Or, at least, TimesSelect may be going goodbye. My strong suspicion is that the dawn of the internet is going to make being an important opinion writer less financially lucrative, relative to other professions, than it once was.
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Information Wants to be Free?
07 Aug 2007 01:57 pm
Comments (19)
Are you suggesting that people of middling intelligence should not be paid extravagant salaries to type roughly the same 500 words each week and pose smirkingly for a new head shot every 3 years?! BOLSHEVISM!!!
Like having him die in a plane crash.
TimesSelect was already free to anyone with a .edu address, so that covered a good chunk of the liberal elites inclined to read it anyway.
The way opinion-writing gets you real money is when your celebrity entitles you to marry billionairesses.
or, at least, that's how it worked for Tom Friedman...
Conservatives shop at Walmart! Liberals drink fancy coffee!
So now we can have a free press.
I'm surprised they don't charge for the whole thing. Bravo to Consumer Reports and the WSJ: you shouldn't give your stuff away for free.
I took a cab ride in Bangalore recently. The driver told me how he didn't think Friedman could pour piss out of a boot with instructions written on the heel. Perhaps that's why they can't sell it.
I signed up for a weekend-only home subscription to the NYT in Boston in order to get access to Times Select. Guess I can cancel that now.
I let my weekend Boston Globe subscription lapse beforehand, however, so no net profit for the NYT Co.
I would pay for more Krugman and Rich and less Brooks, Friedman, and Dowd. The problem isn't that they want to sell, it's what they want to sell.
So. Are we headed back to middle ages, when art, literature and politics were pastimes of the aristocracy? Or are the Times opinion columnists just not all that great?
Happy days for Mickey.
I wouldn't pay 1 kopek to read the drivel of those morons Tom Friedman and Maureen Dowd.
Aw shit. This means far too much bandwidth is going to be consumed with, Here's what that nitwit Friedman/Rich/Brooks typed today. That airhead Dowd is gonna be back! Ish!!!!!
Anyway, I thought the op-ed schtick was just a way-station on the gravy train. I thought the real money rolled in with the TV gasfests, the book deals, and the speaking tours.
One of these days both our op-eds and software will be supplied by Chinese prison labor.
DNS's comment (#3 here) was awe-inspiringly bizarre to me, until it found it in its intended context on the Bourne thread.
I took a cab ride in Bangalore recently. The driver told me how he didn't think Friedman could pour piss out of a boot with instructions written on the heel. Perhaps that's why they can't sell it.
Yes, Friedman's mind is flat..
Despite everything, Tom Friedman has an extraordinary international following, especially among educated people with access to the internet.
But I guess his numerous followers aren't actually devoted enough to put their money where their mouth is...
Comments closed August 21, 2007.
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Heads in the Sand
My strong suspicion is that the dawn of the internet is going to make being an important opinion writer less financially lucrative, relative to other professions, than it once was.
Unfortunately for you . . .
Posted by rea | August 7, 2007 2:14 PM