> people are an endless font of excuses about why they won't pay (or they just don't) even though many people routinely subscribed to a newspaper and a bunch of magazines.

That’s not really fair. Back when magazine subscriptions were a thing, you weren’t exposed as much to other magazines or newspapers you were not subscribed to, or if you were you could just read them. Cafés used to have newspapers, various places with waiting rooms used to have stacks of magazines and nobody tried to shame you for reading without paying.

As a matter or fact, I am subscribed to the Atlantic and 3 newspaper’s websites (in different languages), which is equivalent to what my parents did when I was a kid. But I am not going to get a subscription for the Wall Street Journal, the Economist, the Financial Times, or some random local news website every time someone links to a story there.

I don't really disagree you had your magazine and maybe newspaper subscriptions and otherwise you mostly went without other than occasionally going to the library, surfing in a waiting room, picking up a free newspaper, etc. If you didn't care enough about a publication to subscribe you mostly did without and you were generally fine with that because you were unaware that you were missing anything.