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The New York Times made a weird editorial decision with its tech coverage

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Re: The New York Times made a weird editorial decision with its tech coverage

#51

Post by socialismisok »

New York Times is a rag, imo. Maybe it's just because I'm a leftist and NYT absolutely loathes the idea of leftists even having the ability to discuss non "radical centrist" ideals, but I've never found much worth reading there. Some anemic both sides opinion pieces, some inflammatory diversity pieces, etc. (And I'm an extremely pro b diversity, equity, inclusion person).

It's just not a great paper unless you are a boomer looking to tell yourself, "no it is the children who are wrong."

Re: The New York Times made a weird editorial decision with its tech coverage

#52

Post by throwaway1777 »

KKKKkkkk1 wrote: post #50
_zgx0 wrote: post #2

>Instead of covering the [tech] industry with a business press lens or a consumer lens they started covering it with a very tough investigative lens — highly oppositional at all times and occasionally unfair. ... >Tech executives and investors mostly did not like this change, for understandable reasons. And I mostly agree with them on the merits. The author agrees - that the tech industry should not be subject to inv…

> You can suggest that coverage is inaccurate or unfair, but suggesting that tech should not be covered with an investigative lens is hard to argue. That's because he's being very charitable to what is happening. In fact, under the guise of aggressively investigative coverage, the media is constantly propagating false memes about the industry. Biggest example is the idea that it's dominated by a culture of white tech…

Too on the nose. When I worked at faang almost my entire org was Indians.

Re: The New York Times made a weird editorial decision with its tech coverage

#53

Post by JamesianP »

pixl97 wrote: post #38
JamesianP wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Personally when I look at the tech section I want to hear what's new in technology (I guess you'd call this marketing), not politics and gossip about what some rich meathead said. Put politics in the politics section, and the gossip in the tabloids.

That boat sailed a long time ago. And while yes, there is a lot of interesting tech news out there, we've had tech companies become the largest corporations on the planet gobbling up every bit of information on every person, well it gets political really quick.

Information technology companies have a lot of information you say? And I guess you mean a long time ago measured in months. These are soap operas to hook a million or so like-minded people, not real news. Certainly not going to change the minds they want to change.

Generally I think that's a problem with modern society, everyone thinks the biggest "problem" that needs fixing is each other and wastes their "civic improvement" energy on fighting to change rules back and forth. Step away from it all for 6 months and it will look small and childish.

Re: The New York Times made a weird editorial decision with its tech coverage

#54

Post by bad_username »

MisterBastahrd wrote: post #23

Musk's acquisition of twitter was, among many other things, an attempt to use his wealth to steer the marketplace of ideas. The man lives in a world where he can freely attempt to destroy anyone who tells him "no" without consequence. The New York Times, then, would seem to have been fully warranted in their apprehension regarding social giants like twitter.

Twitter is hardly a marketplace of ideas. It is a marketplace of hot takes. Twitter format is the enemy of depth and nuance. More importantly, Twitter has been steering this marketplace in a very specific direction, promoting certain viewpoints and suppressing the opposing ones. I am not convinced Musk is going to handle the issue in any good way, but Twitter has not been a neutral "public square" for a good number of years already.

Re: The New York Times made a weird editorial decision with its tech coverage

#55

Post by ALittleLight »

_zgx0 wrote: post #33
ForrestN wrote: post #12

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He's not saying that they shouldn't be subject to coverage "with an investigative lens." He's talking about the adversarial, negative tone of the coverage, relating to the tech industry primarily as full of bad actors rather than a power center worthy of investigation that also does some good things, say. I don't think Yglesias would say we shouldn't investigate these companies, but rather that we should paint a more…

He correctly identifies a fundamental difference between business/consumer reporting, which is often fawning regurgitations of PR materials made with limited due diligence and investigative reporting. I stand by my comment, it seems to me that he is saying the change from business/consumer to investigative was unwelcome and he agrees with that reaction. I think investigative journalism should be fair, but I don't thi…

Shouldn't good investigative journalism just tell you what's true regardless of whether it makes the subject look good or bad? I don't mean that every story must convey the totality of the subject, but the body of reporting should try to resemble the subject - some good, some bad.

Re: The New York Times made a weird editorial decision with its tech coverage

#56

Post by DeathArrow »

_zgx0 wrote: post #2

>Instead of covering the [tech] industry with a business press lens or a consumer lens they started covering it with a very tough investigative lens — highly oppositional at all times and occasionally unfair. ... >Tech executives and investors mostly did not like this change, for understandable reasons. And I mostly agree with them on the merits. The author agrees - that the tech industry should not be subject to inv…

>Tech now is the most wealthy and powerful industry in the US.

I thought weapon and pharmaceutical industries beat the tech.

Re: The New York Times made a weird editorial decision with its tech coverage

#57

Post by watwut »

ForrestN wrote: post #12
_zgx0 wrote: post #2

>Instead of covering the [tech] industry with a business press lens or a consumer lens they started covering it with a very tough investigative lens — highly oppositional at all times and occasionally unfair. ... >Tech executives and investors mostly did not like this change, for understandable reasons. And I mostly agree with them on the merits. The author agrees - that the tech industry should not be subject to inv…

He's not saying that they shouldn't be subject to coverage "with an investigative lens." He's talking about the adversarial, negative tone of the coverage, relating to the tech industry primarily as full of bad actors rather than a power center worthy of investigation that also does some good things, say. I don't think Yglesias would say we shouldn't investigate these companies, but rather that we should paint a more…

It is OK to use adversarial tone. Journalists do not have to limit themselves to fawning admiration. And before there was criticism, there was surplus of fawning admiration.

Cool companies were praised to heaven and admired, Thermos, Tesla, Uber, Google, Facebook you name it. Correction was necessary.

Re: The New York Times made a weird editorial decision with its tech coverage

#58

Post by watwut »

tinalumfoil wrote: post #4

To save you a click, > What's happened is that they have mistaken their own resentment at journalists' unearned checkmark privilege for something that journalists themselves care deeply about and are either willing to pay for or are mad that other people will be able to buy. Basically he's arguing Musk's $8-check decision comes from a misunderstanding of the journalism industry. His point is only marginally related t…

By this interpretation, it is attack on free speech. He wants to prevent criticism of Tesla. Yglesias said not me.

Re: The New York Times made a weird editorial decision with its tech coverage

#59

Post by watwut »

bad_username wrote: post #54
MisterBastahrd wrote: post #23

Musk's acquisition of twitter was, among many other things, an attempt to use his wealth to steer the marketplace of ideas. The man lives in a world where he can freely attempt to destroy anyone who tells him "no" without consequence. The New York Times, then, would seem to have been fully warranted in their apprehension regarding social giants like twitter.

Twitter is hardly a marketplace of ideas. It is a marketplace of hot takes. Twitter format is the enemy of depth and nuance. More importantly, Twitter has been steering this marketplace in a very specific direction, promoting certain viewpoints and suppressing the opposing ones. I am not convinced Musk is going to handle the issue in any good way, but Twitter has not been a neutral "public square" for a good number o…

It was the place where you could read what actual biologists think, actual layers think etc, without having it filtered through third party.

As duch, you really could use it as marketplace of ideas.

Re: The New York Times made a weird editorial decision with its tech coverage

#60

Post by Kbelicius »

ALittleLight wrote: post #55
_zgx0 wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

He correctly identifies a fundamental difference between business/consumer reporting, which is often fawning regurgitations of PR materials made with limited due diligence and investigative reporting. I stand by my comment, it seems to me that he is saying the change from business/consumer to investigative was unwelcome and he agrees with that reaction. I think investigative journalism should be fair, but I don't thi…

Shouldn't good investigative journalism just tell you what's true regardless of whether it makes the subject look good or bad? I don't mean that every story must convey the totality of the subject, but the body of reporting should try to resemble the subject - some good, some bad.

> Shouldn't good investigative journalism just tell you what's true regardless of whether it makes the subject look good or bad?

GP already covered that:

> Should an investigation into political corruption talk about what good that politician did? Maybe if its directly related to the corruption, but otherwise no.

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