I would pay for news if I knew I could cancel easily without jumping through ridiculous hoops. I'd really like to get a NYT subscription but that'll never happen so long as they have their Kafka inspired cancellation process in place.
I use privacy.com proxy cards for this. Don't even bother unsubscribing most of the time, I just cancel the card and let nature run it's course :)
Legally, can't they let the subscription run and say you owe them the money?
I can say you owe me money too. The hard part is collecting said money. The overheads of collecting from a non-cooperative customer would not make it worthwhile.