I was thinking about how newspapers
have been losing subscribers through the years. In my life I'd had a newspaper
delivered to my home ever since I was born; my parents always subscribed to
them. When I finally moved out after getting married the first time, we
continued having a newspaper subscription. I was always very faithful about
reading it on a daily basis.
The end began when I was in my late
forties and working at a television station. I had to be to work at 7 in the
morning. This meant leaving home by 6:30 to get to work on time. The newspaper
was supposed to be delivered by 5:30, but it was never getting delivered before
I left home. As a result, I started reading the newspaper at work on my break
on a regular basis. I tried to get the newspaper delivered on time, but the
carrier did not follow through. Therefore I got into the habit of reading at
work and not at home. So I didn't need a newspaper at home anymore and I
cancelled the subscription.
In the last 5 years, since I don't
work at a TV station anymore, my habit of reading a daily newspaper has gone
away, especially with so much news available on the internet now. I use
reuters.com for national and international news and I often listen to the radio
on my way to work in the morning for local news. It's a sad state for
newspapers today but I think in some ways they are doing it to themselves. If
my newspaper was getting delivered on time before I had to leave for work, I
might have stayed with a subscription all of these years.
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