"Thanks for the comment, Mark; always a pleasure to hear from you. Don't read too much into the "crusty old billionaire" crack -- I was just yanking your chain a little :-) As far as the whole business model thing is concerned, please read my response to Ian -- I am not some kind of business naïf, or Internet triumphalist. And I don't think advertising is the key to making content pay online, in part because of the factors you describe. But the fact remains that in order to prove value, or even successfully create it, we have to use tools like Twitter and Facebook and yes, even Google -- not cut them off and put roadblocks in their way. People sharing our content is one of the best marketing tools we have available; why would we make that even harder than we do already? You should be thanking me for saying that you're right about the power of Twitter etc. But you don't explain how that jibes with Rupert's Google-blocking and pay-walling - which is understandable, because it doesn't. Go..." - mathew ingram