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Rupert Murdoch: ‘E-readers will become the norm’

News Corp chairman Rupert Murdoch has said electronic newspapers delivered on new e-reader technology will become mainstream within the next 10 to 15 years.

In an interview for the Fox Business Network, Murdoch said: “Instead of an analogue paper printed on paper you may get it on a panel which would be mobile, which will receive the whole newspaper over the air, [and] be updated every hour or two.”

Murdoch also repeated his view that falls in print circulations and advertising revenue mean that newspapers must begin charging for online content.

He believes that in future readers will only get the main headlines and alerts for free electronically.

He said: “All these things are possible. Some of the greatest electronics companies in the world are working on this very hard.”

Earlier this month, Murdoch revealed on a News Corp conference call that he believes “the current days of the internet will soon be over” and he revealed that more News Corp publications, in addition to the Wall Street Journal, will begin charging for online content within the next 12 months.

In his Fox Business interview, Murdoch said that newspapers which had rushed online for free to get a bigger audience “damaged themselves”.

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He said: “Now they’re going to have to pull back from that and say: ‘Hey, we’re going to charge for this.”

When asked what he thought of government bail-outs for ailing publications, he said News Corp would not consider this option.

He said that such a move would mean “we’d give up our freedom to criticize or to play our full role in the community”.

He said. “Nothing that News Corp owns will ever take money from the government and I don’t believe even The New York Times would.”

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