Saturday, September 17, 2005

Dowd and Out Today's Maureen Dowd column in the New York Times will be the last one that can be accessed on-line for free.  Starting Monday, the Times inaugurates a new feature euphemistically called "Times Select," whereby a $49.95 annual subscription will be required to read the op-ed page. I'm a regular reader of Dowd's, Paul Krugman's and Bob Herbert's columns.  Sometimes I'm even foolish enough to read Thomas Friedman, the head cheerleader for globalization.  But I don't intend to pay this fee and I suspect I'll have plenty of company.  It's one thing to charge for something from the outset and quite another to get people to pay for what they've been getting for free for years. The LA Times found this out when they started charging for their Calendar section (It tells you a lot about a city when the only section in their on-line newspaper that you have to pay for deals with entertainment. There's no biz like show biz.).  The Times eventually abandoned its policy and made the section free again.  It's a basic principle of business, especially the world's oldest business, prostitution:  If you give it away, nobody will pay.  You can set that rap lyric to the rhythm track of your choice, then lip-sync it to some Johnny Cochrane footage and have one of the LA Times' music critics review it in their Calendar section. 2:09:17 PM    comment []