Do you pay for your News?

[radhak]

I have - off-and-on - subscribed to local newspapers in the past, but got fed up of the huge adverts (junk) that came along and foreswore off them. In general I have found the internet to be my sole source of news, as I don't get to the TV much, and when I did I'd have to wait around their ads.

But I have realized that most of the 'free' news is, well, not very satisfying. I always ended up with one some of the major newspaper sites, like NYT, LA times or Washington Post or something. And now NYT only allows 20 free articles a month - they have a pay-structure in place. I know, I could always work around their restrictions technologically, but that felt bad.

The other day I was ruing loudly about printed newspapers struggling nowadays, and my ever precocious daughter demands to know which newspaper do I support with subscription ! So the upshot is I ended up subscribing to home-delivery of the NYT; first time since moving to FL. Seems counter-intuitive to get a newspaper from all that distance away, but maybe I get some karma for helping the industry. And they give me free access to all their content - website, and smart-gadgets. It was toss-up with the WSJ, but LOML might find that really dry.

Looking forward to sitting down and reading some good-ole newspaper; and swat some flies too ! After all, a website or iPad can't be used like that!

[dbhost]

While it has been off again mostly with occasionally on again subscription to the Houston Chronicle, I really do NOT like it as a paper. We used to have 2 papers in Houston, the Chronicle, and the Post. I loved the post, and when Chron bought them out and shut them down, I have had a bad taste for the Chronicle ever since...

As a rule, the old institutional media, print, and TV tend to have fairly extreme political leanings, either left, or right, so I tend to try to get my news from the internet, and am constantly searching for bias free news sources. So far I have been unable to find any such beast. It is quite annoying. I am actually capable of making up my own mind without some dimwit reporter or editor trying to tell me what I should think about a subject.

To paraphrase Joe Friday... "Just the facts ma'am..."

For what it's worth, the last use I had for the Chronicle was house breaking a puppy...

[toolguy1000]

WSJ...but it's not the paper it was 20 years ago.

[bthorne]

My wife and I had just decided to subscribe to the NYT after they went behind the paywall when I received an email from them offering me a few months of free online subscription sponsored by a car company. Once that runs out, we will be subscribing. Hopefully by then they will have a bundle that will allow you online access with a kindle subscription.

[billwmeyer]

Here the local papers post it on the net, and do not charge for it. I would subscribe if they gave local news other than just a couple of items per day. I probably spend less than 5 minutes a day on line reading what they offer.

Bill

[Shep]

Get the Columbus Dispatch mainly for the coupons. They keep trying to raise the subscription price, we keep calling to cancel if they do. They end up keeping the price the same.

[johnk]

Never

[LCHIEN]

I used to subscribe to the Houston Chronicle and the Post before it was bought. It was delivered in the morning and I wouldn't read it until the evening and by then I'd have absorbed bits and pieces from the net so it would all be old news by then.

I use mostly news.google.com as my news aggregator, they have multiple links to other places for each topic.

I like NYT articles a lot, they seem to go to depth a bit more. I always have questions that are unanswered after reading articles, esp. ones about technology so I always have to read several sources. WSJ is also good and is LATimes. But WSJ articles are increasingly blocked as are NYT for fees.... I think they let you have a few per month for free if linked from other sites.

As yet I'm hesitant to pay for news because i get it from so many sources (mostly links from news.google.com.) I couldn't afford all of them but one would not be enough.

[cabinetman]

We subscribe to the local newspaper. After 12 years it's ending up closer to our front door. We pretty much read the whole thing especially on Sundays (LOML has to have the ads).

But, our news is mainly internet, which costs also.

.

[cabinetman]

I was thinking about "newspapers". Everything that's supposed to be "news" has already happened. That's more like a recent history report. I would like a newspaper that tells me what's going to happen tomorrow.

.

[jackellis]

We can't get home delivery of anything up here, but my wife takes the San Jose Mercury when she's in Palo Alto.

I read articles from the NYT and will subscribe when they start asking me to pay. I also read news aggregated on Yahoo throughout the day.

I enjoy reading a real paper, but it's fine reading on a screen, too. when I was living in England, I'd usually get a paper on the weekends and I'd read cast-offs on trains.

[cork58]

It's the Anchorage Daily News at our house, World News on TV in the evening. I like the feeling of newsprint in my hands and its great for Patty's birds, and my fishing worms like to use it for compost making AND its on my front porch before I crawl out of bed!

[RDavidP]

I liked the newspaper when I had a pet bird. I would line the bottom of his cage with it and always made sure the picture of some politician was the top most sheet, and positioned right underneath the favorite perch.

[jdon]

Old school: Seattle Times (sad day when the Post-Intelligencer went under).

1. Harbor Freight coupons included regularly.

2. spilled coffee not as catastrophic as on a laptop.

3. supports community, to some extent.

[Kristofor]

The articles from the Strib are online and I can generally read them for free the night before they'd arrive anyhow. I haven't done an actual count, but it seems that in many/most papers these days over half the content if from wire services anyhow offering no real value. So, nope, no payment for a newspaper.

I do pay for satellite TV which of course includes a handful of mediocre news channels.

I also (gladly) donate to MPR/NPR and I think they are hands down the best news & non-fictional content organization in the country. There are lots of long-form well produced news and investigation pieces, and even their political content is generally much more informed and nuanced than the talking (yelling) heads on CNN/MSNBC/FOX.

While I agree with their own (now ex) fund-raising guy that they would be better off if they weren't on the dole from the government, the quality of the content is high enough that I still feel willing to pony up.