I'm currently staying at a Starwood property. They have a daily charge for internet access should I want to pay that price.

What is interesting is that they do allow complementary access to certain websites include some news media outlets. So one could still read over the news without paying the daily internet charges, but the hotel still gets revenue should I want to go to other sites.

The really interesting thing about the hotel's free access is that they don't give free access to any Starwood websites, but they do allow me to access Marriott's website. So I can check out all the Marriott properties, make/cancel Marriott reservations for free. (This is a Sheraton BTW.)

As others have said, I don't have any problem if Marriott doesn't want to waste time and money on people who don't want daily delivery of the newspaper. I happen to like getting the local paper for wherever I happen to be, but although my profile says this, I always end up getting the USAT. Probably twice in the last year I have received the local paper as requested. This is akin to the sign about hanging up your towels so that they can be reused. I would guess that 99% of the time, I hang my used towel on the hook on the back of the door. That towel is taken and replaced 99% of the time.

My unscientific guess would be that it actually takes less time (and therefore potentially less money) to just give a newspaper/change the towels for everyone than it does to have a low-on-the-food-chain staff member compile and then follow a room list for such items, not to mention the hassle if there's a mistake. I could be wrong here though, especially on the towels, for which you do have to factor in laundering. $.02.

Or at the very least, free access to major online newspapers. USA Today, WSJ and NYT immediately come to mind, as these are the major national papers Marriott has been providing in paper format.

I'm thinking it would be relatively easy to whitelist certain online news sites and allow those "free" in MHRS rooms, until such time as Marriott is ready to join the 21st century and offer the entire web for free.

Although some large-city newspapers still publish two or three editions and the earliest may print before midnight, most papers print after 1 am. Of course, the composition closes earlier.

actually I think it would be a better use of company resources had they announced they were giving everyone (including retiree's) $1M each because then we could all afford to pay these fees

I just stayed at the full service Marriott Racine (not exactly a star in the Marriott chain but...). This morning, there was not a paper at my Concierge Level room door. When I innocently asked "what happened to the paper" at the CL, the attendant gave the b.s. answer, "Oh, we've decided to go green, everybody reads the news online, this was a directive from Marriott..." I then went down to the front desk where they informed me that they get ten USATodays (don't know about the WSJ) and they were long gone. I spoke with the MOD to voice my complaint. She was very nice about it (as was I), but I wanted to let them know that this was noticed.

The Marriott web site (linked to in the original post in this thread), says that limited service properties will be affected by the program starting April 20 and full service on June 1. It also says that newspaper deliveries will continue at FS properties.

Clearly some properties don't get the message - from corporate or their customers.

I would ask for compensation in that case, since it is obvious this property has used the new directive as an excuse to eliminate a benefit.

Surely the first time such a thing has happened.

Does the newspaper delivery policy apply to weekends? There is no mention that it doesn't apply on weekends in the link from Marriott Concierge's post in this thread.
I was recently at the JW Marriott in DC and there was no weekend delivery of newspapers on the Concierge floor.

I spent the past week at 2 different properties. Neither had any local papers (the preference in my profile), except on Sunday. I guess this particular form of cost-cutting reaches much farther than they're letting on.

Room delivery of newspapers has always officially been a Monday through Friday amenity. The fact that some properties would deliver the local paper on Saturday/Sunday has been an unexpected (but appreciated!) bonus.

"Under your door" is probably not going to happen...unless you also forgive the hotel for the inevitable noise complaints that will occur from having that large of a gap between the bottom of the door and the threshold.

Is this written somewhere by Marriott? I can't find it. What would be the rationale for excluding weekend guests?

Well, by golly, it's gone from the elites benefit page...or did this become a general benefit, now retracted?

The rationale behind it was that USAToday was only published M-F. Again, some properties would go beyond on weekends.

I think that at one time, weekday paper delivery was listed as an elite benefit. As for the rationale, I would guess it would be the same reason as providing free breakfast only on weekdays for Gold/Plats. It probably has something to do with their focus on business travel (and their assumption that leasure travel makes up a much higher % of weekend travel.)