The Morning News is a very respectable web publication staffed with very respectable writers and designers and illustrators all working very hard to disprove the idea that the web is a disposable publishing medium -- and, in my opinion, they are succeeding. However, just to disprove the point they just worked so hard to disprove, they have done something special with their creative energy: published (in the truest sense) the first-ever The Morning News Print Annual.

Among its 200 (!) pages, the editors have collected some of their favorite pieces from 2008 and have also (bonus!) commissioned 21 new pieces from some of their writing staff. One of those new pieces was written by me expressly for this annual, so if you'd like to read it you should buy this thing now. I would also add that there are 200 pages worth of other reasons to buy this damn thing. If I know the editors of TMN -- and I'd like to think I do -- I know they made certain they were producing a quality (maybe even respectable) product.

It would make a fine gift, and also a fine small, selfish gesture during this holiday season. Plus, for this initial run there is only a limited quantity of 200 copies. So please, do us all a favor.