New York Times 2020 Report

But how are you defining that diversity, and how does it do much good if your business model is deteriorating around you?

Seems like this is a really bad time for, "Well, we're hurting real journalism, but ..."

 

Pretty sure he defined it as race, gender, sexual orientation, language, geographic background, education, prosperity, etc. As long as they got that who cares if no one buys the paper.

 

So guys, I'm sorry if I've somehow offended you by giving some context to the report you clearly don't agree with. (I apologize if you're not guys, but it's hard to tell when you snipe anonymously.) Maybe the report is not the answer. Maybe the industry is totally doomed. But what I know is this: while you talk about no one buying the paper and broken business models, The NYT has turned to subscription revenue to replace the falling ad revenue. The results? Increased subscriptions in both print and digital. Will we lose some editing jobs? Yes. Maybe even mine. Are we expanding with new bureaus in Australia and Canada? Yes. Are we translating our journalism into Chinese, Spanish and Hindi with an eye on drawing more subscriptions? Yes. Will the $50 million investment in global expansion soon look to make strides in Europe? I believe so.

So sure, you can call it a flawed report. You can be bitter about people who will be out of work. You can lament the superficial changes that other outlets have made as failures. But you just can't piss on all attempts at change. Well, I guess you can, but that says more about you than about what you're pissing on. I admire the attempts to evolve. I think you'll see more of the same from the Globe in the next year or so. I'm sure the WaPo folks, while wary of change, love Bezos's willingness to try new things.

Someone had messaged me privately, advising me to run, not walk, from this thread. I'm done now. Have at it.

Cheers,
JJL

 

Jimmy, wasn't offended at all. Know a few guys who worked at the Times. Know a few who are still there. Over the past decade they've had at least two big layoffs. Know a few good guys who decided it was better to take the severance deal. Kind of think if the Times was concerned about the quality of journalism they maybe wouldn't have wanted a lot of good people to take a buyout.

 

Jim, you made the cardinal error on SJ.com: You pointed out to an anonymous poster that he's got no clue what he's talking about. And the anonymous poster then doubled down by trying to pretend that his assumptions were the Times' fault when he should've been saying, "My bad. I had no idea what I was talking about." Thanks for providing some perspective on this from someone who knows what they're talking about as opposed to people throwing out conjecture and making statements based on their own personal views rather than any real knowledge of what's going on.

 

This is one of the dumber posts I've seen on SJ.com. Leave the visual journalism to people who know what they hell they're talking about. The New York Times does multimedia as well as anyone in the business and better than most. If you don't realize that, you're only exhibiting your lack of knowledge about the journalism industry.

 

Hey, that's a very valid point. And I think The NYT recognizes that they've made mistakes in that regard, too. That's why the buyouts last summer were not offered to people in certain departments. I'm sure the next one will be the same. And that's why in contract negotiations the company is looking to do away with or significantly change severance language when they lay off out of seniority. They want to be able to more freely pick and choose who goes, keeping the talent they want to hold onto. I just think it's wrong to equate a desire to become more diverse with thumbing your nose at good journalism.

And JRoyal, thanks for the support. I'm not trying to stir the shit here. I was just trying to have some intelligent conversation about the business, recognizing that no plan is perfect. Hell, if anyone knew what was perfect and painless, we'd be reading what they have to say instead of each other.

Cheers!

 

No offense, but that's a pile of shit. We have the report. That's it. If we were supposed to know the backgrounds of the people who wrote it, then that's unfortunate.

The comments I have seen are based on the report and previous initiatives that sound awfully similar to this one. Those initiatives failed. Based on that small detail and what's in this report, I assume this one will, too.

 

I think you just beat it. So the initial text box should cover the athlete who's the topic of the entire presentation? Got it.

I think you just sang the last bar of Exhibiting Lack of Knowledge. Your performance was brief but bad.

It should be pointed out again they said, in their own report, there were people who wanted to know how to do graphics. The example cited an article without a map. That would seem to be the type of graphic they want to learn. If they hope to learn how to do a whole multimedia presentation, I would say that would be an ambitious endeavor.

 

None of that was in the report. I actually think newspapers should have looked to boost subscription revenue. Would it have worked everywhere? Probably not.

Yeah, we've seen and heard that before, too. CHANGE! Doesn't matter how. Just trust us and change.

Again, good luck with protecting that writer's voice, helping people learn how to do graphics, and the bid for diversity. We'll see how things stand in 2020.

 

Lolz. Son, I've forgotten more about visual journalism than you'll probably ever know. If you think that was some kind of cardinal mistake, you're not too bright in that area. Go back to whatever it is you do and leave this to people who know the craft.

 

One semi-specific so far. You have demonstrated a wealth of knowledge.

Again, read the report. Article about a subway route. No map. Try something resembling facts, rather than just blustering about how great you are. Right now, the magic 8-ball says, "Signs point to No."