New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers • Hacker News Board

Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#151

Post by rainonmoon » Thu, Aug 09, 2018, 9:51 AM UTC

VSTN wrote: post #146

toyg wrote: post #127

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't know how old you are, but from a 40-yo perspective, the NYT being seen as "leftist" is a terrifying signal of how right-wing the mainstream political window has gone in the US. The traditional megaphone of the East-Coast moneyed, the newspaper that sold the Iraq War to the public with lie after lie, is now seen as a bastion of liberalism. The US is in a very dark place right now. Last time it happened, it too…

This is because there is a massive confusion of the political spectrum which is better divided as 4 parts rather than 2. The NYT isn't left at all when it comes to its views on how the economy should be run. But on social issues it certainly is a left rag. In fact, in what kind of environment but the leftomost extremist side could one tolerate the presence of an employee like Sarah Jeong who said such nice things as…

Arguably, the kind of environment in which one elects a President who generalises an entire nationality as criminals and rapists except for "a few, [who] I assume, are good people." If you want to find how low the bar has fallen, understand that one side of the political divide lowered it long before Jeong got there.

Your final assertion is not worth addressing.

Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#152

Post by VSTN » Thu, Aug 09, 2018, 9:53 AM UTC

rainonmoon wrote: post #151

VSTN wrote: post #146

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This is because there is a massive confusion of the political spectrum which is better divided as 4 parts rather than 2. The NYT isn't left at all when it comes to its views on how the economy should be run. But on social issues it certainly is a left rag. In fact, in what kind of environment but the leftomost extremist side could one tolerate the presence of an employee like Sarah Jeong who said such nice things as…

Arguably, the kind of environment in which one elects a President who generalises an entire nationality as criminals and rapists except for "a few, [who] I assume, are good people." If you want to find how low the bar has fallen, understand that one side of the political divide lowered it long before Jeong got there. Your final assertion is not worth addressing.

"some people did it first" is not worth addressing either.

Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#153

Post by Latty » Thu, Aug 09, 2018, 9:57 AM UTC

zarkov99 wrote: post #123

radmuzom wrote: post #111

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

even their incoherent stance on racism as illustrated in the Sarah Jeong debacle? I could live with a left bias but not their blatant hypocrisy.

Weaponizing old, out-of-context tweets is just the new alt-right playbook. James Gunn is the other obvious example.

Yes, these people posted things that were bad ideas. They also apologised, made it clear they were not serious about what was said, and moved past it.

To claim it makes their entire coverage of racism incoherent is... misleading at best. Imitating the masses of people trolling you as a joke may be a bad idea, but it's not comparable to the racism sustained by minorities that regularly damages their quality of life. Pretending the two things are the same is severely downplaying the severity of the latter.

People grow, change and learn. I've known people who used to be racist, and I don't hold it against them, because they have changed and deserve a chance to be a part of society, as long as they don't act like that any more.

Trying to stop anyone on the left who has ever made a mistake from having a voice, long after they made those mistakes is insane. The fact that alt-right voices arguing in bad faith are actively targeting the people trying to change the very issues at hand shows the issue.

Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#154

Post by naturalgradient » Thu, Aug 09, 2018, 9:58 AM UTC

Latty wrote: post #147

naturalgradient wrote: post #93

The greatest marketing trick the NYT has ever pulled off is presenting themselves as the last bastion of objectivity in the trump era. Nothing could be further from the truth. I think the most recent Sarah Jeong controversy and virtually all reporting on migration, feminism, campus politics etc shows this. Mind you this is from a European perspective where I see almost all reporting about politics here as copying off…

"Far left" is a pretty polarising way to describe them. I'm from the UK, which is a country which is firmly on the right of most of Europe, and policy in the US is extremely far right of here. The reporting I've seen from the New York Times is barely left, let alone "far left". The right seems to have moved so far out to the far right, and yet people act like the centre-point of the Repbulicans and Democrats is still…

I did not call the NYT a far left magazine.

I said their reporting on EUROPEAN politics ("politics here") copies points from the far left (e.g. all mass migration is unquestionably good, parties against it must be right wing populists if not racists, etc).

I think their reporting on campus politics, identity politics is also far left, but other than that their stance on Iraq war etc is more Hillary-left than traditional 'left'. It's pointless semantics though, outrage mode is already engaged in this thread and it will probably soon turn into a dumpster fire.

Someone cannot just be wrong or inaccurate, they must be the enemy ('right rant'), and culture wars demand I first clarify I am on 'the right side of the issues' before saying anything. The more objective people think they are, the blinder towards their own bias. Of course I am biased too, but what people engage with in my post is the 'far left' comment on European politics instead of the actual point.

My point was that the NYT engages in culture war because it sells. I can agree with many issues on the NYT but still observe that and be annoyed by it, but that does not matter in tribalistic discourse.

Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#155

Post by gearhart » Thu, Aug 09, 2018, 9:58 AM UTC

The NYT has been paying roughly the same amount each year for production of news for the last few years, and a steadily increasing amount of "general, sales and admin", even as their gross income from subscriptions has shot up, and their income from advertising has plummeted.[1]

I really struggle with that. That isn't how this is supposed to work. Escaping the broken advertising model and moving to a reader-funded model is supposed to give you scope to shake off overheads, to clarify your business's purpose and to slimline and focus operations to improve the quality of content at the price point. That's the mantra for the new renaissance of journalism, in which the NYT has been hailed as a massive success story.

I don't by any means mean to denigrate the NYT - they produce some excellent reporting, but it seems that from a business perspective there is something askew here. The Guardian in the UK has managed to do exactly what was expected - the proportion of their staff who are journalists has increased steadily for a decade as their revenue split has shifted towards subscription, and their finances have steadily improved (they're still not in the black, but it looks like they will be this year, for the first time since the business model fell apart). On the other side, it seems like the NYT are posting profits, but without fundamentally reshaping the business.

There is a massive backlash in this thread against dark patterns to prevent subscriber loss and continued advertising even after subscription. It feels like the company may be selling the goodwill and brand value that are the cornerstone to the reader-funded, reader-focused new age of journalism in order to get their profit margins looking healthy, despite failing to cut overheads, which is where the profit increases in this new model ought to be coming from.

I would really, deeply like to be shown to be wrong. We need sustainable, reader-funded businesses producing great journalism and I want to think the NYT is one of them.

[1] https://s1.q4cdn.com/156149269/files/doc_financials/annual/2... (page 55)

Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#156

Post by Latty » Thu, Aug 09, 2018, 9:59 AM UTC

lumberjack wrote: post #120

naturalgradient wrote: post #93

The greatest marketing trick the NYT has ever pulled off is presenting themselves as the last bastion of objectivity in the trump era. Nothing could be further from the truth. I think the most recent Sarah Jeong controversy and virtually all reporting on migration, feminism, campus politics etc shows this. Mind you this is from a European perspective where I see almost all reporting about politics here as copying off…

Being a liberal (the philosophy) is equivalent to being neutral and objective according to all the mainstream media, which are all liberals.

Is being neutral reporting on facts or is it reporting a viewpoint at the middle of the two parties? Those are two very different things.

As someone from the UK, a country that is pretty far to the right of most of Europe, and yet still far to the left of the US, the idea that these publications are biased to the left is, frankly, laughable.

Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#157

Post by hhjinks » Thu, Aug 09, 2018, 9:59 AM UTC

eksemplar wrote: post #100

zorkw4rg wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Weird why is that getting flagged/downvoted? Isn't that a legitimate topic of discussion? It should be possible to at least point out the facts of what happened. She wrote some tweets in the past that some people interpreted as racist against white people, nyt responded by arguing that it was just a reflection of the hateful rhetoric she received as an asian person. https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-intersect/w…

Is it a legitimate topic for discussion though? If you can become president after calling Mexicans criminal rapists, I think you should be allowed to be a journalist after those tweets, especially when you’ve expressed regret and remorse for posting them. People really should uninstall twitter though. I mean, I’ve never written things that were racist, but I’m really happy there isn’t a permanent record of everything…

Trump shouldn't have been President, and Jeong shouldn't have been hired. Two wrongs don't make a right.

Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#158

Post by ethanwillis » Thu, Aug 09, 2018, 10:03 AM UTC

chx wrote: post #73

I subscribed the moment they hired Susan Flower (susanthesquark). We often call for the boycott of bad actors so we should reward the good actors, I feel. I couldn't subscribe again when they hired Sarah Jeong (sarahjeong) but if I could, I would do it again in a heartbeat.

https://twitter.com/RealSexyCyborg/status/102628661051659469...

Since everyone is talking about the "racist" tweets. Maybe we should also remember how Sarah dog piled onto Naomi Wu.

Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#159

Post by ethanwillis » Thu, Aug 09, 2018, 10:05 AM UTC

bumholio wrote: post #75

There seems to be a natural opportunity for ISPs in a certain country to pay to have all their customers unblocked by major publications relevant to that public - and have a certain fraction of the customer bill disbursed depending on online circulation. I would gladly pay 20% more to my ISP to have hassle free access to major online publications, knowing that revenue helps journalists produce quality news, and that…

Great, then you can pay the extra 20% on my ISP bill.

Re: New York Times Co. Reports $24M Profit, Thanks to Digital Subscribers

#160

Post by unstableph » Thu, Aug 09, 2018, 10:07 AM UTC

naturalgradient wrote: post #154

Latty wrote: post #147

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Far left" is a pretty polarising way to describe them. I'm from the UK, which is a country which is firmly on the right of most of Europe, and policy in the US is extremely far right of here. The reporting I've seen from the New York Times is barely left, let alone "far left". The right seems to have moved so far out to the far right, and yet people act like the centre-point of the Repbulicans and Democrats is still…

I did not call the NYT a far left magazine. I said their reporting on EUROPEAN politics ("politics here") copies points from the far left (e.g. all mass migration is unquestionably good, parties against it must be right wing populists if not racists, etc). I think their reporting on campus politics, identity politics is also far left, but other than that their stance on Iraq war etc is more Hillary-left than traditio…

They are not far left, they are globalist. This is: far left when it comes to social issues in the US (feminism, uncontrolled immigration, etc) but also nuke all the Muslim countries and drag the US into an endless war.