The truth versus paywalls

It feels like most information today is free, and it largely is. Movies and music are locked up in services like Netflix and Spotify, but most news and information is free, right?

It largely is, but the growing list of news outlets that are putting up paywalls is becoming troublesome. I don’t object to them doing that, as they deserve to get paid for what they do, but those paywalls are increasing causing division online.

Current Affairs listed this out, and you can easily see the split:

Paywalls:

• The New York Times
• The New Yorker
• The Washington Post
• The New Republic
• New York
• Harper’s
• The New York Review of Books
• The Financial Times
• The London Times

No Paywalls:

• Breitbart
• Fox News
• The Daily Wire
• The Federalist
• The Washington Examiner
• InfoWars

It’s easy to see why content from the second list spreads far faster and wider than content from the top list. I personally pay for some of the sources in the top list, and read…