"There's a "News Troll" a-coming and he say's that content ain't Free!!"

Meet The Guy Who Wants to Kill Free News on the Web.

This is the new owner of the Chicago Tribune and LA Times. His name is Sam. Very soon, he's going to be known as the guy who foolishly tried to kill free news on the internet.

According to a Washington Post Story (free registration required) Mr. Zell has indicated that the newspapers could not "economically sustain the practice of allowing their articles, photos and other content to be used free by other Internet news aggregators."

He went further, singling out Google, (wrongly) accusing them of outright theft:

"If all of the newspapers in America did not allow Google to steal their content, how profitable would Google be? Not Very."

He said the relationship between the Tribune's media properties and search engines such as Google can, "last for a time," but that, "We're going to see new formulas in the immediate future that reflect the cost benefit."

Sadly for the Tribune companies, Mr. Zell might find out the hard way that there's not a lot of "cost benefit" for their customers and readers to pay for something from that they can get somewhere else (and often better) for FREE.

We don't care about your "cost benefit," Mr. Zell. We care about Good Content. We're even willing to pay for some of it some of the time, provided you give us a reason to.

If it by the Tribune's management's own admission, that their online efforts are "feeble" ...Why in the hell will anyone start PAYING for them ?!?!?