Received an email from ST Interactive this morning. Seems they're not happy letting us read their wonderful news for free, never mind that there's a troublesome registration to undertake first. Now they're going to charge $96 for six months, or $12 a month. That works out to an average of 40 cents a day, or fully half of the street cost of the hardcopy that includes printing and shipping costs, as well as vendor mark-ups. For less content than the print edition. Makes cents, doesn't it?
Anyhoo, here's my reply to them:
"Dear STi,
This is a mistake. I'm not going to subscribe, and neither are a majority of your (needlessly-) registered users. About the only reason I read ST is for the forum, to understand what local people feel and want. I do not care for filtered, 'approved' news, fluff gossip, nor inadequate tech info. Extending a pathetic three-day history to seven is also insulting - if self-financed sites can store a huge archive of past data, what more the sixth-largest publicly-listed company in Singapore, especially when it charges a subscription!
The very fact that I'm using the web means that I have access to far more impartial news, from richly-divergent viewpoints. The best filter is my brain, which I fully intend to use. So much for being net-savvy, ST..."
No comments:
Post a Comment