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No one is willing to pay for news because as soon as a piece is published there are thousands of other publishers posting copycat articles. The copycats have next to zero expenses and post on aggregators like facebook with no fee so everyone just reads them. It's a tragedy of the commons that only the government can solve since people prefer to read their news through facebook/google blurbs for free.

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> tragedy of the commons that only the government can solve

Tragedy of commons are not always solvable by governments, in this case most certainly not as people in government have their incentives aligned with getting favorable publicity from media.

Government can be a more effective regulatory mechanism for say polluted air or river because cleaner air benefits everyone equally. Media is not the case. Media benefits to those who can control it and putting government in charge will give us another CNN and FOX News.

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