Sunday, October 16, 2005
Krugman
I want to first thank Hatem for commenting on my previous post on what he sees as my poor choices for favorite columnists that I had listed on my index (Paul Krugman and Molly Ivins). He reminded me that I have been meaning to remove Krugman from my list of favorite columnists.
I removed Krugman, but then it was just Ivins all alone, and I thought about adding some others like Joe Conason, Nat Hentoff or Anna Quindlen, but none of them had permanent pages that I know of, so I just decided to delete my "favorite columnist" index all together.
But don't get too excited Hatem, I didn't delete Krugman for any political reason...
I am unjustifiably very angry at the New York Times right now. Their new "Times Select" service now obliges me to pay an annual fee in order to read all my favorite daily columnists, from Friedman and Dowd to yes, Krugman.
So what if they are asking for a piddly $49.95 a year? Do I pay five times that to maintain my daily coffee habit? Of course. So why balk at $0.14 a day to read quality prose from my favorite columnists? I don't really know. But it just irks me. I just can't bring myself to pay for something I've enjoyed free for years. And I feel like if I sell out, then I am sending them a message that their little "foot in the door" scheme worked. I can't possibly be a contributor to the slippery slope that is the decline of the free dissemination of ideas and information. Or can I? Meanwhile, I'm just sulking here and missing hours of therapeutic reading. Firewalled from enthralling titles like "Miserable by design" and "A Pig in a Jacket."
I wonder what Krugman thinks? Does he empathize with my dilemma? I sure wish he'd write an editorial. He could use his economics background to make sense of all this. But then again, I wouldn't be able to read it anyhow.... Let's face it, I'll probably start subscribing to "Times Select" next month... But either way, Mr. Krugman won't be going back on my index bar, at least for the time being.
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I removed Krugman, but then it was just Ivins all alone, and I thought about adding some others like Joe Conason, Nat Hentoff or Anna Quindlen, but none of them had permanent pages that I know of, so I just decided to delete my "favorite columnist" index all together.
But don't get too excited Hatem, I didn't delete Krugman for any political reason...
I am unjustifiably very angry at the New York Times right now. Their new "Times Select" service now obliges me to pay an annual fee in order to read all my favorite daily columnists, from Friedman and Dowd to yes, Krugman.
So what if they are asking for a piddly $49.95 a year? Do I pay five times that to maintain my daily coffee habit? Of course. So why balk at $0.14 a day to read quality prose from my favorite columnists? I don't really know. But it just irks me. I just can't bring myself to pay for something I've enjoyed free for years. And I feel like if I sell out, then I am sending them a message that their little "foot in the door" scheme worked. I can't possibly be a contributor to the slippery slope that is the decline of the free dissemination of ideas and information. Or can I? Meanwhile, I'm just sulking here and missing hours of therapeutic reading. Firewalled from enthralling titles like "Miserable by design" and "A Pig in a Jacket."
I wonder what Krugman thinks? Does he empathize with my dilemma? I sure wish he'd write an editorial. He could use his economics background to make sense of all this. But then again, I wouldn't be able to read it anyhow.... Let's face it, I'll probably start subscribing to "Times Select" next month... But either way, Mr. Krugman won't be going back on my index bar, at least for the time being.
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