Starting today, you can no longer browse the Omaha World-Herald website anonymously.
It’s fast, it’s free and, beginning today, it’s required!
Starting today, you will need to register to access most of the articles in the Online Edition. Simply click here to begin the registration process, and continue to enjoy unlimited online access to the Midlands’ leading news and information resource.
Calling themselves “the Midland’s leading news and information resource” may be a stretch. So, if you register on the World-Herald’s website you will be able to access this “leading news” and you will also be handing over your personal information to a company that plans to use it as much as possible.
Take a look at how the Omaha World-Herald plans to use your information…
* E-mail addresses. If you supply Omaha.com with your e-mail address, either by registering on the site or by communicating with us via e-mail, we may, from time to time, send you information that we believe would be of interest to you via e-mail. This information may be from Omaha.com, the Omaha World-Herald, or from one of our quality advertisers. Note: If we send you e-mail on behalf of another company, your information is never disclosed to that company. Rather, the company provides us with the information it wants to send, and we prepare and send the e-mail directly to you. Your information never leaves our systems.
* Postal addresses. If you supply Omaha.com with your postal address, we may send you periodic mailings with information on new products, coming events, surveys or other research materials, or other information we think might be of interest to you.
* Telephone numbers. If you provide your telephone number, Omaha.com may call you regarding orders you have placed online, to tell you about new products, services, or coming events, or to offer other information that may interest you. Additionally, Omaha.com, the Omaha World-Herald or one of their agents may call you for research purposes.
Maybe i missed something but it doesn’t sound like they are handing your information over to anyone, “your information is never disclosed to that company.” Granted they will send you spam but its sent by them, most companies that send spam that way don’t send you 10 emails or even 1 email a day, it reduces the credibility of that company. The only misleading thing is that both the Postal Adress and Telephone clauses say “if” which implies that giving them that information is optional, but they are marked as required fields, but it’s not like it’s hard to give them a fake address and phone number. Is this really that big of deal? The New York Times has been free registration for a long time. Is it a slow news day or something? Why is this important?
It’s just sad when a free site changes to a registration free site.
It’s a smaller jump from free registration to paying registration.
It’s also just a hassel that thousands of us are going to have to go throuh everytime we want to read the news online.
And a slow news day.
If you don’t want to register with the World Herald, then go to http://www.bugmenot.com . They have a bunch of user names and passwords to get by the OWH.
Um, all i have to say is go to Lexis-Nexis if you need OMW stuff thats a few days old. I’ve been told that you have to pay to get access to articles over 14 days old or something like that. but you do have to be registered through the UNO library for lexis-nexis, so it might defeat the purpose