A New Age of Media Patronage?

Clay Shirky debates the future of news. Fallows has related thoughts:

Suppose you decide ahead of time that you'd be willing to spend $100 over the next year for the news that you can get free on the Internet. Why would you make that choice? For the same reason many people now decide to pledge $100 to NPR: they know that they can still listen without paying but recognize that if everyone makes that choice, there will eventually be nothing to hear. In NPR's case, the money is then doled out to specific shows and producers by the network or individual stations. In the case of an online journalism fund, it could be doled out proportionately to the news sites you actually visit during that year.