Information wants to be free, reporters want to be paid, Part 39

Someone had to come up with it.

As everyone from newspapers and other news media to bloggers and information niches fumble about looking for a way to use the Internet profitably, a guy named Matthew Mitchell has come up an app to sell to them all.

According to an article posted today on min-online by Steve Smith, Mitchell has created Mediapass, which allows info sellers to sign up online for free and put some portion of a website behind a pay wall. Mitchell’s cut is 35 percent of any paid subscriptions the user might get for their golden nuggets of wisdom or drizzles of drivel and doggerel.

According to Smith’s article, the secret is not to put everything behind the wall, but to keep traffic coming for the free stuff, which can still be advertising supported, but tantalize them with the better stuff behind the wall.

“There should always be a mix …” Mitchell is quoted as saying. “At the end of the day our message is really that subscription outperforms advertising yet does not need to replace advertising.”

Has he built a better mouse trap or a flash in the pan? If it makes a buck, how long before Google and Yahoo! swipe the idea?