photo credit: Vanessa Roanhorse

I recently moved from a brownstone to a large multi-story apartment building. One of the casualties of this move was my apparently unrealistic expectation that when you get a newspaper delivered to you daily, you will always have a blue-plastic wrapped paper lovingly waiting for you when you wake up in the morning and put some pants and flip-flops on to retrieve it. After three days in a row of having my paper poached by some unscrupulous new neighbor, I did what any self-respecting thirty-something graduate student would do: I griped about it on Facebook. (Well, after calling the paper for re-delivery, that is).

While many people have expressed sympathy about the paper-poaching, some people I’ve complained to, both virtually and face-to-face, have also expressed surprise that I get the newspaper delivered to me daily. The expense of daily delivery is one aspect of the surprise (to which my reply is: bourgie habits die hard), but some are also amazed that I actually read the paper in print form. “Why don’t you just read it online?” they ask.

So, I’ve been trying to articulate why I prefer to read my paper in 3-D rather than online. Here are just three reasons:

• It’s part of my morning ritual. Every morning, 7 days a week, I like to sit at my kitchen table and read the paper while I eat my breakfast and drink my coffee. If I read it online, I’d have to bring my laptop to the kitchen, or bring my breakfast to my desk, which is a personal boundary I shall not cross. (And don’t even think about suggesting I scroll through the headlines on my iPod in between sips of coffee and bites of granola).
• The sensory experience. Feeling newsprint between your fingers, smelling traces of ink, hearing the scratch of paper as you turn pages: you lose the tactile experience when you read online.  Perhaps it is my history as a former zinester that led me to appreciate the allure of physical paper. Analog rules.
• The reading experience. I read differently when the copy is printed on a page in my hands as opposed to appearing on a screen in front of me. I like being able to visually scan a large page, or easily flip to another page, rather than having to (primarily) scroll vertically and click on links. The content and quantity of my reading also changes depending on format. The printed paper is curated differently from the online version, leading to a different cumulative narrative of headlines and stories. When I read a physical paper, I tend to look at every page, scanning all headlines and reading what appeals to me. When I read the paper online, my eye gravitates to what is on top and in the middle and in large print, rarely scrolling down to read or click on the smaller headlines. My attention span wanders. I veer off to read other sites. I end up reading less, and being less informed.

I know, I know, despite my preference for print, the newspaper industry is dying. But what do other people think about print versus online? Do you read print newspapers, or are you primarily an online reader? What are your reasons either way?