Few journalists would have had the audacity (or is it stupidity?) to pitch a story idea to Time Magazine about micropayments for journalism.

Even fewer journalists would have gotten that story idea accepted. And almost none of those journalists would have had their story wind up on the front cover of Time Magazine.

Enter Walter Isaacson. 

He got a cover story into Time Magazine on the incredibly half-baked idea of micropayments — charging for content by literally nickel and dimeing people. Let me remind all of you that this idea is not remotely new. Mark Potts points out that this idea dates back to well into the 1990s.

The difference is that Isaacson is a journalism bigwig. He is revered in many circles. He can write whatever he wants, and we’ll print it. 

And we did.

If I wrote the same exact piece and published it to my blog, I would have been laughed at. and Time Magazine would never have seriously considered publishing it. But shouldn’t Isaacson be held to a higher standard than me, not a lower one? After all, my half-baked ideas aren’t thrown on magazine cove