There's been a lot of buzz about the impending death of the pay wall known as TimesSelect. I have resisted the temptation to report the rumors, although I have been reading them avidly for months. (Thanks, Google Alert!)
Money quote (was there ever a better chance to use this phrase?) from the first:
Those who have paid in advance for access to TimesSelect will be reimbursed on a prorated basis.
The NYT may be into me for a double sawbuck, but I'll file that one under "Don't hold your breath."
Nonetheless, I'm glad that the NYT has opened up access to some of their best. Now I can link to Paul Krugman and Frank Rich, and Selena Roberts and William C. Rhoden, and Clyde Haberman and Dick Cavett, and Gretchen Morgenson and Joe Nocera, with impunity, and retire the tiresome [T$] link. Maybe the sunlight will help Mo D will get her mojo back, and (okay, now I'm really dreaming) expose the need to put out to pasture The Moustache of Understanding.
I still think, as followers of the [T$] link will have noted, that what the NYT tried was a worthwhile experiment. TANSTAAFL, as the old master said. It may be that ad links will carry the day in supporting good reporting and commentary. I sure hope so. As amazing as Wikipedia and the blogosphere are, there's no lack of need for dedicated -- and supported -- reporting. As another old master said, "When the going gets weird, the weird turn pro." We need the pros.
I have not added the AdBlock extension to my Firefox browser, although I do employ Flashblock. I can tolerate some ads on a page I'm reading, and I think most others can, too. The problem is a matter of degree: intrusiveness and distraction.
I've just finished reading a collection of essays by E. B. White, The Points of My Compass. This is the best dollar I've ever spent (thanks, used book sales!). The essays were all composed in the late 1950s. One of them was about television ads, and it is amazingly resonant with today's Web.
It'll be interesting to see how it all shakes out.
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