New Year, New Dish, New Media

[Re-posted from earlier today]

When I first stumbled into blogging over 12 years ago, it was for two reasons: curiosity and freedom. I was curious about the potential for writing in this new medium; and for the first time, I felt total freedom as a writer. On my little blog, I was beholden to no one but my readers. I had no editor to please, no advertiser to woo, no publisher to work for, no colleagues to manage. Perhaps it was working for so long in old media that made me appreciate this breakthrough so much. But it still exhilarates every day.

For the first time in human history, a writer - or group of writers and editors - can instantly reach readers - even hundreds of thousands of readers across the planet - with no intermediary at all.

And they can reach back. Few discovered this as quickly as I did - and as the Dish evolved over the first six years, I was forced to admit when I was wrong (see: George W. Bush, 9/11, the Iraq War, etc), and it was not pretty at times. Looking back, I realize that in many ways, you, the readers, made that unavoidable. I had to face you every day. And you were merciless.

And that, I realized, was a good thing. The more this sank in, the more what started as a monologue became a dialogue. The dialogue eventually ceded to a sprawling conversation in which I now play the role of host/provocateur, while my Dish colleagues (and readers) scour every nook of the web to add insight, news or amusement to the whole mix. We have an official staff of 7, and an unofficial one of around a million unpaid obsessives.

But as the pretense of old media authority ceded to the crowd-sourcing of argument, fact and thought, one thing remained elusive: how to make this work financially.

I did it on my own for nothing but two pledge drives for six years. Then I tried partnering with bigger media institutions for the following six - Time, the Atlantic, and the Daily Beast. The Beast in particular gave us the resources and support to take the Dish to a new level of richness, breadth and depth: adding one more staffer and two paid interns, helping us with video, giving us a supportive space to breathe and grow, as we have. We are intensely grateful to them, especially Tina Brown and Barry Diller, who became great partners in this evolving enterprise. The Dish now is beyond what I allowed myself to imagine twelve years ago.

And so, as we contemplated the end of our contract with the Beast at the end of 2012, we faced a decision. As usual, we sought your input and the blogosphere's - hence the not-terribly subtle thread that explored whether online readers will ever pay for content, and how. The answer is: no one really knows. But as we debated and discussed that unknowable future, we felt more and more that getting readers to pay a small amount for content was the only truly solid future for online journalism. And since the Dish has, from its beginnings, attempted to pioneer exactly such a solid future for web journalism, we also felt we almost had a duty to try and see if we could help break some new ground.

The only completely clear and transparent way to do this, we concluded, was to become totally independent of other media entities and rely entirely on you for our salaries, health insurance, and legal, technological and accounting expenses.

The "we" in particular was executive editors Patrick Appel, Chris Bodenner and me. Every member of the Dish team contributed to the debate (Zoe and Matt very much so), but Patrick, Chris and I were the core. We'd bonded most powerfully during our coverage of the Iranian Green Revolution, but over the years before and since, we'd evolved into something like a triad brain, blogging alone (apart from weekly lunches and South Park nights) but somehow intuiting each other's rhythms and interests, passions and conflicts - while constantly feeding off yours in the in-tray and beyond. We grew to trust the model that emerged from the intimations of the daily blogging, and treasure the formula you slowly helped concoct and we collectively call the Dish.

And so last week, the three of us signed an agreement setting up an independent company called Dish Publishing LLC, and agreed to strike out on our own with no safety net below us but you.

And that's the primary reason we're hopeful this can work. Because the Dish readership is the core strength of this site anyway, and you have shown us over the years how deeply you care about an open, honest, provocative debate on all kinds of subjects. The computers say the average Dish reader spends up to 17 minutes a day on the site - a massive investment of time and energy. All your extraordinary emails are anonymous - a sign of a community eager to debate the real issues rather than take credit for their own insights. And this relationship between all of us now goes back a long way - to a time when everyone I met kept asking me what a blog was, through the horrors of 9/11 and the Iraq War, past the Obama miracle and the odd lies of a former half-term governor whose name now escapes me.

If you've stuck with the Dish through all this, if you've tolerated my idiosyncrasies and occasional meltdowns, and if, in fact, you've helped create our content with the best reader threads anywhere online, we just hope you'll help keep this show on the road in a more sustainable, permanent way.

So, as of February 1, we will revert to our old URL - www.andrewsullivan.com. All previous URLs will automatically redirect, so don't worry about losing us. Until then, the Beast has generously agreed to keep us on so we can organize ourselves in time for the launch. In fact, Tina and Barry have been fully supportive of this decision once we made it, although we're all sad to part ways.

Here's the core principle: we want to create a place where readers - and readers alone - sustain the site. No bigger media companies will be subsidizing us; no venture capital will be sought to cushion our transition (unless my savings count as venture capital); and, most critically, no advertising will be getting in the way.

The decision on advertising was the hardest, because obviously it provides a vital revenue stream for almost all media products. But we know from your emails how distracting and intrusive it can be; and how it often slows down the page painfully. And we're increasingly struck how  advertising is dominated online by huge entities, and how compromising and time-consuming it could be for so few of us to try and lure big corporations to support us. We're also mindful how online ads have created incentives for pageviews over quality content.

We're only human and so we want to set up the incentives so we are geared entirely to improving the total reader experience, not to ratchet up hits, or to please corporate advertisers. We may be fooling ourselves, and it would be imprudent for us to rule out all advertising right now for ever. So we won't. But it would be a great missed opportunity, in my view, not to try. Remember the classic saying:

If you're not paying for the product, you are the product being sold.

We want to treat our readers better than that, because you deserve better than that.

Hence the purest, simplest model for online journalism: you, us, and a meter. Period. No corporate ownership, no advertising demands, no pressure for pageviews ... just a concept designed to make your reading experience as good as possible, and to lead us not into temptation.

So for the next month, we're going to offer you advance membership of the Dish for $19.99 a year, which translates to $1.67 a month, which is around a nickel a day. The meter won't start until February, and the price won't change then, but by pre-subscribing, you give us a crucial financial bridge to get to independence - and you'll never notice a thing when the transition happens.

To be honest, we didn't know where to set the price - we have almost no precedents for where we want to go - but $19.99 seemed the lowest compatible with a serious venture. We wanted to make this as affordable as possible, while maximizing revenues.

Which led us to a second thought: who better knows the value of a site than its readers? More to the point, we know the Dish is worth much more to some of you than others; that twice-daily readers plumb more of it than daily ones; and that multiple-click readers and regular emailers are the source of so much of our content, and might see the Dish as more valuable. So for those of you who would like to support the Dish over and above $19.99, we've left the price box empty. Pay $19.99 or what you think a year of reading the Dish is worth to you. No member will have any more access or benefits than any other member, but if hardcore Dishheads want to give us some love for the years of free blogging and for the adventure ahead, we'd be crazy not to take it.

And we do need it, if we are to continue and grow. We need, in particular, to get paid decently for what is extremely intense work 365 days a year. Some people I bump into ask me how we produce 240 posts a week (13,000 separate posts last year alone) or how we read the 90,000 emails we get a year. I have a simple answer: we work our asses off. And my colleagues and I deserve to be paid for it. (For the best defense of this basic principle, see Louis CK's explanation here.) If the money doesn't come in, we'll have to find another way to make a living.

Equally, the more you give us, the more we will be able to do. It's really as simple as that. The more of you who pre-subscribe the easier our transition will be; the more of you who give more than $19.99 the more ambitious we can get. We have many future projects in our head - commissioning and editing original long-form journalism is a core ambition of ours, along with a possible monthly tablet magazine called "Deep Dish" (which would both require hiring old-school editors) - and the more you give us, the faster we can evolve, mature and develop further. Throughout, we'll be asking you what you want, and as always, airing dissent and opinion as freely as possible.

And that's where the real pay-off begins. If this model works, we'll have proof of principle that a small group of writers and editors can be paid directly by readers, and that an independent site, if tended to diligently, can grow an audience large enough to sustain it indefinitely.

The point of doing this as simply and as purely as possible is precisely to forge a path other smaller blogs and sites can follow. We believe in a bottom-up Internet, which allows a thousand flowers to bloom, rather than a corporate-dominated web where the promise of a free space becomes co-opted by large and powerful institutions and intrusive advertising algorithms. We want to help build a new media environment that is not solely about advertising or profit above everything, but that is dedicated first to content and quality. (And notice I've even finally managed to spell "advertising" right in this post.)

That's why we have partnered with a new company, TinyPass, which shares our vision. You can read their mission statement on their website. Here it is:

Tinypass is a team of refugees from advertising, design, and banking. We came together because we believe that in this new digital world there should be more than one bookstore, more than one music store, and more than one video store.

They are providing a way for any website - from a mom and pop store to a fledgling newspaper - to get revenue from readers in the easiest and simplest way. No massive cut for Amazon when selling your book, no 30 percent to Apple for getting your music or podcast out there - just a simple meter and payment system that can be scaled at any level.

Our particular version will be a meter that will be counted every time you hit a "Read on" button to expand or contract a lengthy post. You'll have a limited number of free read-ons a month, before we hit you up for $19.99. Everything else on the Dish will remain free. No link from another blog to us will ever be counted for the meter - so no blogger or writer need ever worry that a link to us will push their readers into a paywall. It won't. Ever. There is no paywall. Just a freemium-based meter. We've tried to maximize what's freely available, while monetizing those parts of the Dish where true Dishheads reside. The only tough love we're offering is the answer to the View From Your Window Contest. You'll have to become a member to find where the place is. Ha!

So it's over to you. We're in your hands. The meter won't start until February 1, but you can become a member now. It takes two minutes tops. All you need is a credit card and a zip code - and you're done. The more of you who decide to contribute more than $19.99 the deeper and richer and more ambitious a Dish we will be able to provide. We have no marketing, no ads, no corporation behind us now. We only have you.

The link is here. Join us and keep the Dish alive and ad-free here.

And change the media world just a little - for the better.

The Daily Wrap

Today on the Dish, Andrew declared our independence, announcing that on February 1 the Dish would leave The Daily Beast to become a fully independent blog which depends on nothing but our readers for support (via a freemium-based meter). Andrew then answered reader questions about the move here and here. Also we rounded up blog reax, as well as checked in on the Twitter response here and here. We watched in amazement as an avalanche of memberships began, published many reader reactions from the inbox, reposted last year's fascinating reader survey, charted the inequality of the web advertising business, got called mavericky in a tweet, and handed John Nolte a Malkin nomination for calling the Dish's independence part of some left-wing media conspiracy.

You can join us as a founding member here.

In political coverage, we rounded up blogosphere response to the now-passed fiscal cliff deal, Michael Hirsh wondered if Joe Biden was the most influential VP in history, Conor Friedersdorf rejected the notion that the 2nd Amendment was some safeguard against tyranny, Paul Ryan earned the year's first Yglesias nomination for supporting the fiscal cliff deal, and Richard Socarides anticipated marriage equality for Illinois.

In assorted coverage, Maria Popova explained her donation-over-advertising strategy, Boris Muñoz imagined a Venezuela without Hugo Chavez, Ada Calhoun looked at the increasing practice of at-home abortions, Wayne Curtis surveyed America's walking stats, and Terry Teachout advocated for more accurate depictions of small-town life in the arts. Also, Edward McPherson told us the story behind Dallas' essential airport, Alex Knapp questioned the management skills of robots, Kevin Kelly called in about the developing world's prioritizing of cell phones over toilets, and a reader (who is an actuary) set the record straight about car insurance rates based on how much someone drives. Readers also pushed back on the idea that teenagers shouldn't smoke weed, while other readers weighed in on why women seem to smoke less of it than men. Then we went over the news that Avis was buying Zipcar, examined the possible late-career solipsism of Judd Apatow, discovered a new use for washing machines in our MHB, met a Chinese camel herder in our FOTD, and saw Colorado mountains through the VFYW.

- C.D.

The Next Marriage Equality State

Richard Socarides is hopeful that it will be the Land of Lincoln:

Seemingly out of nowhere, Illinois, the fifth largest state, with a population of almost thirteen million people, is likely about to become the tenth state to allow same-sex marriage. It could happen within the next week, during the lame-duck session of the state legislature, which ends on January 8th. If it does, over twenty per cent of the U.S. population will live in states with marriage equality, even before the U.S. Supreme Court rules on marriage rights in California this June. California alone has approximately twelve per cent of the U.S population, and its addition to the group would then bring the total to about a third of the population.

Abby Rapoport is also watching Rhode Island and New Jersey. Chris Geidner adds California, Delaware, Minnesota, and Hawaii to the list.

Faces Of The Day

A camel herder and her grandson along the Ghez River, Xinjiang Province, China. Via Getty Images. 

When Nature Calls

Kevin Kelly contemplates the economic choices of citizens in developing countries:

The farmers in rural China have chosen cell phones and twitter over toilets and running water. To them, this is not a hypothetical choice at all, but a real one. And they have made their decision in massive numbers. Tens of millions, maybe hundreds of millions, if not billions of people in the rest of Asia, Africa and South America have chosen Option B. You can go to almost any African village to see this. And it is not because they are too poor to afford a toilet. As you can see from these farmers’ homes in Yunnan, they definitely could have at least built an outhouse if they found it valuable. (I know they don’t have a toilet because I’ve stayed in many of their homes.) But instead they found the intangible benefits of connection to be greater than the physical comforts of running water.

Millman adds:

If you don’t have plumbing, and have never had plumbing, and nobody around you has ever had plumbing, then you’ve presumably long since worked out an efficient way to relieve yourself. 

Read On »

Chart Of The Day

The above chart is from the Interactive Advertising Bureau's October 2012 report (pdf) on internet advertising revenue. What it shows:

Online advertising continues to remain concentrated with the 10 leading ad-selling companies, which accounted for 73% of total revenues in Q2 2012, up slightly from the 72% reported in Q2 2011. Companies ranked 11th to 25th accounted for 9% of revenues in Q2 2012, consistent with the 9% reported in Q2 2011. Companies ranked 26th to 50th accounted for 8% in Q2 2012, also consistent with the 8% in Q2 2011.

The Car-Sharing Economy

Felix Salmon sees the logic of Avis buying Zipcar:

[F]rom Avis’s point of view, it’s buying the clear leader in what is probably the future of car renting. We’re only at the beginning of a long secular decline in the number of cars owned per household: as America becomes increasingly urban, there’s much less need for households to own a car, or a second car — and it becomes much cheaper to just rent cars by the hour or the day when you need them than it is to own a car outright and just leave it parked and useless for 99% of its life.

Yglesias goes into more detail:

Read On »

Hugo's End?

Rumors are swirling about Hugo Chavez's health. Should he die, Boris Muñoz wonders about Venezuela's future:

The struggle for a successor is in full swing. Maduro and Cabello, Chávez’s two potential heirs, represent two opposing strands of chavismo, his brand of left-wing nationalism. For fourteen years, since he came to power in 1998, Chávez has been the alpha and omega of his “Bolivarian revolution.” He has dealt with Venezuela as if it were a corporation and he himself its absolutist C.E.O., obsessed with micromanagement, relying on a few advisors to hold the country under tight control. That time is nearing an end. Deep fissures are already present. Chavismo is a political movement with marked divisions between its military and civilian wings. Chávez, a former Army paratrooper, has been a leader on both fronts, playing either military or civilian leader when convenient. But the civilian-military division reflects an even deeper one based on two differing conceptualizations of the Bolivarian revolution: a nationalist revolution or a socialist one based on the Cuban model.

(Photo: A mechanic shows a picture of Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez at his workshop in Caracas, on January 2, 2013. Chavez is conscious and fully aware of how 'complex' his condition remains three weeks after difficult cancer surgery in Havana, the Venezuelan president's handpicked successor, Vice President Nicolas Maduro, said Tuesday. Chavez underwent his fourth cancer-related surgery three weeks ago in Havana and has been bed-ridden ever since. By Leo Ramirez/AFP/Getty Images)

Dish Independence: Tweet Reax II

Obama freaking out about Andrew Sullivan going behind a paywall: "Did Sully just throw the entire Dish away?"

— delrayser (@delrayser) January 2, 2013

Heh. But it's not a paywall. To reiterate: No one coming to the Dish home-page will ever be stopped. All links to individual posts will be outside the meter and as free after we launch as they are now. The only meter arrives at the "Read On" posts, whose full text you have to be a member to read. Even non-members will be able to read a certain number of "Read On" posts a month, free and in full. Dish alum Zack reiterates something else for us:

Key point of clarification on @sullydish's new model: RSS subscription is still completely free andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com/2013/01/dish-i…

— Zack Beauchamp (@zackbeauchamp) January 2, 2013

The Dish's new biz model: NYTimes-esque freemium meter, minus ads, plus Radioheadesque pay-what-u-want option andrewsullivan.thedailybeast.com/2013/01/a-decl… …

— Derek Thompson (@DKThomp) January 2, 2013

Hm. Looking deeper into @sullydish's proposal. Interesting.Not sure how much $ he'll get in the long run from the lack of paywall.

— Alan DeHaan (@Aulayan) January 2, 2013

Two must-read political blogs launched in 2000 - @sullydish and @joshtpm. As of today, they're both independent, web-based publications.

— Yoni Appelbaum (@YAppelbaum) January 2, 2013

I'll sign up for @sullydish Premium and so should you, but only after you join @tpmprime

— Benjy Sarlin (@BenjySarlin) January 2, 2013

Subscribe to TPM Prime here. My full pitch for Josh's new venture here.

I just put down $19.99 for subscription to @sullydish. Will demand refund if he changes his mind about the Iraq war again.

— Robert Wright (@robertwrighter) January 2, 2013

Read On »

Why Not Chase Ad Dollars?

Maria Popova explains why she asks for donations instead of running ads on her site, Brain Pickings: 

There's a really beautiful letter that a newspaper journalist named Bruce Bliven wrote in 1923 to his editor. It was about how the circulation manager had taken over the newspaper, deciding what went on the front page. Today, search engine optimisation is the "circulation management" of the internet. It doesn't put the reader's best interests first – it turns them into a sellable eyeball, and sells that to advertisers. As soon as you begin to treat your stakeholder as a bargaining chip, you're not interested in broadening their intellectual horizons or bettering their life. I don't believe in this model of making people into currency. You become accountable to advertisers, rather than your reader.

Dish Readers: Who Are You? Ctd

Dish Readers: Who Are You?

Back in December 2011, we posted the Urtak survey seen above as a quick and easy way to get a better sense of you, the typical Dish reader. We first brainstormed questions we'd like most to know about you, and then we allowed you to brainstorm and add your own questions - and answer them. The reaction to the reader-driven survey was overwhelming - responses nearly eclipsed the 1.5 million mark. If you didn't respond to the questions at the time, or think you may have missed some added by readers, go ahead and click through the quick and easy Yes/No questions above. Analyze the results of the survey here. Some cross-tabs from the Urtak blog:

[Andrew Sullivan's] readers under the age of 35 are less likely to have cried in response to a Dish post. Cold-hearted youth!

His married readers would be less interested in attending an annual conference of Dish readers.

His Jewish readers are almost three times more likely than their gentile counterparts to have attended Ivy League colleges.

His Republican-voting readers are more likely to have emailed him.

And his gun-owning readers are more likely to make more than $100,000/year.

Readers also sifted through the data:

I was shocked to find out that FIFTY percent of your readers who took your poll were atheists like me. I've always respected your Catholicism and read every word of your debate with Sam Harris years ago, but I think that this is living proof that there are a lot of nameless, faceless, intelligent skeptics out there - many of whom are aligned with you on most other important issues. I think it just goes to show how independent and anomalous you are.

Well, that's a nice way to put it. Another writes:

Read On »

Mental Health Break

Beats doing the laundry:

Dish Independence: Your Questions, Ctd

A reader quotes a previous one:

"Please consider allowing comments in the paid site." NO! NEVER! PLEASE! In general, I HATE comment sections; they so often turn into cesspools, despite everyone's good intentions.  But your "curated comment section" is one of the best things about your blog. I've already signed up for the paid site, but if I get wind that there will be an open comment section, I'll probably try to get my money back.

Another reader reminds us that "if people want comments, they can go to the Dish Facebook page and comment there till their heart's content - and I don't have to see it." Another:

Delighted to see you striking out on your own.  I think it's high time.  I pay for the NYT, the FT, and the Economist, and I think your move is another signal of the quality differentiating itself.  I wouldn't pay for just any newspaper, and I wouldn't pay for just any blog.  But you've set yourself apart. 

That begs a separate question, though.  If we give enough, would you all consider setting aside the resources to build dedicated apps/web apps for your subscribers?  I'd love to have a clean, specially designed iPhone/iPad interface, and with the web apps the NYT and FT are now using, you wouldn't need to go through Apple (and for that matter, you could probably do a pretty easy port to Android).

Apps - or at least a customized mobile version for the home-page - are definitely forthcoming, once we get our footing with the new Dish. Another reader:

Have you ever thought of a limited merchandise offering? I can't be the only one who'd love to have an official DishHead teeshirt or ball cap. It would be fun to recognize each other at the local coffee shop.

Merchandise is very much on our radar. Back in December 2010 we launched some limited edition t-shirts (the ones featured in our staff photo). We are holding off on any subsequent merch until we have stabilized with the new transition, but stay tuned. Another reader dissents:

If you are going to start off on your own, start off right. Don't go for that $19.99 crap; be honest and direct and ask for $20.00. 

I have just finished law school and have to last until I can take the bar in February. My only income is some money from my Dad; I have to make my savings last. I don't even pay for the local Sacramento Bee, but I sent in my twenty and wish you the best.

We are immensely grateful. Join him in subscribing to an independent, ad-free Dish here.

New Year, New Dish, New Media: Blog Reax

Matt K. Lewis wishes us well:

Though Sullivan concedes that “no one really knows” whether or not online readers will pay for a blogger’s content, others (like Glenn Beck) have proven that it is at least possible to make money from online subscriptions. Say what you will about his politics, as a blogger, Sullivan is a visionary. And by maintaining his own brand — and “ownership” of his blog — he has proven that he is a free agent, capable of moving from outlet to outlet without losing his audience. If anyone can pull it off, it might be Sullivan.

Rod Dreher says he has subscribed:

Longtime readers know that Andrew and I have argued and fallen out over various issues over the years, and have agreed on some of them as well. The thing about Andrew’s blog is that even when it drives me crazy, I keep reading it. I have to. I want to. He and his team are scooping up stories and information that means something to me. I don’t care about pot, and I don’t care about Obama love, and I don’t care about the evolution of gay culture — three of Sully’s big themes. I think Sully is often unfair to his enemies, especially the Pope.

What I do care about is the broader cultural coverage the Dish team aggregates, which has for years given me lots to think about, and, of course, to blog about. And what I do care about is reading opinion journalism that engages me and makes me argue with it, even when it ticks me off. I love The Dish sometimes, I hate it other times, but above all, I read it, several times a day. With so many sites out there clamoring for one’s attention, that’s quite an accomplishment.

Therefore, I’m happy to support them financially, and to invest in a journalism model that means something to me personally. I encourage you to do the same.

Brad DeLong is also supportive:

Let me say that I will never, never, never forgive Andrew Sullivan for what he hired Charles Murray to do to the New Republic--or, for that matter, for any other of his manifold sins against the Holy Ghost. Nevertheless, he and his myrmidons are always worth reading, and definitely worth funding now that they go Full Utopian on us.

Mistermix compares our new business model to others in the industry:

This is a variant of the subscription model other sites like the Times and Gannett papers are using, except that it sounds like a lot of the Dish content will always be free. In practice, those subscription models end up looking a lot like public radio or TV – it’s pretty easy to get the content for free even after you’ve reached a limit, so "subscribers" tend to be voluntary. Sully has a huge readership, so I assume that enough people will pony up $19.99 a year to pay for him and his two under bloggers, and his site will still get a lot of hits since you can still view a lot of the content without a subscription. He won’t be hosting ads on the site, which is an indicator of just how badly the Internet ad market is cratering.

Just on a factual note, the Dish has seven employees (five staffers and two paid interns), not just three, so the budget is a challenge, but the rest of the paragraph is largely correct. Steven Taylor probably won't subscribe:

Sullivan has been at the forefront of blogging since the beginning, so I will be curious to see how this plays out, although I am unlikely to be a subscriber, given that I have more free content to read now than I have time for (which is the biggest threat to this model to begin with).

Drum worries that "as free access gets rarer, blogging is going to get harder":

[T]his is a trend that's a real problem for blogging. I currently subscribe to three newspapers: the LA Times, the New York Times, and the Wall Street Journal. This costs me over a thousand dollars a year, but I need to have access to all these sites to do my job decently. But as more and more media sites start erecting paywalls, I simply won't be able to afford to keep up all the subscriptions. Andrew's 20 bucks a year is obviously fairly small change compared to subscription fees from big media operations, but as more and more sites go down this path, my choices are going to get harder and harder.

And Joyner does some math:

To be sure, clicking through for nothing is a different kettle of fish than being a paying customer. At least in the early going, though, a lot of people will sign up out of sheer loyalty for past services rendered. Hell, I did that for Josh Marshall’s site at a substantially higher price and most of its content is still free; I’ll almost certainly do it for Sullivan. Still, off the top of my head, I figure they’ll need at least $500,000 a year to cover salary and basic operating costs. That’s 25,000 $19.99 subscriptions.

I can't disagree on the math. And as the numbers come in, we're on our way. We'll report on the day's results when we have more data. But the trend is pretty amazing. Keep it going by pre-subscribing here.

Dish Independence: Reader Reax I

A reader writes:

I have been reading you for 12 years.   I would have paid you a long time ago.  $19.99 is too cheap.  I just sent you $100.  Thanks for all of the years of excellent reading.  You make me think.  You have introduced me to so many other excellent writers - David Frum and Rod Dreher specifically.  Congrats on this new business venture.  If you can't make it work - no one can. Happy New Year to you and your excellent team (and the dogs and Aaron).

Another:

I was waiting for you to finally ask me for money. I will say, I've rarely, if ever, received so much for so little. Glad to support you and your great team.  Best of luck.

Another:

Easiest $100 I've ever spent!  Consider it retroactive payment for 10 years of reading you for free without ever once clicking on an ad. I suspect you are going to be surprised at how many people choose to give more - we already know that quality of time at the Dish is higher for core readers than almost any other source, and people will always pay for that.  Hell I give to NPR every year and I know I am on the Dish more often than on the radio.

Another:

I just signed up for $49.99.  I wish it could be more, but, to be candid, I’m still carrying debt from Obama 2012 contributions.  Living and contributing according to my means is a definite focus of the new year and beyond.

Another:

Since I found this blog several years ago, it has become part of my daily read. I don't always agree on everything that comes out (I still don't know the fascination about circumcision ), but I know that I'll get honest, fair and balanced views on national events. It's been Andrew's marriage that helped me to be in favor of same sex marriages, where I wimped out and thought civil unions was the way to go, the essays on Obama's first and second campaigns put me behind his candidacy, the discussions on religion made me to accept my own atheism (yeah, probably not what you wanted) and the fun of the "View from my window" contests, opened my eyes to wonderful places on this earth. This what a blog is, in my mind.

Thank you so much and yes, I am going to subscribe!

Another:

Count me in for $100! As a graduate of Columbia School of Journalism back in 1982 and now an advertising agency owner in L.A., I think you're simply the best. If I had to choose between giving up the NY Times or you, I'd probably choose you. I am a firm believer in paying for value and The Dish has been an enriching and vital part of my life for years. You are worth $19.99 and then some, so I am happy to be one of your first subscribers and happy to pay $100 for the privilege. Keep up the great work. I know you will do well. As I learned back in 1989 when I first left the big agency I worked for and went out of my own, you're always better off cutting out the middle man and betting on yourself!

Another:

I just gave $50 to Greenwald a few days ago. I only gave you guys $30 because I'm less concerned about your viability. I was surprised you didn't go this route sooner but I'm glad you have faith in your readers. I think one key difference between your blog and most other media outlets, particularly "old media," is that you have all worked hard and succeeded at creating a real community vibe, and that you have done so without a comments section is a real testament. I've been reading since pretty much the beginning, and I do feel like I'm a contributor, however small. I would feel that way even if you never printed any of my emails. You guys not only read your emails, but you legitimately cherish the input. Dissents and varied opinions are aired, minds are changed ... what a concept. I think a lot of us feel like we have a stake in this thing, so $20 is nothing, though I'm really glad you're not cutting off the free-riders.

The advertising and host-jumping never felt right to me. This feels right.

Another:

The way I think of my relationship with your site is similar to a get-together I have with a good friend of mine every two or three weeks. We meet at a local bar here in Toronto and talk about the three things that interest us: movies, American politics, and baseball. I realize baseball isn't really your thing (although you should reconsider that - it's a beautiful sport). Other topics come up, of course, and we don't always agree. But the discussion is the point.

The whole thing costs me almost exactly twenty bucks in beer money. (I buy, since my friend comes to my neighbourhood.) If I get the Dish for an entire year for the same amount for a whole year -well, that seems like a steal to me. Now if you could only supply the beer.

Another:

First, $20 a year is hugely reasonable. I think I pay $80 a year for New Yorker, $120 a year for the NYT as part of a student deal, and £140 a year for the Guardian (I'm British), all on iPad. However much I worry about my ever increasing media diet (both in terms of cost and size), adding The Dish at that price is a steal.

Second, I think it's worth saying that, if anything, I think paying for content makes it better as an experience, in every sense. When I've invested in journalism, I feel I've done my bit to sustain this vital industry that I'd never want to see crumble. And it also makes me more attentive, more inclined to spend time reading what I should. I can only assume other Dish heads will feel similarly. 

Oh, and if there's any way to bind a digital community even more tightly together, this is it. Fret not. It's going to work.

We certainly hope so. Join us and keep the Dish alive and ad-free here. A lot more reader feedback to come. We are simply overwhelmed with email but pledge to read every single one eventually.

(Context for the top illustration here and here. More Dish explained here and here)

Malkin Award Nominee

"Unfortunately, Sullivan isn't going away entirely. He's too beloved by the elite left-wing media to disappear into the obscurity he deserves. As we've seen from left-wing journalists like Ben Smith and Dave Weigel, there's already a push to ensure Sullivan's success in a new venture that will likely produce more of the hysterical, out-of-control Andrew Sullivan the media finds so valuable. Now that he'll be a total independent and beholden to no editorial oversight whatsoever, Sullivan will enjoy the room necessary to blossom even more as the media's wicked id, the raging conspiracy theorist and bigot who attacks the Right in ways the media doesn't dare, but still enables by propping Sullivan up," - John Nolte, Breitbart.com.

Actually, my contracts in the past all guaranteed me total editorial independence so there is no change there. And he doesn't seem to understand the difference between a pay-wall (which we won't have) and a meter that nonetheless leaves a vast amount of the content free. But if you want to show him that this is emphatically not a site propped up by anyone except its readers, pre-subscribe here.

36 New Dish Members A Minute

That's the pace at 3.03 pm. Join us here.

New Dish: Update

It's an avalanche of memberships. And so far, a full third of you have given more than the $19.99 minimum, which is incredibly encouraging. We're still at the bottom slope of the mountain for a truly sustainable base, but your response thus far, I can truthfully say, has blown us all away. We knew you were a special readership. Now you're proving it. In a matter of a couple of hours.

All we can say is thanks; and that we will work our asses off to make it worth every cent you pay us. The post explaining the move is here. And you can pre-subscribe here.

We'll get more up-to-date info on the first day's response soon. But my basic response so far: wow.

The View From Your Window

Grand Junction, Colorado, 8.01 am

Dish Independence: Tweet Reax

Wow. Andrew Sullivan strikes off on his own with a leaky paywalls and no ads. Love it: thebea.st/VvO87k

— Ryan Chittum (@ryanchittum) January 2, 2013

Andrew Sullivan pulls a Sinatra: @sullydish will do it his way thebea.st/ZbRj77

— Peter Kadzis (@Kadzis) January 2, 2013

So, a blog then? RT @romenesko: Andrew Sullivan and staff decide "to strike out on our own with no safety net." thebea.st/10OzuvB

— James Joyner (@drjjoyner) January 2, 2013

Have been reading @sullydish in blog form since 2000. Where do I hit the "subscribe" button?

— daveweigel (@daveweigel) January 2, 2013

The first blogger I ever read regularly, Andrew Sullivan @sullydish, is going it alone and asking readers to pay for content. Sign me up.

— Michael Lewis (@michaeljlewis75) January 2, 2013

@cschweitz @sullydish @thedailybeast - Horrible move. Sullivan does no original reporting. He's a commentator. No one w/pay for that.

— Hesiod Theogeny (@Hesiod2k11) January 2, 2013

Andrew Sullivan says "we work our asses off." This is so true. Dish guys (and girl) work all day, every day, non-stop. I've witnessed it.

— Brian Ries Verified! (@moneyries) January 2, 2013

Read On »

Dish Independence: Your Questions

A reader asks:

Congratulations on the move forward! I've already registered for a Dish membership ($25), but I've got one question: will RSS feeds work with the meter and the new site? That's my primary method of delivery for all online reading, and it will be difficult to keep up reading yall without it.

Fear not - our RSS feed won't be affected by the meter. Another:

Congratulations on the new adventure, we will definitely join the team! However, I could not figure out whether a subscription can be purchased for a couple with multiple machines or whether we need a separate account for each individual.  Any info on that?

You will be able to use your username/password for multiple devices, given that many Dishheads read the blog at work and at home, as well as mobile devices. Another reader:

Please consider allowing comments in the paid site. There will be far fewer "trolls" in that environment.

No plans for a comments section, but we will put it up for a vote again in due course. In the past, readers have overwhelmingly preferred our curated reader emails rather than often raucous comments sections.

One final point which may have gotten lost. There is no paywall. No one coming to the Dish home-page will ever be stopped. All links to individual posts will be outside the meter and as free after we launch as they are now. We have no intention of cutting ourselves off from the blogosphere we love and need. And vice-versa. The only meter arrives at the "Read On" posts, whose full text you have to be a member to read.

And, by the way, we are currently overwhelmed by the massive response. We'll report back as soon as we can firm up the precise numbers. But the level of support so far is pretty staggering. We can't thank you enough. Stay tuned ...

Tweet Of The Day

Ha! @sullydish gone rogue.

— GRYKING(@GRYKING) January 2, 2013

Yglesias Award Nominee

"Will the American people be better off if this law passes relative to the alternative? In the final analysis, the answer is undoubtedly yes. I came to Congress to make tough decisions—not to run away from them," - Paul Ryan, explaining why he broke ranks with Eric Cantor and Kevin McCarthy.

My take on the deal and Obama's long game is here. Reax from the blogosphere is here and here.

The Importance Of Biden

Michael Hirsh highlights Joe Biden's integral role in the Obama administration, wondering if he is the most influential VP in history:

Over the past four years Biden has insinuated himself into the White House, while seeming hardly to try, in a way that no other vice president in memory has done. He and Obama, both consummate pragmatists though they tend to be liberal in outlook, have achieved something close to a mind meld across a whole range of issues, including foreign policy, the economy, and political strategy. Biden said it outright in his speech during the presidential campaign: "I literally get to be the last guy in the room with the president. That's our arrangement." That's no small thing in a town where power is often measured in minutes of presidential face time. 

But by far the biggest achievement is wielding all this influence while being widely viewed as a joke. And the breadth of his portfolio is pretty amazing:

Read On »

DIY Abortions

Ada Calhoun reports on them:

[W]hile obtaining an abortion at a clinic is becoming harder, home abortion has never been easier or safer. In 2012, women have two resources that previous generations did not: abortion pills and the Internet. The combination of two drugs—Cytotec (Misoprostol) and Mifeprex (Mifepristone, known as RU-486 in trials) is 95 to 99 percent effective at ending a pregnancy in the first nine weeks, according to Ibis Reproductive Health’s Daniel Grossman, an expert on medical abortion. (Cytotec is 85 to 90 percent effective on its own.) "Essentially they induce an abortion similar to a spontaneous miscarriage," says Grossman of the drug combination. ...

Determining how many American women have had home abortions is exceedingly difficult: 

Read On »

The Weed Gender Gap, Ctd

A reader writes:

The continuing discussion on the weed gender gap compelled me to email the Dish for the first time. I am a daily smoker (when I can afford it) and enjoy getting high much more than getting drunk. Especially the after effects. When living with my girlfriend (also a regular smoker) in England during our studies, I always picked up for us. Now that I am living back in the States and she is still in England, I get a little nervous when she goes to pick up. I am sure she is fine but I can't help my feelings.

Another:

I don't know any women my age (40) who are daily pot smokers.  First of all, the munchies; we actually try to avoid hunger and getting fat.  Secondly, responsible people don't smoke pot when they're pregnant and nursing. Finally, it's not really attractive to be a daily pot-smoking woman. Unfair or not, it's just socially less acceptable for women to smoke pot regularly.

2nd Amendment Fixation

Conor Friedersdorf has a great rant against it:

Read On »

The Year In Cannabis, Ctd

A reader writes:

I think it's a bit premature to go around claiming that cannabis changes the teenage brain. Further, even if it does, how can we be certain that such changes are always bad? See this article, "Teen Marijuana Use May Show No Effect On Brain Tissue, Unlike Alcohol, Study Finds." 

By the way, I recall reading years ago of a psychologist who claimed that her adolescent patients who'd smoked had better personalities - more and better humor, greater compassion, sense of sharing and community, etc. This is little more than an anecdote, but it resonated with me. 

Another proposes we legalize pot for some teenagers:

As a 16-year-old student in Portland, Maine approximately the correct age range for that study, I want to contribute my two cents. The first thing that popped into my head while reading your post was the problem we have with teenage drinking in the US. Teenagers are not supposed to drink, because it is dangerous to their health. We are told over and over again that it stunts brain development, that it's illegal for teenagers, that it's something designed for only adults to do in moderation. As you said, that we should wait.

The problem with this approach is that is not working, in any way, shape or form.

Read On »

The Fiscal Cliff Deal: Reax II

Obama's reaction to the House passing the Senate's bill:

Sarah Binder puts the deal in perspective:

This week’s drama is a good reminder of the difficulty Congress faces in legislating solutions to long-term problems. Imposing costs today to secure benefits tomorrow puts legislators at risk for voter backlash. Myopic policies for myopic voters, Ed Tufte once wrote. The result is that Congress more often plays a new round of kick the can than tackles solutions to its fiscal mess. This time, Republicans think they will have the upper hand, as the parties go to battle over what it will take to raise the government’s debt ceiling. I suspect any solution will involve a new set of future deadlines intended to force Congress to legislate. Deja vu all over again.

Dave Weigel notes that most House Republicans voted against the Senate's bill. Daniel McCarthy adds:

The Tea Party is meant to ensure that the next go round will be different, but the Tea Party is part of the problem. In the absence of a real opportunity to shrink government, many of its activists would settle for wrecking government — which is what failing to raise the debt ceiling and let Uncle Sam to pay (or at least charge off) his bills amounts to. A wreck was also what some were hoping the fiscal cliff would produce. But there’s nothing conservative about that, and policy-by-catastrophe is detrimental to the cause of small government in the long run.

Paul Waldman's related thoughts:

[M]any of today's most conservative Republicans don't care all that much about the fortunes of the GOP. They didn't get where they are by toiling away on the lower rungs of the party ladder, patiently working their way up. They see themselves as brave mavericks, bucking the party establishment to promote their ideological agenda. I'm sure that for more than a few of them, a bipartisan chorus of voices screaming, "Are you f-ing crazy???" does nothing but convince them that they're right.

Yglesias weighs in:

Noam Scheiber worries about future legislative fights:

[The fiscal cliff negotiations] affirmed to Republicans that Obama will do pretty much anything he can to avoid a debt default, regardless of what he says. It affirmed the White House anxiety that the GOP might not blink before we default. To put it mildly, that's quite an asymmetry. I want to believe the president can get through the next stage in this endless budget stalemate without accepting some of the more dangerous spending cuts conservatives are demanding. But at this point I’m having a hard time seeing it.

Ezra Klein also sizes up future negotiations:

[T]he Republicans aren’t quite as crazy as they’d like the Democrats to believe. They were scared to take the country over the fiscal cliff. They’re going to be terrified to force the country into default, as the economic consequences would be calamitous. They know they need to offer the White House a deal that the White House can actually take — or at least a deal that, if the White House doesn’t take it, doesn’t lead to Republicans shouldering the blame for crashing the global economy. That deal will have to include taxes, though the tax increases could come through reform rather than higher rates.

Earlier reaction here.

DIY Typecasting

Jordan Fischer critiques the trajectory of Judd Apatow's career:

This Is 40 seems to be almost the definition of a screenwriting non-challenge — it's so thoroughly The Judd Apatow Story that for the third movie in a row, he's cast his actual wife and actual kids as thinly veiled caricatures of his actual wife and actual kids. (The always-appealing Paul Rudd returns as a somewhat handsomer Apatow.)

Now, don't get me wrong; I actually find Leslie Mann — Mrs. Judd Apatow — funny and talented. And yes, his kids, like many kids, are cute. But his path-of-least resistance casting and thin plotting seem to point to an increasing solipsism in his work; a diminishing curiosity about anything in the world that's not right in front of his nose. 

Megan Daum also finds the film wanting:

[I]n “This is 40,” Apatow seems to be really trying to say something profound about marriage and the difficulties of getting older. The problem is it’s almost as if he’s a fourteen-year-old imagining what it’s like to be forty (“that’s like, really old—but at least you can have nice cars!”) and the result is that the movie is a stunning misrepresentation of life at any stage.

How Much Do Americans Walk?

Wayne Curtis reviews recent research:

A study published in 2010 rigged up 1,136 Americans with pedometers, and concluded that we walk an average of 5,117 steps every day. (No surprise: that was significantly less than in other countries studied — both Australians and the Swiss walked around 9,600 steps daily, and the Japanese 7,100.)

It wasn't always this way:

Read On »

Small Towns On The Big Screen

Good depictions of small-town life are underrepresented in the arts, according to Terry Teachout:

"Every great man nowadays has his disciples, and it is usually Judas who writes the biography," said Oscar Wilde. I've noticed something similar when it comes to fictional treatments of small-town life in America, most of which are the work of bright, embittered émigrés who couldn't wait to grow up, move to the big city, and write novels, most of them bad, about how much they hated their childhoods. ...

For the most part, you have to look to films, not novels, to get a clear sense of small-town life, and it's surprising--or maybe not--how few of the ostensibly serious ones hit the mark at all squarely. By far the most convincing cinematic portrayal of a small town that I know is Kenneth Lonergan's You Can Count on Me, a modest little masterpiece that gets absolutely everything right. Peter Bogdanovich's The Last Picture Show comes close, but it's too harsh to be entirely persuasive, at least to me.

Saving Money By Not Driving, Ctd

A reader writes:

Eric Jaffe's description of the pricing of automobile insurers is decidedly incorrect.  As a pricing actuary for a top 10 U.S. insurer, I can assure you that most, if not all of the top 20 companies, already factor into the price of auto insurance the amount of miles driving. In our company's parlance, this variable is called "annual mileage." All other rating variables being equal, somebody who drives, say, 12,000 miles a year already pays considerably more (more than twice as much) than somebody who drives only 3,000 miles annual miles. 

What is emerging in the field of auto insurance pricing is what's referred to as "usage-based insurance". A small device installed in the car measures "how you drive."  It measures abrupt lane changes, accelerations, heavy breaking, etc.  Ideally, the "usage-based" data will allow insurers to more accurately predict risk and therefore differentiate premiums more appropriately.

America's Hub

Edward McPherson pens a sprawling homage to Dallas:

Dallas is an underdog. Landlocked, not blessed by a navigable waterway, Dallas made itself into a transportation hub by sheer will. Charles Lindbergh, at a banquet in Dallas in September of 1927, told the city, "Keep your airport—it will place you among the commercial leaders of the world." A midcentury scene: an aviation company is considering moving to Dallas. The president of the company is heard saying the runways at Love Field aren’t long enough by 2,000 feet. Three hours and forty minutes pass. The phone rings; it’s the city council. Thanks to an emergency bond measure, crews will begin lengthening the runways on Monday.

But Dallas eventually outgrew Love Field and built itself a bigger airport, Dallas-Fort Worth International, which opened in 1974 and now sprawls some twenty-seven square miles, making the airport the third largest (in terms of size) and fourth busiest (in terms of takeoffs and landings) in the world. You could fit JFK, LAX, and O’Hare within its boundaries and still have room to park. Thanks to DFW, the people of Dallas are within four hours of every major U.S. city in the lower forty-eight.

("Dallas' 1946 urban plan (somewhat comically) assumed that most people, by the year 1980, would be commuting to work by air. ... The super airport would eventually become D/FW Airport," by Justin Cozart)

Robots In Middle Management, Ctd

Unlike Scott Adams, Alex Knapp believes that robots would make terrible managers:

In theory, it sounds awesome. Finally – an objective manager, without any human quirks or foibles. Your performance is measured objectively, so you know exactly where you stand, and there can’t be any favoritism. Everyone is kept on track, following the exact steps of the project that are known to everyone.

In practice, I’d expect what you’d see a lot more of is the same thing that happens when schools start getting judged solely by their students’ performance on certain standardized tests. Pretty soon, all the incentives for the schools become geared towards teaching to those tests, and everything else falls by the wayside. Similarly, when your manager is judging you solely on your performance of its project management tasks, everything else will fall by the wayside, too.

A reader calls Adams' proposal "absurb":

Read On »

The Long Game, Revisited

[Re-posted from earlier today]

It's been interesting to see how the final mini-cliff-deal on taxes has been greeted on left and right. The left is pissed that Obama did not go fully over the cliff, using the post-re-election sunsetting of the Bush tax cuts to get all the revenues he campaigned on. The right is eager to get on with the debt ceiling fight, keen to forget the implosion of Plan B and their votes for one of the biggest tax increases in recent times (see the above chart from Zachary Goldfarb ranking the tax hikes in terms of their percentage of GDP). Obama yesterday basically said that he regarded the tax increases as simply the premise on which any future Grand Bargain needs to be agreed upon. And he is insisting that the next deal - on entitlements and tax reform - be equally balanced between revenue increases and spending cuts.

Well he can insist, but why would the GOP not talk right past him? The answer to that is that Obama has not lost all his leverage. The sequester remains - and is suspended only for two months (a reasonable compromise, although I'd have preferred it going into force already as a way to pressure these politicians into grander ambitions). The threat to the Pentagon therefore endures, which frightens those Republicans (and many Democrats) still wedded to a Cold War defense strategy a couple of decades after the Cold War ended. And the threat to Medicare hasn't gone away for the Democrats. Both sides will want to mitigate these crude cuts - and closing loopholes is one way to do it. Another Small Bargain with more revenues - and fewer loopholes - is therefore not necessarily a pipe dream.

And so you see that Obama's re-election has meant the biggest increase in revenues to the federal government since 1968. That would not have happened under Romney. And if the tax deal is not as big as the polls suggest Obama could have gotten away with, it is in part because of the contextual reasons Bruce Bartlett lays out here, in part because Obama genuinely believes in exercizing responsibility as president, but also in part because the president wants to avoid too much austerity too soon as we inch out of the worst recession since the 1930s.

It seems to me this latter point is under-rated. The left often talked of the fiscal cliff as if it were only win-win for Obama. It wasn't, in my view. He faced two dangers: of seeming unable to come up with a compromise (which is integral to his appeal) and of seeing the US economy sink under the weight of an imprudent and drastic reduction in demand. As Josh Marshall has noted, Obama always wanted a deal. No president wants to kick off his second term with a double-dip recession. He got half of a deal that will not have as drastic an effect as the full cliff-divers wanted.

Does the promised debt-ceiling hostage-taking by the GOP render all this strategy moot? Maybe. But it seems to me that the GOP has hurt itself so far since the election on fiscal matters - appearing, especially last week, as a herd of feral, foam-flecked cats. I don't see their threatening to ruin America's credit unless they get to cut Medicare by $500 billion over a decade as a particularly strong political hand. Any party triggering a self-imposed credit crisis as the economy recovers will not be rewarded politically. On that, especially after 2011, the president has the upper hand. Americans do not like monkeying around with the national credit rating as a way to cut medical care for grandma.

More to the point, the GOP has yet to even lay out the details of its proposed entitlement cuts (and campaigned in part against them). One way out would be for both parties to focus on cutting the Pentagon bloat - but that's not going to happen any time soon. And so I can see revenue-raising tax reform returning as a way to alleviate some of the political pain on both sides.

In other words, I can see Obama's logic here. What he's getting - which is a gradual shift toward more fiscal responsibility, with key protections for the working poor and the unemployed in place - is all he really wants right now. Like many of Obama's incremental achievements, you can sometimes miss the forest for the trees. We have the biggest tax hike in decades - without a sudden recession. And we have huge, painful spending cuts looming unless new revenue is found through tax reform. The end result - for all its unseemly messiness right now - may still be a sane, graduated fiscal readjustment as the economy recovers. The sequester can be back-loaded a little to find that elusive sweet spot between structural fiscal rebalancing and economic growth. And we could even clean up the tax code a little.

It's not great, but it will do. Sometimes, the little advances are preferable under certain circumstances to big breakthroughs. And Obama has to face a rabid Republican House probably for his next four years. They self-destructed on Plan B. They will almost certainly have to swallow hard and vote for big tax increases in the next day or so [and, in fact, now have]. And a campaign to slash Medicare is their next major goal. A phrase springs to mind.

Meep meep.

(Photo: U.S. President Barack Obama delivers remarks about the fiscal cliff negotiations in the Eisenhower Executive Office Building next to the White House December 31, 2012 in Washington, DC. By Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images.)

The Daily Wrap

Today on the Dish, Andrew offered his extended thoughts on last night's fiscal cliff deal, raised an eyebrow at Barney Frank's recent change of heart about Chuck Hagel, and announced 2012's Dish Award winners, later adding some important context to our Face Of The Year.

In political coverage, we rounded up blogosphere reactions to the fiscal cliff deal, while Bruce Bartlett and Daniel Gross examined why a Grand Bargain didn't happen and Drum cautioned that deal or not, the fiscal cliff was still out there. Also, readers responded to the conversation over Hillary Clinton's blood clot, Ann Friedman checked in on the still-limited progress of America's female politicians, and a traveler aboard the National Review's "conservative cruise of a lifetime" shared her Hewitt-ian fears. Looking overseas, Marc Lynch hoped Egypt would be able to "muddle through" its current morass.

In assorted coverage, Oliver Burkeman offered a reality check regarding New Year's resolutions, readers proved themselves quite knowledgable about Hobbit names, Eric Jaffe suggested pay-per-mile car insurance as a way to reduce driving, Rober Walker pondered the shrinking authority of magazine covers, and Gary Marcus argued that an automated workforce could lead to greater inequality. Also, Nathan Harden previewed the idea of a la carte college classes from multiple universities, Gaia Vince appreciated the many benefits of urban density, David Haglund teared up while watching a trailer for Landfill Harmonic, a reader gave their perspective on why women don't often buy weed, and somewhat relatedly, Justin Shanes avoided a hangover in our Tweet Of The Day. Readers shared their views from abroad on America's vacation-light work ethic, Charles Simic noted the ease with which present-day idiots can make themselves known, Jeff Jordan anticipated the death of shopping malls, and Atossa Araxia Abrahamian explained the (libertarian) paleolithic diet, while Robert Lustig detailed the dangers of fructose. John Herrman surveyed Instagram's growing international footprint, a reader passed along a great Don Becker joke referring to his mental illness, and Rand Simberg explored the fascinating implications of property rights in space.

We also watched the new trailer for To The Wonder, learned about the use of canine labor throughout history, saw a Puerto de la Cruz paraglider through the VFYW, and enjoyed a four minute reduction of 2012 in our MHB. Meanwhile readers struggled with this week's difficult (and Danish) VFYW contest and Nancy Pelosi walked the media gauntlet in our FOTD.

Lastly, don't forget to help us decide what to ask Flynt and Hillary Mann Leverett here. And the Holiday Wrap is here.

- C.D.

(Photo by Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)

Who Owns Space?

Rand Simberg wonders:

Despite the progress in technology, and the appeal of valuable resources, space settlement has been hampered by the lack of a clearly defined legal regime for recognizing property rights in space under current U.S. and international law.

There is in fact some slight internationally recognized legal precedent for retaining ownership of resources mined in space, as lunar samples returned to Earth on both U.S. and Soviet missions (the latter robotically) have been exchanged for other tokens of value. But actually owning the portion of the celestial body from which the resources are harvested — as in a traditional mining claim — is more problematic. Without legally recognized rights to buy, own, and sell titled property, it is difficult if not impossible to raise capital to develop land or extract the resources it holds. Property rights have long been considered one of the pillars of prosperity in the modern world, and their absence in space — due to the contingencies of the history of international law during the early space age — partly explains why we have not yet developed that final frontier.

(By Phillip Schumacher via My Modern Met)

Aphorisms At Year's End

The poet Charles Simic pieces together impressionistic fragments from 2012. Among them: 

"Are there more idiots in the world today percentagewise than in some earlier ages?" asks Teofil Pancic, a columnist for Belgrade’s weekly Vreme. His answer is that it only seems so, because today they are more visible, more audible, and, of course, connected by the Internet. In the past, he wittily observes, everyone was his own idiot, isolated not only from the rest of mankind, but also from his fellow idiots, so that when something stupid occurred to him, there was no chance of it instantly becoming known to idiots in Tasmania and Uzbekistan.

The Recycled Orchestra

David Haglund is moved by the above trailer:

If you do not lose it a little when 19-year-old Juan Manuel Chavez starts playing Bach’s Cello Suite no. 1 on an instrument "made from an oil can, and wood that was thrown away in the garbage," then you are made of sterner stuff than I.