - as well as the networking reception from 5pm - please register at here.

If you can't be there in person, there are other ways to join the discussion. You can post your questions and comments on this site, or you can view the live Webcast by logging in as a guest. Online participants will be able to post questions to panelists in a text chat room.