New York Times

Tomorrow is the last day that the most popular sections of the online version of the New York Times will be provided free of charge. For those of you who want to read the newspaper going forward, you will either have to get a paper subscription (which will cost about $125 per year, or subscribe to the online content, which will cost $49.95.

While I will miss not being able to read columnists Tom Friedman, Nicholas Kristof, and David Brooks, I'll get over it. The Times, while establishment, is a "left-wing" American paper. This means, that in America, it caters to the left-wing establishment. It is undoubtedly conservative, say in Europe, but not here.

One example is a news artilce I read this morning. It was very interesting, written by a John Leland. The topic was abortion and the author travelled to an Arkansas abortion clinic. It was largely apologetic that there was such a stigma associated with abortion. In fact, this stigma, which coupled with mountains of regulations, is making abortions more difficult to obtain, the author lamented.

Aw shucks. It seems mountains of regulations are OK for every industry except abortions, eh? I am quite familiar with this regulation regime. However, the industry in which I work is regulated far more than the abortion industry. In fact, if you listen to other NY Times authors, my industry is not regulated enough. While I choose not to disclose my industry (doing so may violate my company's Blog policy), I can assure you that decisions I make do not affect life or death.

Having said all of this, the Washington Post is a far superior (and balanced) paper, with a far superior on-line precense. Congrats to that paper's editors, because their sponsors should stand to benefit immensely from the Times err in judgement.