This move may not be as naive as it may sound. Newspapers have built a user base and loyalty over the years based on and presenting perspectives that suit their readership base.
Google and other news aggregators break this ability of newspapers to "present a single perspective" and often present headlines from WSJ and nytimes side by side.
Imagine the advantage newspaper sites would have if you HAVE to go to online.wsj.com or nytimes.com to get your news instead of google.com/news or another aggregator.
When the NYT required you to register to read an article that a blogger was discussing I did not bother reading the article. Lots of people did just the same, it is news, it's not like other news sources will not cover the same event. I just have to wait an hour or so and it will be on the BBC where I can read it for free and without registering. The NYT does not have a lock on the events that it reports. Someone else will report the same event, if NYT cannot command my attention by the quality of their writing then putting up a pay wall is hardly going to entice me.
And as for the user base, why do you think that they are closing down, because the user base is no longer there.
The more stuff like this I see the more I am convinced that new papers are heading for extinction.
Perhaps I should buy some so that I can sell them on eBay in a decade or so :)
Google and other news aggregators break this ability of newspapers to "present a single perspective" and often present headlines from WSJ and nytimes side by side.
Imagine the advantage newspaper sites would have if you HAVE to go to online.wsj.com or nytimes.com to get your news instead of google.com/news or another aggregator.