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I’ve ranted in the past about the New York Times pay-for-some policy on online articles, which they intelligently reversed a couple weeks ago. I haven’t had time to explore their now-free texts beyond my usual daily skimming of the online site, but today I read, beginning to end, a really interesting summary of Verizon’s decision/reversal on Naral’s Pro-Choice America messages. I learned that most US companies – and the number is growing – who use text messaging to send political messages tend to have liberal agendas. I was reminded of a recent report that in 2006 young voters who received messages encouraging them to vote were more likely to do so. And I learned a curious thing. In the 19th century Western Union "engaged in discrimination" (didn’t the whole world, back then?) in the telegrams business and one result was the common carrier law that says all telegram and telephone operators must accept all communications from all parties.

The law doesn’t apply to the Internet, but when new technologies blur previously clear business lines, gray areas appear. You end up with odd situations, such as the one where Verizon decided, temporarily, that it couldn’t carry pro-abortion messages. They decided otherwise.

So Naral is free to send and I’m free to read about it, for free, on the NY Times site. I like that.

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