The New York Times can kiss my lardy caboose. You think I or anyone else is going to pay $49.95 a year to get access to your Times Select to read your brainless columnists who say the same crap every day?
David Brooks: "College professors are evil and the urban jungle is the liberals' fault."
Maureen Dowd: "George Bush is stupid and evil, and this column willl be another clever way of telling you that."
Paul Krugman: "The latest economic figures prove that Bush has his head up his caboose, and I'm an economist so it means more when I say it."
Nice knowing you, losers. I have a feeling you'll still infiltrate my life through syndication, but you certainly won't get my money. I can get all the same crap from random bloggers or pull it out of my own stinky buns. I'm sure as fook not paying any $$$ for it.
TimesSelect? I'll select somewhere else to read what I already know, thanks so much.
More where this came from at Blunderford.
Ed/Pub:NB
Article comments
1 - Bob A. Booey
Oh no. What will lazy, stupid bloggers everywhere do now other than link to the biggest name columnists on the NYT page? Will they have to find new people to agree with? Will they have to come up with their OWN opinions?
That is all.
2 - Eric Berlin
If the columnists of the Times are as worthless as you purport, why the apparent anger at the move to charge for their words?
I actually enjoy the Times' columns -- liberal and conservative voices alike -- as I appreciate intelligent, well founded opinions, so I'm genuinely sad to see the move to fee-based content.
3 - Blunderford
There's an easy answer to that question. I'm angry about everything. I'm angry at your response to my post, as a matter of fact.
4 - idf
Those bastards dont make enough on advertising? Now times select?
So only rich people can read editorials? Many people like to gain knowledge but, more and more because of greedy publications like The NYT, not everyone can afford to. Thanks for helping to keep a stupid American public even more stupid.
Touche capatialism and up yours Krugman, Dowd, Herbert and the rest of you pompous ass elitist 'editorialists'.
5 - DrPat
Actually, Rush pointed out the truth of this matter yesterday: the editorials will be available elsewhere on the net, if in bits and pieces, and interpreted through blogger's eyes.
Some will pay the fee; some will be comped -- and the opinions will still get out.
For further insight on this topic, may I refer you all (yes, even you, Blunderford!) to look at Chris Muir's Day by Day cartoon from yesterday?
Dead tree media, indeed...
6 - Scott Butki
So you won't donate to Katrina, you won't pay for the Times... I'm starting to wonder where you spend your money.
7 - Scott Butki
I'm beginning to think you're just a troll looking to irk and annoy.
Is there anything you're for... or are you just against things?
I'd be interested in an answer to Eric's question - a real answer not a glib one.
8 - Scott Butki
Hmm, no response?
Did you read my piece on TimesSelect?
9 - Scott Butki
That piece is
here
10 - rmck1
My recent blast to NYT public editor Byron Calame for his grotesquely butt-kissing portrait of the NYT readership in this Sunday's edition:
.
TO THE PUBLIC EDITOR:
.
Byron Calame's flattering (nay, sycophantic) portrait of the New
York Times audience coyly defers a discussion of its online readership
for another day. Nor does it address the views of the Op-Ed staff.
.
This is not surprising. The controversy (nay, outrage) over
the introduction of Times Select still roils, and is taking
its steady toll on the goodwill of your long-term readership.
.
If I were Byron Calame, I'd be looking for ways to avoid getting
anywhere near those subjects in a published article, myself ...
.
Nor was the portrait itself particularly suprising to New York
Times readers, who have always known themselves to be above the
mean in terms of income, education and attainment. We aren't so
insecure, though, as to need explict confirmation of this. Some of
us might even feel a little embarrassed about being told directly.
.
Nor was the need the New York Times evidently felt
to "alert" us to this comforting picture surprising,
either. What else does one do in the teeth of deep
chagrin from a significant chunk of one's target audience?
.
To the folks like myself who heard the alarm bells go off with
Times Select, the orientation you present to your readers is sadly
less suprising, still. It is the same calculated orientation
your upscale advertisers attempt to convey to their niche markets.
.
Sometimes flattery, though, will get you less than nowhere.
.
Many -- if not indeed most -- of the famously meritocratic elite
who read The New York Times also reject political elitism (and
the faux populism of its rhetorical garb). We reject the "gated
community" approach to life -- even as some of us may live in one.
This is why we devour the International section, why our hearts rend
over the devastation of Katrina, why we followed your series on class
in America with avidity. This is why so many of us vote Democratic.
.
And this is why addressing us as a set of upscale consumers --
as if what the New York Times offers us equates to a luxury
sedan, a Swiss chronometer, an estate in the Hamptons --
is, in truth, demoralizing and not flattering at all.
.
We'd much rather you see us as part of a broad national dialogue
than as just another coveted but shrinking niche market.
.
Sinccerely,
.
Bob McKeown (rmck1)