If a tree falls in a forest, and no one hears it, does it makes a sound?
Make that a dead tree, infested with pundits. The New York Times is planning to hide its op-ed columns away from everyone except print subscribers and those who pay $50/year for online access. Salon's article on this decision quotes Andrew Sullivan...
"The blog is already becoming a rival to the dated op-ed column format as a means of communicating opinion journalism. My bet is that the NYT's retrogressive move will only fasten the decline of op-ed columnists' influence."
...and Markos, of course:
"I think this is the best way they can become irrelevant," said Moulitsas. "If my readers can't read it, why would I link to it?"
It's pretty simple: what blogs do best is not primary reporting (although there are some
fantastic blogger-
journalists out there), but analysis and opinion. The Times is not restricting access to its news stories -- so bloggers will still have them as raw material. Instead they're killing their audience for the very thing that blogs can do
better than they can.
I swore off paying for the NYT after their appalling failures during the run-up to the invasion of Iraq. (I also documented their flawed coverage of anti-war protests, and actually got a quasi-apology from Daniel Okrent's deputy.)
Now they want us to pay them to tell us how to think? I'll miss Paul Krugman and Frank Rich. But Brooks, Dowd, Tierney, Kristof? Good riddance.