Old Grey Lady Shoots Self in Foot

The New York Times will charge a fee to access their online material in September, and Andrew Sullivan says this is only going to hurt the Times, lessen the influence of newspaper opinion-makers in general, and increase the influence of the blogosphere (that's us).

By sectioning off their op-ed columnists and best writers, they are cutting them off from the life-blood of today's political debate: the free blogosphere. Inevitably, fewer people will link to them; fewer will read them; their influence will wane faster than it has already. The blog is already becoming a rival to the dated op-ed column format as a means of communicating opinion journalism. My bet is that the NYT's retrogressive move will only fasten the decline of op-ed columnists' influence.