In a total contradiction to an earlier statement of his, Rupert Murdoch said Thursday that The Wall Street Journal will continue to charge a fee for full access to its Web site, and indicated that those charges actually may go up instead of disappear, MediaPost reports.

Murdoch was quoted in today's Journal as saying that WSJ.com would "greatly expand and improve" the portion of the site that is available to non-paying subscribers, the article said. But he said there will still be a "strong offering" for paying subscribers. "The really special things will still be a subscription service, and, sorry to tell you, probably more expensive," the Journal quoted Murdoch as saying.

So much for the hope that the WSJ would follow The New York Times and offer restricted content for free on the mobile Web.

WSJ.com Free? Murdoch Says Forget About It [MediaPost]