In what seems like a U-Turn on the dream of making the Internet more accessible, Google have announced plans to limit how much news people can read.
Newspaper publishers will now be able to set a limit on the number of free news articles people can read through Google, the company has announced.
The concession follows claims from some media companies that the search engine is profiting from online news pages.Under the First Click Free programme, publishers can now prevent unrestricted access to subscription websites.
Users who click on more than five articles in a day may be routed to payment or registration pages.
“Previously, each click from a user would be treated as free,” Google senior business product manager Josh Cohen said in a blog post.
Luckily the BBC is still free – although maybe one day non-license payers may no longer have access?
Read more over at the BBC News Centre
