The Truth Is Paywalled But the Lies Are Free
3rd August 2020
Of course, this being Current Affairs, the ‘lies’ are mostly what the Right believes while the ‘truth’ is mostly what the Left believes:
Eric Levitz of New York is one of the best and most prolific left political commentators we have. But unless you’re a subscriber of New York, you won’t get to hear much of what he has to say each month.
But still, his point is well taken. What you get for free on the Internet is mostly click-bait, because that gets page views, and that gets advertising, and advertising is how you pay for stuff that isn’t behind a paywall.
Personally, I have yet to find a behind-the-paywall site that has stuff I’m willing to pay for (yes, that includes the Wall Street Journal). Anything that gets published that is even moderately significant will eventually wind up somewhere I can read it for free, typically accompanied by fairly useful commentary. I’m not saying that’s a good thing, but it’s a thing, and I take the world as I find it.