According to the Press Freedom Index, New Zealand has fewer media restrictions than the US, the UK and even Australia. It ranks equal 19th alongside Denmark, Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Trinidad and Tobago.

Yet you wouldn't think so today if you wanted to know what was going on with the new cellular phone operator 2degrees.

Chris Keall wrote Revealed: Vodafone’s secret deal with 2degrees for the National Business Review, exposing the pricing deal between the two companies. After an order from the Commerce Commission, the NBR gutted the story leaving just a stub.

It turns out the Commerce Commission has the power to do this under the terms of the Commerce Act. And that's what makes a mockery of press freedom. If the secret information was, say, a matter of state security, or perhaps had the power to ruin the lives of innocent people the ruling may have made sense. But it's neither of those things. 2degrees prefers to keep the price it pays Vodafone a secret.

So much for transparency and the open society.

And to add insult to injury, publishing banned information is a criminal offence in New Zealand.

Anyway, it seems the top-secret information is online internationally. That'll put the cat among the pigeons.

New Zealand's The National Business Review newspaper is erecting a pay wall, reserving roughly 20 percent of its online material for paying guests only. I've nothing in principle against charging for online content. In fact, I've a vested interest in the scheme succeeding.

My objection is practical.

First, I don't believe enough customers will pay enough money to make online charging a practical proposition for all but a handful of specialist publications. The NBR is good, but its content isn't unique or special enough to get away with charging.

Second, hiding the 20 percent of the best content behind a pay wall, means cutting off considerably more than 20 percent of the paper's potential traffic from advertisers.

Third, the NBR's price is just plain wrong. The paper wants to charge $89 as a special offer and a normal rate of $149 for access to 20 percent of its content for six months. This compares with $228 (including GST) for a six month subscription to the print edition. For that money, the NBR will chop up and munch trees, squirt ink, and post the finished product to your letter box once a week. You'll get to see 100 percent of the printed material for as long as you wish.

On that basis, the fair price for a six month subscription to 20 percent of the content would be under $50, less postage, less printing costs, less paper. What would that figure be? That's right. Around zero dollars.

So unless the online deal offers more material or something else special, it's hardly attractive.