Melbourne, May 11 Readers worldwide do not mind paying for online news content, according to a survey.

Conducted by accounting giant PricewaterhouseCoopers, the survey has revealed that readers are willing to pay almost as much for some high-quality online newspapers as they do for print versions, particularly in specialist news areas.

According to The Australian, the study of 4900 respondents in the US and Europe has found that sport and business are the areas in which consumers are most ready to pay for content.

The surveyors claim that consumers would not mind paying 97 per cent of the purchase price of a traditional newspaper for online business content, provided there are no free online products of equal quality on the market.

As regards online sport content, consumers would be willing to fork out 77 per cent of the purchase price of a traditional paper if there were no free Internet equivalents.

The findings might boost up plans by a number of the world's major newspaper publishers to find more ways to make money from online content.

News Corporation Chairman Rupert Murdoch said at the company's third-quarter results briefing last week that they would charge for some mastheads' online content "within the next 12 months". (ANI)