BostonNOW

Anyone remember that segment ‘Why?’ on «In Living Color»? They asked questions like. ‘Why do they always interview the most uninformed eyewitness on a crime scene?’. and then showed Damon Wayans acting like a complete spaz while James (Jim if you must) Carrey jumped around in the background? Well I’d like to ask the BostonNow people. Why do you always pick the most uninformed people to quote on your newspaper?
I don’t care if it’s free, it’s basically a picture paper with blogs and sudoku. The spelling errors and unfinished sentences make my brain hurt. They only have a few staff writers so there’s a couple wack opinions floating around instead of actual interesting content. Kristine M. is right. what a sad waste of trees.
The 2 stars are for the pity I feel for the «sellers» and for some of the nicer ones I have encountered.

BostonNOW gets two stars. One for each additional Sudoku it has compared to the Metro. And for giving me another crossword puzzle to do during class.
That bitch of a treasure hunt is also annoying as shit. Especially the clues that they give out.
It’s such a poorly laid out paper that it was probably some 3^rd graders art project.
And (if it’s possible) the carriers are even MORE annoying than the Metro carriers.
It’s like a tabloid that trying to be legit, but fails horribly. Or like the Herald, but cheaper.
The End.

BostonNOW is patently awful. The writing (what of it they actually do instead of taking off the AP wire) is quite bad, no one proofreads or edits anything that is printed, many stories are written days (or months, in a couple of cases) after the actual «news» they claim to be breaking, and a few front-​page stories have been completely false/​wrong. Add in the inanity of the web «contributors» and the COMPLETE lack of any sports coverage AT ALL and you end up with something that is only suited for training your puppy not to pee in the house.
The only thing worse than this awful «newspaper» is the people they hire to give it out all over the city. They clog up the most congested walking areas in the whole city (I’m looking at you, guy who stands in the middle of the tiny tunnel at the bottom of the escalator at South Station) and make no effort to move elsewhere, and they’re rude about it to boot. One of the very first BN hawkers who worked at Downtown Crossing would stand at the top of the escalator on Washington St. that emptied into the street. After weeks of making minimal, if any, effort at not being in the way, I finally had to resort to lowering my shoulder like an NFL fullback to be able to get past him to the freedom of an open street. Additionally, because of the hawking blitz that BN went on when they started publishing, the number of Metro hawkers also tripled. I had to literally run a gauntlet of some 25 free newspaper hawkers in the 200 feet from my T exit to the door at work.
Everything about BostonNOW sucks.

Garbage. Such a sad, sad waste of trees. It would be one thing if it were a blog, but it just does NOT work as a print newspaper. I understand that it’s a free newspaper so it’s not as if it were the Globe, however, their standards are so obviously low that it’s painful. Don’t these writers want to be taken seriously? Don’t they take pride in their work?
Their obvious lack of editing is something they should be embarrassed of. Sometimes their facts are blatantly incorrect, there are typos galore, and their celebrity gossip page is lifted RIGHT off
.
Despicable.

The only thing worse than going to work in the early morning is dealing with the BostonNOW A-​hole standing at the Park Street stop. I don’t want a paper, I never want that paper!!! I always make eye contact, slightly smile and say «no thanks» and keep moving. So why WHY WHY would you continue to shove this shit at me and insist that maybe I really do??? I’ve don’t even need to write a review on how this paper is a piece of drivel as so many other reviews illuminate the topic. The only thing it’s good for is when it’s raining and I don’t have an umbrella or need to know a movie time on a Friday night. Btw, after 5pm you can fuck off too! Why would I want to relax on the way home with that nonsense?
Edit** This morning at Harvard noticed the BostonNOW retard is wearing a Yankees hat while distributing a Boston paper. Very smart.

One Monday morning, I arrived at the T with nothing to read and as the streetcar pulled up, I grabbed a BostonNow from the newspaper box. Two stops later, I’d read enough to silently thank BostonNow for making the Metro look like the New York Times. I held onto the paper for the rest of the trip as I indulged in T-​related thoughts not relevant to this review.
When we pulled into Copley Station, I remembered the paper. Not wanting to contribute to an unsuspecting passenger’s IQ drop, I couldn’t leave BostonNow on the T and I certainly didn’t want to litter. I passed a trash can but I couldn’t throw the paper away: I’d barely touched it and it was still perfectly serviceable for – if not reading – something. I decided to return it to a newspaper box on Boylston Street.
As I reached the top of the stairs, however, I was verbally assaulted by the BostonNow and Metro guys who’d been shoving papers at me every morning for months, all of which I’d politely declined before I started ignoring them. As the BostonNow guy started shouting at me to take a paper, I handed mine back to him.
«I don’t want your paper,» he said with just a touch of scorn.
«WELL NOW YOU KNOW HOW I FEEL EVERY GOD-​DAMNED MORNING,» I yelled back.
He took the paper and the next morning, I started getting off the T at Arlington Street.

«BostonNOW: Because utter desperation is sexy, right?»
It’s kind of fun watching people run and squirm away from the BostonNOW people downtown. I mean, you’d think the paper peddlers worked for Greenpeace or something. The two second trip from the station to the office is more like an obstacle course now than ever before.
One time there was a budding R Kelly-​in-​training on the sidewalk SINGING about BostonNOW, a nice little R&B «get your free paper» croon. So your basic dignity and self-​worth go for what now, $ 7.50 an hour? This kid’s going places!
Yesterday, there was a copy sitting on the break table in the office, so I picked it up. I think it was a day old, but that’s irrelevant since there’s not actually any news in it anyway. On the cover was a bit about Mass being number 2 in the nation for underaged tobacco sales, with a picture of this young girl lighting up; the thing is, she’s all hair-​dye and dark lipstick and black nail polish and totally looks like the reason we all started smoking in the first place.
Highlights inside included: «Malden: Students FAIR poorly on exam.» (emphasis added) It would seem that they then went on to write for this publication. This couldn’t possibly be intentional could it? Could it?
Next, I come to a full page article called «Friends With Benefits?» telling me that (drumroll) college kids like to have sex. Here’s the featured quote: «‘I have plenty of friends with benefits, but they have to not go to my school. It complicates things too much.’ –Sasha Baptiste, a Bunker Hill College sophomore.» Get down with your bad self, Sasha, I’m sure you’re jolly fun at parties. Oh, make sure you send a copy of this article to your mum to put on the fridge.
Thank goodness they had the good sense to give Paris Hilton some much needed publicity in the Gossip section, though. Regarding her upcoming trip to Africa, Paris ruminates, «I’m scared, yeah. I’ve heard it’s really dangerous.»
If any of this is news, I would most certainly rather live in ignorance, or sign up with Greenpeace.

There’s comedy, there’s high comedy, and then there’s the Novelette section in the back of each (week)daily edition of upstart Metro clone BostonNOW. Certainly it’s a (er…ahem…) novel and admirable, if quixotic, idea, publishing serialized fiction for the masses of mass transit. But really, I’d think there would have been a bit of, um… quality control? Hardline proofing? Check for basic readability? — before sending this section (and the entire paper, I guess) on its virgin run.
And perhaps I’m a bit stodgy and old fashioned, I guess, but there’s something just plain unnatural about writing fiction entirely in the present tense, a certain feel to the exigencies of its syntactical strictures that makes it hard to take seriously.
Okay, then… removing my head from my ass, I’ll admit its hard to fairly assess BostonNOW in its fledgling stage. It bills itself as an evolutionary step in publishing, looking for a sort of seamless meshing between print and on-​line content, between the daily paper and the website, between professional and amateur, with regular staff writers and bloggers, freelancers, etc. contributing, if not equally, then at least with the same legitimacy. On «paper», it’s a great concept, though in the end I have a feeling will all reduce to just a junior league Metro — a quick disposable read on the train and bus, finding its ultimate use as a quick mop for spilled coffee, a baton for swatting away reeling drunks or fodder for recycling.
I wish them the best, I suppose, but I really wish both they and the Metro would really just go away — they are only contributing to the ADD fueled cult of constant distraction that is corroding our cultural discourse.