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| So Long Newsday After 32 Years (517982) | |||
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So Long Newsday After 32 Years |
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Posted by Howard Fein on Mon Nov 2 09:09:00 2009 After purchasing NEWSDAY every day since the March 25, 1977 demise of the LONG ISLAND PRESS, I find I must switch my daily newspaper. Effective today, November 2, the newstand price of NEWSDAY is doubling from $.50 to $1.00. This is something I cannot tolerate, especially for a newspaper that has pretty much jettisoned any coverage of New York City in recent years.Till '95 there was an offshoot, NEW YORK NEWSDAY. It had its own headquarters on Park Avenue South. When it folded, the 'original' NEWSDAY based in Melville continued to run a New York City edition. It had a decent amount of city-based coverage. I could tell the difference when reading a Nassau or Suffolkd edition at someone's house, public library, or found on an LIRR train. But now, virtually all of the local news and ads are centered around Nassau and Suffolk- even in the 'City Edition' found at newstands in the five boroughs. If there's a huge event- usually an accident or sensational murder- that occurs in New York City proper, it will get token coverage. But a similar event taking place in Nassau or Suffolk- or involving a resident (such as the Schuler family)- will dominate for days at the expense of city, or even national and international coverage. It also seems impossible to get a Letter to the Editor published any more unless the writer is from Nassau or Suffolk. During the eighties and nineties before it was possible to vent on the Internet, I actually had a couple printed. Not over the past decade, though. The overriding intent to this doubling of the newstand price is to get more people to subscribe. Sorry, but that tactic backfires with me. As it is, more and more of NEWSDAY's content is only available on-line; there are many blurbs that say along the lines of "For more information/to continue this series/, see www.newsday.com. But not everyone has a computer. And maybe not everyone wants to go to the trouble of turning on the computer to read something that used to be in the newspaper you're already paying for. And now, TWICE as much. Then there's NEWSDAY's 'Early Sunday' edition, which is far easier to find in stores on Saturdays than the actual Saturday edition. It costs the same as the Sunday edition, and has all the feature sections; indeed, everything but the main news section. So why would someone essentially pay $1.25 on Saturday, and have to pay ANOTHER $1.25 the next day for 70% of the same paper that was purchased on Saturday? So effective today I start buying the DAILY NEWS. It won't be easy to make the adjustment. Your daily paper becomes part of you; everyone develops their own routine or style of reading it. The NEWS has a certain trashy aspect that can be offputting; though not as bad as the POST. I'll miss opening NEWSDAY every morning to see what sportswriter Wallace Matthews can possibly find to bitch about the Mets and Yankees; the comic strips; the occasional interesting story about LIRR deficiencies; the periodic coupons for a great rib joint in East Meadow. But not enough to pay a 100% price increase. Sorry! But at least I can still go on their (increasingly difficult to navigate) website. Ending a thirty-two and a half year habit won't be easy. But my hand has been forced. |
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