You can view an exact digital replica of the print edition — delivered to your email every day by 5 a.m. Flip the pages, scan the headlines and read the stories! No matter where you are, The Daily Advertiser is right there with you, keeping you connected to what’s happening at home.
And the paper will be offering live feeds and alerts for your tablet and smartphone (see details below).
OK, so that’s new (presumably) and sounds kind of cool. But what’s it going to cost? Good luck on that one. 
The letter does state that this “privilege” of full access to theadvertiser.com will be exclusively for subscribers.
That’s why they call it a paywall. You'll soon have to pay for what you want to read online, and the cost of the print edition is going up, too.
Good luck just getting through via the 1-800 number on the letter or the paper's direct local line. Since the automated answering system does not have an option to reach the publisher, who we hoped to interview for this story, The Independent waited while being “transferred to an attendant,” only to twice hear: “Your call cannot be completed at this time. Please try again later. Good-bye.”
So we gave up. 
One Daily Advertiser subscriber, however, did not give up. Below is a partial note we received from said daily reader:
Called the 1-800 number; after several minutes I spoke to a human.
Ok, back and forth with the Daily Ad. rep and the word “CANCEL” constantly coming out my mouth and also explaining to Melanie (the Daily Ad woman) that THE LETTER I received is not clear as to what my monthly fee will be after the promotional period, whatever the hell date that is. Melanie asked to put me on hold, that was for about 2 minutes. I think she was with her supervisor reading THE LETTER.
Melanie then came back on the line and stated that she will keep my subscription at the $13.29 per month for an additional 6 months, “until you can find out what the NEW monthly charge will be.” Melanie said that “until you can find out what the NEW monthly rate will be,” she, Melanie, couldn’t tell me what my new monthly rate will be?
You know, I am not surprised she said that and couldn’t tell me the new rate. Remember this, my friend, is the Daily Advertiser. I think no one knows.
I asked for a confirmation number and Melanie told me she would email it to me.
The confirmation email did come, though it was not a confirmation of the six-month promo price and the "new" amount referenced is the reader's old amount:
Thank you for being a subscriber to The Daily Advertiser.
Your subscription fee has been changed for your Monday Sunday delivery. Your new amount of $13.29, less any applicable credits, will automatically be deducted from your designated EZ Pay account every month on the 1st of the month. If at any time you wish to make a change to your account, simply contact us at 800-259-8852.
For your convenience, you can always access your subscription account online at MyNewspaperService.com.
At MyNewspaperService.com you can put your delivery of the print edition on hold while out of town, you can register a delivery concern or make a subscription payment.
The reader is still trying to cancel but can't find an option for doing so.
Lincoln’s letter does note that the current full access subscription most people are paying, $17 per month, “is an extremely great value” and that the rate will be honored for the duration of the promotional period. That promo period, as the Daily Advertiser reader pointed out, is not defined.
Read more about The Advertiser’s paywall and the one that’s coming soon to The Advocate, too, here.
The Independent, as you know, is free. All access. All the time.
MAY 24 Blogger Robert Mann posts this entry about the Baton Rouge Chamber's recent report on Louisiana's higher education system. It's critical to economic development, and yet our system is facing a "funding crisis" with no way to resolve it, the report says. The Chamber says control of tuition and fees must be returned to the higher ed governing boards.
MAY 24 Here's a NBC33 story about Tyrann Mathieu. He has signed with the Arizona Cardinals, inking a $3 million, four-year deal. He gets a signing bonus of $265K, but gets another, larger bonus if he doesn't get cut from the team for doing drugs. The deal reportedly includes mandatory tests and meetings for the player.
MAY 24 Jarvis DeBerry posts here about the redonkulus rhetoric that would have us believe NOLA is a safe city with a murder problem. Maybe the city's crime stats don't compare with its murder stats because you can't manipulate a murder, he says: a dead body's a dead body. It just doesn't make sense, he says, and his readers agree: a poll asks if they believe the city is safe, and more than 90 percent say no.
MAY 24 Jindal administration officials announced Thursday that the privatization of public health care is going to cost a lot more than they budgeted for, the Advocate reports here. "I'm so surprised," said no one. Anywhere. The cost they're projecting now is more than $1 billion - a lot more than the $626 million budgeted for it. And, it's more than it cost the state to operate those hospitals. So why are we doing this again?
MAY 24 Blogger CB Forgotston ridicules the recent PR campaign by the state GOP in the wake of a legislative auditor's request to both major parties. The GOP (apparently unaware that the Dems got the same request) started yammering about being targeted because it had "killed" a tax increase. CB finds that laughable, but it's also pretty funny that the GOP was comparing this episode to the IRS scandal (Because the President has so much to do with our state auditor. Right?).
MAY 24 Politico details some recent fund-raising efforts by Sen. David Vitter, which have raised the question of his future political plans. This time, it is a $5,000 per head "bayou weekend" that includes "Cajun cooking" and an all-caps "alligator hunt," the story reports. Funds raised go to a super PAC that can spend money to support Vitter in federal or state races, the story points out.
MAY 24 The pink building on Royal in the quarter was sold at a sheriff's sale Thursday, this Picayune story reports. An injunction that would have halted the sale wasn't enforced because the family failed to post a $150,000 bond, the story reports. So the owner of the mortgages on the building bought it, for nearly $7 million. Now the feuding family will have to negotiate with that company to get a lease on the building that has housed their business for close to 60 years.
MAY 23 This post in Louisiana Voice tells us about a bill by a Winnsboro lege that would require all public high school students to take at least one Course Choice online class in order to graduate. (What?) Blogger Tom Aswell says it's a monument to "waste and corruption," especially in light of the problems he's exposed with the program in recent weeks. Idaho had a similar program, but voters removed it by a 2-1 margin, Aswell says.
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