I quit the Star-Ledger, and I liked it.

self | 10/31/09 | NewJerseyJoe

[NewJerseyJoe]

A few months ago, needing to cut my monthly budget way down, I examined every place where I could cut. One of the things I noticed was how much money I was spending on a liberal newspaper that was continuing to jack its price while constantly shrinking in size and increasing in content from other news agencies (i.e., less NJ news, which is the reason I bought it in the first place).

So I quit the Star-Ledger cold turkey.

Other than the comics and the weekly food sections, I discovered that I don't miss it. On Sundays, an acquaintance is able to give me her "used" paper and I'm able to get the Sunday coupons -- about the only thing of value left in this paper. (Plus, you can print coupons from the Internet now.)

Breaking up (with the Star-Ledger) was really easy to do. I get almost 100% of my news online. I watch local news only for the traffic & weather, and the occasional local-interest story. The weekly free newspaper in my town has more local news stories than the daily paid paper. I get more news from listening to Rush Limbaugh each day than I ever did from the Star-Ledger. And if I'm so motivated, I can get most of the Star-Ledger articles on the nj.com website anyway.

Any similar stories?

[Focault's Pendulum]

I got the Asbury Park Press down my way. Just as bad as the Star Ledger.

[SunnyUsa]

Congrats! I look at it online if I want to find something out....

One less thing in your pile of recycling!!!

My husband has cut down his NY Times "addiction" to weekends only......

Please add me to your NJ PING LIST

[surrey]

We also dropped the Globe and when I told them why they hung up on me. We couldn’t take the spike in blood pressure every morning when we read the editorial page. Not a day went by when there wasn’t an article promoting the gay lifestyle. Good riddance to them and we’ve saved quite a bit of $$$.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

I kept getting calls from them and “free” Thursday copies. I sorta felt sorry for the poor telemarketers and was always as civil a possible. I finally told one lady the reason and she sort of sighed and said thank you and hung up. They must have known from the date they got my call why I canceled. I had been fed up with them for years, but the Chuck Turner incident let me overcome my inertia and make the call.

[The_Victor]

I canceled my subscription to the Houston Comical ~15 years ago. Never missed it either. I learned to read my news online, and found that I find out what's going on much faster, and I can read several different articles on the same event and get a real perspective.

Welcome to the light.

[Coachm]

Me too!

[Katoolie]

The bottom line on a newspaper being profitable is the number of its subscribers. The more subscribers, the more it can charge for advertising which is where the profit is.

If you drop your subscription, you hit them where it hurts.

Later, if you just gotta have an issue just buy it from a machine when you need to. They dont break even on the sale of the paper itself, but need the subscribers to raise their add rates to make money.

[McGavin999]

Every once in awhile the Arizona Republic leaves a “free” copy in my drive. I call them and tell them their littering on my property is unacceptable.

[McLynnan]

I cancelled my subscription to The Waco Tribune Herald when they endorsed John Kerry. Right in the President’s own conservative back yard. Then they spent years of angst worrying that Bush seemed to be leaning towards SMU as the site for his library, not local Baylor. Go figure. Then they cancelled Ted Nugent’s column. New ownership claims to be conservative. We shall see. I read online a few times a week to keep up with local news and their editorializing.

[Lonesome in Massachussets]

Still, my biggest problem with the Globe, Time, Newsweek, the New York Times, etc. isn't their ideological slant, it's the pervasive insipidness. I like British papers of any ideological stripe and some Canadian papers as well. My problem with American Journalism, aside from its ideological blinders, is its pathetic predictability. The two traits are linked, I suppose. When you twist yourself into corkscrews to avoid the obvious to promote orwellian distortions, (diversity is good, blacks are not prone to violent crime or academic failure, women never lie about rape, Clinton was a great president, or more fabulously Carter was an adequate one...) it becomes an intellectual straightjacket that (to mix a metaphor) smothers creatitivy in the cradle.

[italianquaker]

I did the same with the Miami Herald. I would not pay a for a paper that pays pitts a salary

[US Navy Vet]

I ONLY take the Omaha Weird-Herald for the Sunday Coupons.

[behzinlea]

The older readership (65+ years) is what largely sustains the decaying and dying newsprint industry these days. And why do the oldsters continue to subscribe? Habit and the obituary section, mostly.

Every day this pool of sustaining subscribers recedes and shrinks according to nature's laws.

[truthkeeper]

Good for you. I broke my lifelong L.A. Times habit over 10 years ago. I’d rather read toilet paper.

[dead]

Good job Joe. The Star Ledger is a complete trash newspaper.

So many examples, but one that comes to mind is the fact that they knew for a year that McGreevey appointed his boy toy to the top Homeland Security job. But they opted not to go with the story.

They never even "noticed" that Bob Torricelli was corrupt.

It a hack journalistic front for the political machine in this state. And its written for sixth graders.

[kitkat]

Did the same thing oh, about ten years or so ago. Agree with every point you made. I just couldn’t support the local liberal paper.

[Nam Vet]

I quit the Pacific NW Socialist Oregonian about 10 years ago. My blood pressure dropped dramatically.

Nam Vet

[ThomasThomas]

Female canaries and hamsters hurt the worst.

[FrogMom]

I quit the local paper during election hell month after they decided to “not get involved” and support either W or albore. Chicken bastards.

Their letters to the editor printed conservative’s letters so infrequently, it used to make me furious.

Haven’t missed them a bit.

The paper that lands in my driveway occasionally used to mystify me until I found out that they can count those as part of their “subscribers”. Yes, they count the free papers they deliver, too. Now, I do like McGavin does, call them and tell them to come pick up their trash that’s in my yard.

[LeavingNewYork]

I used to deliver the Bergen Evening Record when I was a kid, before it became The Record. It was a good newspaper, and I only lived a few block away.
A few years later I delivered the Newark Star-Ledger. Both were good papers. They had great sports sections, and great opinion pages. It’s a shame to see such papers become what nothing more than socialistic tripe.