... reminds me of making money from Open Source Software - it is very difficult to do. Just as how advertising alone was able to sustain very, very few TV stations in past decades, ad supported news can support only a handful of large revenue generating web sites. Even these large revenue web sites don't generate nearly as much money as over the air TV stations of old, because their barriers to entry are so low, and competition eats away at profits.
It was only at the advent of paid TV, that the number of available TV channels exploded, indicating once again, the importance of paywalls required to sustain businesses. Therefore I strongly believe local news can make money, using highly differentiated user experiences that require payment - which also foster higher paying ads.
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