Financial Times Girds for Battle With Rupert

With Rupert Murdoch talking about taking The Wall Street Journals Web site free, Financial Times is girding its loins for battle.

The newspaper announced yesterday that later this month it will initiate a program that allows online readers to access 30 articles a month without registering as paying members of the site.

Presently most of its content requires a subscription.

While other newspapers like The New York Times have been dismantling paid-content schemes, publications like Financial Times and The Wall Street Journal stand to lose more by going free, since they have a natural market of deep-pocketed corporate expense accounts to drain for subscription revenue.

But if Mr. Murdoch is willing to take that risk to expand the Journal's readership, its main competitor may find itself stuck if it doesn't follow suit.

From The Times' article today:

• The New York Times