If the Globe thinks I am going to pay to read things like that on line.

[Mass]

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2010/10/01/baker_takes_time_out_to_show_a_softer_side/

OK, Charlie Baker is an human being. He was probably a good father. He may even be a good guy when you know him. But why is it worth a fluff article in the Globe? What does it have to do with the fact his policies will cut jobs in our schools and police stations? I guess it tells us that the Globe thinks the voters are stupid.

If I want to read candidates's press releases, I can find them for free on their website.

[TayTay]

1. Ah, that article was fluff, but this one wasn't

http://www.boston.com/news/local/rhode_island/articles/2010/09/29/to_baker_a_tough_call_in_ri_was_right_move/">To Baker, R.I. pullout was right move
By Kay Lazar
Globe Staff / September 29, 2010

In December 1999, an ailing Harvard Pilgrim Health Care pulled out of Rhode Island with two months’ notice, shuttering the company’s three health centers there and forcing 1,200 physicians and other employees to search for new jobs. Thousands of patients suddenly had to find new doctors, and about 128,000 subscribers scrambled for other health insurance.

The Ocean State accounted for about 10 percent of Harvard Pilgrim’s customers but 45 percent of its losses, and to save the company, new chief executive Charles D. Baker essentially cut off its Rhode Island leg.

In the aftermath, pediatrician Fortunato Procopio and a handful of other physicians from the closed Warwick health center hurriedly cobbled together a practice while trying to reassure their anxious patients.

“We had four to five weeks,’’ Procopio said. “We had to incorporate, we had to forge new alliances with insurance companies, we had to buy computer systems, had to arrange for billing systems . . . and patients were walking into a building that looked abandoned.’’

Charlie Baker is arrogant, insensitive, self-righteous and convinced of his own superiority. Other than that, I don't like him. Neither does the Globe. The fluff piece is not really worth much and is insulting to boot.

[beachmom]

2. I just Googled and see what you mean:

http://www.boston.com/news/local/massachusetts/articles/2010/10/01/a_free_press_no_more/

I hate to break it to the Globe, but I don't see this working beyond being a niche. The truth is people don't pay for content online beyond financial papers and sports; if they do pay for the news, they pay for the experience of that content. Like a really nice iPad subscription. But a website is just not that great an experience.

I actually got a Kindle and now subscribe to the Atlanta Journal Constitution, and enjoy it very much. Not that I don't use ajc.com once in a while, but I like the e-Reader easy on the eyes experience; plus the newspaper has a beginning, middle and end. When you're done, you're done. With a website it is so fluid there is no feeling that you finished reading it for the day.

The AJC does a lot of articles that cater to the Right, but that is not my standard of whether or not I would pay. Instead, I like a paper that gives me a sense of the city where I am living, and does a fair amount of investigative reporting. The AJC does both, so I am sticking with it . . . on the Kindle. But I wouldn't pay for the website.

And I have one last gripe which I hope can be solved in the future: how about a subscription for ALL platforms? Here are the platforms:

1. Paper
2. On line
3. ALL mobile devices, tablets, and eReaders

How wonderful it would be if you had a choice of subscription, where you can pick 1 or all 3. Right now you can't, and that is not really the newspapers' fault. It is Apple, Amazon, etc. In the future that needs to be fixed so we can get multiplatform subscriptions. Again, I just think there is more value in 1 & 3, than in 2.