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Departing the New York Times

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Re: Departing the New York Times

#41

Post by tptacek »

tkgally wrote: post #32

I’ve been reading opinion columnists at the New York Times for nearly a half century. My opinion is that the paper should stop giving de-facto lifetime tenure to columnists. All of the long-term columnists I remember—with the possible exception of Russell Baker—became predictable and repetitive. Paul Krugman was not the worst in that regard by any means. The champion was A. M. Rosenthal: Israel good, China bad, drug…

Our politics might not line up perfectly, but we got the same subtext from Krugman's complaint: when he suggests he needs many columns to convey the ideas he's trying to convey, I put myself in his editor's shoes and think "this content isn't selling well".

If this was reporting, I'd be alarmed, but it's not; it's opinion content, which is epsilon from entertainment. Krugman wants an unfiltered feed of his takes for his audience, and the good news here is that there's a facility perfectly matched for that: his Substack. I wish him all the best.

Re: Departing the New York Times

#42

Post by tptacek »

kyrra wrote: post #26
PaulHoule wrote: post #25

I'd argue that it's worse news than it appears. Bari Weiss left for the same reason Krugman did (you can make more money for less hassle with a Substack) even though her politics were the opposite and she didn't have as good a gig as Krugman did. Since the NYT had a web site everybody there knows they live and die based on the usage stats, and the usage stats says that people would rather read Krugman, Klein, Brooks…

Bari Weiss is center left by the way. Prior to her New York times stint, she was at wsj editorial pages where she was to the left of basically everyone. If you read her actual political beliefs, she's more of a classical liberal.

Famously, most people are to the left of the WSJ editorial page. That's not a dunk; that's literally what the WSJ is selling. You can be pretty far to the right of the American consensus and still to the left of the WSJ opinion staff.

Re: Departing the New York Times

#43

Post by favorited »

kyrra wrote: post #26
PaulHoule wrote: post #25

I'd argue that it's worse news than it appears. Bari Weiss left for the same reason Krugman did (you can make more money for less hassle with a Substack) even though her politics were the opposite and she didn't have as good a gig as Krugman did. Since the NYT had a web site everybody there knows they live and die based on the usage stats, and the usage stats says that people would rather read Krugman, Klein, Brooks…

Bari Weiss is center left by the way. Prior to her New York times stint, she was at wsj editorial pages where she was to the left of basically everyone. If you read her actual political beliefs, she's more of a classical liberal.

> she was at wsj editorial pages where she was to the left of basically everyone

That's like saying Weiss must be very tall, because you saw her standing next to a classroom of primary school children. The WSJ's editorial reputation is so poor that WSJ's own journalists asked their publisher to do something about it.

https://archive.ph/mDRvW

Re: Departing the New York Times

#44

Post by ThrowawayR2 »

unyttigfjelltol wrote: post #19
jaredklewis wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's wrong with economists? Not a huge Krugman fan, but I feel economists bring important insights from data that tend to escape regular journalists. If Krugman wore his economist hat more and stayed away from general political punditry, I would probably like him more. The writing of Emily Oster is a great example of what economists can bring to analysis of current events. I wish we could clone her.

[flagged]

The HN moderation team has said that machine generated submissions and posts are not welcome here, e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33950747.

Re: Departing the New York Times

#45

Post by azemetre »

tptacek wrote: post #41
tkgally wrote: post #32

I’ve been reading opinion columnists at the New York Times for nearly a half century. My opinion is that the paper should stop giving de-facto lifetime tenure to columnists. All of the long-term columnists I remember—with the possible exception of Russell Baker—became predictable and repetitive. Paul Krugman was not the worst in that regard by any means. The champion was A. M. Rosenthal: Israel good, China bad, drug…

Our politics might not line up perfectly, but we got the same subtext from Krugman's complaint: when he suggests he needs many columns to convey the ideas he's trying to convey, I put myself in his editor's shoes and think "this content isn't selling well". If this was reporting, I'd be alarmed, but it's not; it's opinion content, which is epsilon from entertainment. Krugman wants an unfiltered feed of his takes for…

It's one of the reasons why I stopped reading most nonfiction books (outside of history or biographies), they all take way too long to make their point. It feels like most modern books can get their message across in 20 pages but I suppose not many people would buy a thick pamphlet.

Re: Departing the New York Times

#46

Post by unyttigfjelltol »

ThrowawayR2 wrote: post #44
unyttigfjelltol wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

[flagged]

The HN moderation team has said that machine generated submissions and posts are not welcome here, e.g. https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=33950747 .

Does it make you feel better that the AI and I engaged in an iterative process to identfy what, precisely, in Krugman's long career was so irritating? The AI couldn't figure it out at first.

The link you shared says bots are banned. I am not a bot. No one down voted me because they misunderstood I was a bot.

The link also says single-purpose users are not in the HN spirit either. I recognize many people here use throwaways for legitimate privacy reasons, but ... c'mon, telling me bots can't post here is not in the spirit of that tradition.

Re: Departing the New York Times

#47

Post by patriot_games »

tptacek wrote: post #3

So, the piece here wants to frame this as an ideological issue, but the kernel of it seems to be: * the Times employed Krugman to generate content, originally on terms that included a Times-branded blog where he could write with minimal editorial oversight. * The Times consolidated their opinion content and eliminated the blog, leaving Krugman only venues with extensive editorial oversight, notably including how ofte…

This editorial oversight is not evenly spread over the opinion pages. Bret Stephen’s isn’t edited.

Re: Departing the New York Times

#48

Post by insane_dreamer »

tptacek wrote: post #40
jaredklewis wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

What's wrong with economists? Not a huge Krugman fan, but I feel economists bring important insights from data that tend to escape regular journalists. If Krugman wore his economist hat more and stayed away from general political punditry, I would probably like him more. The writing of Emily Oster is a great example of what economists can bring to analysis of current events. I wish we could clone her.

Nothing at all in particular, just: I don't think the Times needs another Krugman. I'm a subscriber who thinks they should do more reporting and less, at least a little bit less, opining.

I’m a subscriber who thinks that opinion pieces offer points of view - that you won’t get in regular reporting. I only read a couple of NYT op-ed writers and rarely Kaufman anymore (a The Atlantic level of devotion to Israel that I cannot stomach), but I still think that they perform an important journalistic function.

Re: Departing the New York Times

#49

Post by JeremyNT »

hackyhacky wrote: post #35
JeremyNT wrote: post #29

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> My interpretation of Krugman's departure is that higher-ups edited and re-edited his columns to reduce the possibility of calling up a kerfuffle. They wanted him to soften his words and blunt his message because they were sensitive to calls of media bias. I think that's exactly the wrong response. This seems to be how Krugman is framing it, but is editorial oversight actually bad? In the past this kind of pundit cl…

Sure, why not. Krugman could be lying about the reason for his departure. In fact, maybe he left to avoid embarrassment from the public revelation of his illicit economist-on-editor sex affair. However, that's what might be politely called "unsupported speculation" aka "just making things up." Without evidence to the contrary, I see no reason not to take Krugman at his word.

> I see no reason not to take Krugman at his word.

Why do you find him trustworthy? He's clearly got an axe to grind and lots of incentive to make himself look good on his own blog.

Numerous times I've read blog posts on HN which present one person's side of a dispute, only to see it refuted later.

I'm glad to withhold judgment here until more information is available.

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