John Mahoney

His previous columns are archived HERE.

JOHN MAHONEY

No such thing as a free lunch

What will it take to convince you that there really is no such thing as a free lunch?

Just because you were born free doesn't mean you will get a free ride the rest of your born days.

And spare me that tired old song about how information wants to be free.

The inspiration for this rant comes from a member of Canada's Parliament, one whom one would expect to have at least street smarts, if not genuine intelligence.

Diane St-Jacques represents Quebec's Shefford Riding in Parliament. She, as you may know, is the former Progressive Conservative who jumped to the ruling Liberals not long after illegally voting in the right wing Alliance Party convention.

Not a certified wingnut, but questions have been raised, glances cast...

The Honourable Ms. St-Jacques is one of those who apparently believes information ought to be free, at least for those elected to high places to represent the little people.

Acting on her beliefs, Ms. St. Jay had a lackey cancel her community newspaper subscription because, as her lackey put it, her boss could get what she wanted on the Interenet.

For free.

Never mind that her community newspaper - the Sherbrooke Record, a small, struggling English-language daily - needs every subscription it can get to survive.

Never mind that somebody has to pay the freight for designing, maintaining, and nurturing the Record website.

Information wants to be free, right?

Please keep this in mind, all you folks who profess to love your community newspaper and their free websites.

Everytime you cancel a subscription because you think you're saving a couple of bucks, you're really hurting the ones you say you love.

If enough of you cancel your subs, there won't be any free hometown news websites for you to enjoy.

And there might not even be a print edition.

Then, how much will you have saved?

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