It didn’t take long.

The Observer put up a paywall on its website and the complaint flashed across my computer screen: Why does The Observer use Facebook to posts links to articles on the newspaper’s website that we can’t read because we do not have a subscription?

In short, why isn’t The Observer providing its product for free?

It is a good question with an obvious — but not a casual — answer: Our business — our stock and trade — is professionally researching, writing, editing, publishing and delivering news and information. Like any other profession or business, we expect to be remunerated for our labor and products.

Part of the problem is one of perception. The newspaper industry embraced the free content theme online more than 20 years ago. That was a mistake. Once news consumers could get their news for free, they expected it and, in turn, the effort to produce the news lost perceived value.

Generations of newspaper subscribers before the advent of the internet paid for subscriptions. Yes, those newspapers had advertising, but the paper was not free. The easy access the internet provided blinded consumers to those facts.

Producing news isn’t easy and it isn’t cheap. People — reporters, editors, pressmen, delivery drivers, etc. — do not do their work for free. Just like you, they work to receive a paycheck to pay bills and to live.

Newspaper employees work hard to produce news and unique local content for their reading audience. They work long hours, withstand criticism and, occasionally, bask in the shadows of triumph.

But they don’t do it for free. Nor should they.

We believe our news product is a good one. We believe it has value. And we believe that value is worth something. It’s why we share links to our stories on Facebook and other social media — to draw attention to our work.

To receive the kind of journalism you expect costs money. If you read local news for free on some websites, you get what you pay for. The Observer is the only news source providing in-depth reporting on La Grande’s warming station, for example, and covering breaking news that matters. Because we believe our product has value, we also believe it is worth paying for. If we didn’t, we wouldn’t be in this business in the first place.

So, the long and short of it is simple: Wal-Mart does not give its products away for free. Small businesses — such as The Observer — here in Union County don’t give away their products and services for free, either.

We ask you to pay for our news product because it has value.

If you believe in the concept of local news and deem the body politic must be well-informed, then we hope you will support it by becoming a subscriber to the printed newspaper and/or a digital subscriber. A monthly digital subscription to The Observer is less than the price of Netflix. Getting home delivery of the paper plus everything we can offer online is less than $12 per month.

That’s about the cost of a movie ticket and soda and covers a lot more than a couple hours of entertainment.

By the way, The Observer and our sister paper the Baker City Herald are getting news apps this holiday season. The mobile app is fast, easy to navigate and provides alerts to keep you in the know.