Some interesting data points: both Seattle and Denver already have surviving other papers, the Seattle Times and the Denver Post. So their (former?) competitors’ online sites still have to compete, not only with the other papers’ online sites but with their surviving (for now) print editions. But in San Francisco, neither the Chronicle nor SFGate has an equivalent competitor. So if the print Chronicle goes away and it survives as an online paper, it would be the only big-league journalistic operation of its size, influence and considerable reputation.

So would you pay $5 a month — or even more, considering everything’s more expensive in San Francisco — for SFGate?

I would.