> Stealing candy from a gas station is wrong, but stealing an article from behind a paywall is right, because.... The latter is easier to get away with
They don't give you the option to pay for an article. The only two choices are pay a couple hundred bucks for an annual subscription that you likely won't use more than a few times, or bypass the paywall.
To follow your analogy, this would be like if the gas station only sold gum in packs of 365 - you want a day's worth of gum, but you can only buy a yearly supply. I'll bet you'd see a lot more people stealing gum.
They don't give you the option to pay for an article. The only two choices are pay a couple hundred bucks for an annual subscription that you likely won't use more than a few times, or bypass the paywall.
To follow your analogy, this would be like if the gas station only sold gum in packs of 365 - you want a day's worth of gum, but you can only buy a yearly supply. I'll bet you'd see a lot more people stealing gum.