I’m running into paywalls on the internet more and more these days. I’m not trying too, it’s just hard to avoid them. I’m not asking for access mind you, these sites are offering access through Google and other aggregators, at least they offer until you click the link to get there, then they pull it away with a blocking notice and say you have to pay to play. Because I’m an American raised with a punishing god, I then feel guilty in an aggressively outgoing sort of way – the fuck you, how dare you kind of way. I finger walk away in anger to another site that has the same information without the hassles – mostly feeling that I just wasted my time whilst nursing a minor grudge against whatever man seems appropriate. I’m not big on grudges, but sometimes I seem to hold onto them longer than I should.

When possible, I block these sites, (The new Google News app allows you to banish some of the sites – but not all, and you kind of have to work at it). It’s annoying, though I do understand the problem. They seem, however, not to understand my problem.

I don’t want to pay for news – that should be a loss leader covered by advertisement. I will pay for creative content – editorials, opinions, long investigative pieces and so forth. But, again, I can’t pay for every little thing – it adds up, and the addition return doesn’t equal the investment in money.

I once asked a love one what she would do without me and she said, “I’d find someone else.”

Let that answer serve as a lesson to you as it was to me.

I can’t afford to pay for multiple sites – I’m retired and on a fixed income. I live in San Jose, California, so enough said. I subscribe to the local paper (Mercury News) and the New York Times web addition. I also subscribe to a number of print journals that allow for online access.

I pay for information but can’t pay for every form of information.

Clearly the advertising model is dead for news providers – though it does seem to work for the aggregators like Facebook and Google. I’m not sure what the future holds moneywise but do know that I have limits and hold grudges, so the bastards better get this right pretty soon.