Mary Lou Fulton describes her frustration with the LA Times inability to take money for an e-only subscription. This is so true. I had a similar frustration trying to get a subscription of the IndyStar for my kid who lived in Indiana. Their autopayment settings did not let someone who lived outside of Indiana pay for subscription…Make it easy to take in money, not hard…
When I asked the very polite subscriber services representative if I could simply give the newspaper money, she first asked me if I wanted to switch to a Sunday-only subscription, and then told me about an e-edition that allowed me to read a digital version of the newspaper layout online (but only if I also subscribed to the print edition). In response to my explaining, again, that I just wanted to donate money to help offset the costs of journalism, she put me on hold for a few minutes and then returned to say that I could give money to Newspapers in Education, which provides newspapers to schools as a teaching tool. But I wanted to do none of those things, and so the call ended with the cancellation of my subscription and her suggestion that I contact the LA Times reader’s representative to see if there was anything that could be done with my idea.
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- Breaking News – Newspaper MicroFilm Goes Digital! (librarianbrain.wordpress.com)
- iPad to kill more newspaper print subscriptions in 2011 (newstatesman.com)
Barbara K Iverson 