At first, the notion of a paywall seemed silly. Better to take it down and get the traffic.
But when the traffic didn't turn into profit readily, the notion took on new seriousness. For some time now, publishers have been weighing the benefits of reconstructing a paywall to bring revenue.

In his latest post, veteran media and tech executive Alan Mutter notes the arrival of new, well-heeled local players in the game (Yahoo, AOL, Huffington Post), all willing to give away content others contemplate placing in behind the paywall. 

Mutter's conclusion: "For anyone other than publishers of mission-critical business or government news like the Wall Street Journal and possibly the New York Times, pay walls will not fly. It is time for everyone else to move on to more productive pursuits."

Those pursuits? Unique products for print, online and mobile, valued by customers and advertisers alike. Charging for day-to-day coverage is not likely "fruitful," he argues on his Reflections of a Newsosaur blog.

The Economist looks at the rise of the content farm, places like Demand Media that produce material based on what algorithms tell it users are interested in.

It has a look, too, at AOL's recent transition to a service with more original content --- although it won't lump it into the content farm category.

The challenge, the newsmagazine notes, is that the business model for online journalism is still elusive. Services like Demand Media are paying contributors to produce what people want and attaching a value to that content which ought to grow in time.

The trouble, as commentators note in the piece, is that it can flood the Internet with mediocre material.

The Business Insider has posted an AOL user survey of its Seed.com freelancers. It has some interesting findings on what drives people to contribute and what AOL might be pursuing as operating tactics.

While it's not clear how many contributors participated in the survey, their top motivators to get them to provide content: contests to encourage and ratings systems to reinforce.

Similarly, the survey suggests AOL is looking at outsourcing some functions like copy-editing and fact-checking.

The survey is attached.

The next phase of America Online's foray into news involves a Google-like approach of using algorithms to maximize the impact of the generation and distribution of information.

"Rather than relying on editors and journalists deciding on what kinds of stories to run, AOL will employ a system that relies on a series of algorithms that will predict the kinds of stories, videos and photos that will have the greatest appeal to audiences and advertisers," the Guardian reports.

Data amassed from searches from AOL subscribers will be used. It will create more customized content for advertisers in the mix. And it will employ its new Seed.com service to help pay freelancers more and determine how their work can best be marketed.