That was fast. Just shy of two years after launch, Steve Brill, Gordon Crovitz and Leo Hindery Jr. have sold their “make journalism pay” business to someone who already makes money from publishing. Chicago-based R. R. Donnelley & Sons Co. has acquired Journalism Online and its consumer-facing Press+ paid content…

One company set to face new competition now that Google (NSDQ: GOOG) is rolling out its paid content system is Journalism Online, which to date has helped roughly 24 publications, predominately smaller-circulation newspapers, charge readers to access online content. In an interview co-founder Gordon Crovitz insisted his company’s Press +…

ProPublica is going public today as the latest customer of Press+, the payment platform from Journalism Online.The investigative nonprofit is the most high-profile addition so far from a recent grant by The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation designed to encourage its grantees to try new methods of raising…

The John S. and James L. Knight Foundation has funded any number of experiments to create sustainable journalism, investing millions of dollars in startups, academics and more. The latest effort offers up to 10 Knight nonprofit grantees the chance to try meters, subscriptions or other methods through Journalism Online, the…

Pennsylvania’s LancasterOnline went live this morning with the first newspaper use of Journalism Online’s Press+—metered out-of-town access to obits. The meter kicks in after an out-of-market user reads seven obits in one month; viewing more will cost $1.99 a month or $19.99 a year. [Slideshow.] The plans were outlined earlier…

Updated: In a doubleheader announcement meant to move the needle on Rupert Murdoch’s ambitious paid content plans, News Corp has acquired the Skiff e-reading platform from the Hearst startup and is joining forces with Steve Brill and Gordon Crovitz through a stake in their start-up Journalism Online. The Skiff acquisition…

A few more tea leaves to add in when comes to the Washington Post and paid content, courtesy of Boisfeuillet Jones, Jr. and Ira Stoll, who wrote up the Washington Post Co. (NYSE: WPO) vice chairman’s weekend talk at a Harvard Crimson lunch. Jones, who was publisher of the Post…

For all the coverage and all the talk about paywalls, you might expect a full house when Journalism Online consultant Merrill Brown asked a roomful of editors how many worked in newsrooms considering the notion. Instead, there was a show of hands only slightly larger than the number who claim…

Local newspapers may actually have an easier time charging for content than national and international news brands like the New York Times (NYSE: NYT). And what’s the biggest threat to paid music? Well, probably not piracy. These were among the assertions by panelists on paidContent2010’s The Truth About Subscriptions, who…

Observers aren’t the only ones hearing more about Journalism Online and its plans for Press+ today. The company’s affiliates—publishers who have gone beyond expressing an interest but may not have committed yet—got a combo update/pitch, obtained by paidContent and published below.

Finally some clarity after months of mystery about possible affiliates and constant questions about whether Journalism Online is reality or vaporware. A private beta has been underway for weeks but JO founders Steve Brill and Gordon Crovitz declined until now to identify any of the affiliates taking part. Turns out…

While Journalism Online claimed earlier this fall that it had collected letters of intent from more than 1,000 media outlets, it has been unclear when the startup’s paywall platform will actually launch—or how many of those news organizations it will actually have on board. Co-founder Steve Brill (pictured) provided some…

Journalism Online says companies representing more than 1,000 newspapers, magazines and online media outlets have signed letters of intent to work with the startup on “freemium” models and that the collective number of monthly uniques for those sites passes 100 million. In the end, all that really matters is how…

Journalism Online hasn’t moved beyond letters of intent on the commercial side but the Steve Brill-Gordon Crovitz-Leo Hindery Jr. enterprise is adding a non-profit service that already has a launch partner: the London-based Institute for War and Peace Reporting (IWPR). The non-profit service announced this morning (these are intentional non-profits,…

Journalism Online, the new make-journalism-pay venture from Steve Brill, Gordon Crovitz and Leo Hindery, has letters of intent from newspaper publishers representing 506 newspapers, magazine and “leading global news sites” but isn’t identifying any by name. That’s after weeks of promising a list of interested publishers. They will be announced,…

Some two dozen newspaper industry execs gathered quietly (they thought) in suburban Chicago Thursday to continue a conversation about industry solutions that started last month. In between the two, Steve Brill, Leo Hindery and Gordon Crovitz announced a start-up that hopes to be part of the solution and quickly joined…