From ABC News: "How the New York Times fell apart"
As hard as may be for younger readers of this column to believe, twenty years ago, the New York Times was unquestionably the newspaper of record for the United States and (with the London Times) for much of the rest of the world. It had the most famous reporters and columnists, its coverage set the standard for all other news, and its opinions, delivered ex cathedra from the upper floors of the Gray Lady on 43rd Street set the topics of this country's political debate.The author opines that the Times' decline has less to do with the Internet than how the paper pandered to a certain viewpoint at the expense of its reputation. And remember this brilliant move?
Incredibly, almost every bit of that power has been squandered over the last two decades. It's been a long time since anyone considered the Times to be anything but the newspaper of opinion for anyone but the residents of a few square miles of midtown Manhattan.
At the Times, this philosophy peaked with the amazingly stupid decision to put the paper's columnists, still among the most influential on the planet, behind a subscription firewall. The Times eventually backed down, but after years of reducing those writers to secondary players in the national conversation, their influence had been seriously diminished.Now the joke is that people would pay to keep Paul Krugman back behind the firewall.
Extra - The NYT employee entrance exam.
2 comments:
Yowza! What a body blow! Of course, the Times could just as plausibly do an article entitled "How ABC News fell apart." How's the cachet of that ex cathedra 6:30 broadcast treating them? What if Peter Jennings had done his version of Walter Cronkite's Vietnam editorial; how would that have resonated with the heartland? Think Bush worries about "losing Charles Gibson"?
In other words, news flash news flash: it's 2007. The old industry is dead. Maybe letting everyone click on bitchy Maureen Dowd columns for free could have reversed the tide of history, but now we'll never know.
And, though it's a dagger into the heart of red meat Blogistan, the NY Times is STILL considered "the paper of record" by the world. It's just that BEING the paper of record doesn't mean what it used to. Plus, if it ain't the Times, who is it now?
Rupert Murdoch didn't add the WSJ to his portfolio because the business of news providing is more diffuse today and he needs to spread his chips across the roulette board to stay even, oh no, no. He bought it because he really digs those stippled dot-dot-dot caricatures.
Extra - The NYT employee entrance exam
You gotta love conservative humor! If a joke is worth making, it's worth making 80 times in a row (20 Q's x 4 multiple choice answers).
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