All of which strikes blogger Rob Burgess as utter lunacy. In an item on the topic, Burgess, a former writer for a MediaNews paper, rips the approach as too little way too late in an open letter to Singleton. His prediction: a future without newspapers. Read his take below:
Dear Mr. Singleton,You and the people that own these newspapers are completely at fault for the current state of the industry. Even though I am no longer under your employ I derive no satisfaction from this statement. I am the fourth generation of my family to work in newspapers.
You ruined everything in the beginning by starting with giving everything away for free. It has now been almost 15 years since the Internet broke wide and you're just NOW getting around to asking people to pay for your content? I don't blame people for not wanting to pay for it anymore, why should they? Who would pay for something they can get for free? That's foolishness.
If this is the best idea you people have come up with, we're looking at newspaperless future even faster than I thought.
Sincerely your former employee,
Rob Burgess