The Philadelphia Inquirer

Paywall
Mar 23rd, 2023

Slanted paper pushing liberal agenda
Nov 24th, 2022

I was charged for three months of subscription, which I did not subscribe to. I contacted the Inquirer through the website after the first and did not receive a reply. I received a message that you cannot cancel online the second time, so I followed up with a call. They could not find my account, despite giving them all my personal information. A month later, I was charged again. After 45 minutes on the phone, I was connected to Brett and received a "too bad, so sad" response. He begrudgingly told me he would refund the last month against their policy. Almost hanging up on me, I asked how that would be confirmed, and he replied that an email confirmation would be sent to the email that was used to create the account, which I had notified him several times that I did not have. This is the first time I have ever written a bad review, but I strongly feel something is wrong with their subscription tactics and policies used to obtain money. I would also emphasize the need to review their customer service standards.
Nov 21st, 2023

The Philadelphia Inquirer uses what I would consider a deceptive practice when signing up for a trial. Its a practice that the FTC recently proposed to ban. They are currently accepting comments until June 23rd on a new click to cancel policy that will prohibit what the Inquirer actively engages in. That practice being that when you sign up for a trial, they dont allow you to cancel the same way you signed up. The only reason I can think of that they do this (along with having crazy hours where they close at 3PM so people who work cant really call them unless they call during a three hour window on Saturday morning) is because they know that people dont like to call people anymore and they know that people will put it off, forget about it until the charge comes around again and they get extra months to prop up a dying industry. This seems especially wrong since people with anxiety disorders have a literal fear of picking up the telephone and actively avoid calling people and the, probable, high pressure tactics they would employ once you do manage to remember to call them during their opening hours. In conclusion: what the Inquirer does should (and will soon) be illegal. So as soon as the rule is enforceable, I will be filing an FTC complaint. In the meantime, I am going to chat with my credit card issuer to ask them if they can block the Inquirer from charging me in the future. Shame on the Inquirer for having the same cancellation policy of sketchy gyms!
May 11th, 2023

Staffer Samantha Melamed breached journalistic ethics by taking research and insights I shared with her and using them as her own, and by writing a hit piece with smears that she didnt let me refute (or know about). The Society of Professional Journalists has a Code of Ethics, which says journalists should diligently seek subjects of news coverage to allow them to respond to criticism. Melamed didnt. I asked Brian Leighton (the ethics editor at the Inquirer) to give me the chance to respond to the criticism. Leighton refused, too, also opting to flout the SPJ Code. So I published my rebuttal at JournalisticIntegrity.org, which quickly became the top search result for journalistic integrity on Bing, Yahoo, and Duck Duck Go. Out of 18 million results. Perhaps citizens can get a little justice. ;-) Cant let devious employees of for-profit media corporations get away with glaring ethics breaches. Christian
Sep 19th, 2021