For context, this is part of sweeping cuts to NYT editorial staff:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/blogs/erik-wemple/wp/2017/05/...
The New York Times Is Eliminating Its Public Editor Role
11–20 of 110 posts
Re: The New York Times Is Eliminating Its Public Editor Role
#12Unfortunately, the thing that will always stick in my memory about Liz Spayd is her criticism of the New York Times for refusing to give more credence to the claim that junk emails about Trump hotels were a secret communications channel with Russia: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/20/public-editor/trump-russi... (Seriously. Every single piece of evidence pointed to the communications being mass marketing emails, from the companies actually operating the server to The Intercept obtaining copies of some of the emails.)
Re: The New York Times Is Eliminating Its Public Editor Role
#13Unfortunately, the thing that will always stick in my memory about Liz Spayd is her criticism of the New York Times for refusing to give more credence to the claim that junk emails about Trump hotels were a secret communications channel with Russia: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/20/public-editor/trump-russi... (Seriously. Every single piece of evidence pointed to the communications being mass marketing emails, from…
Wouldn't be surprised if in a few years there will be studies about the "Russia" propaganda campaign. How first it was very effective, everyone repeating the same things, the infamous "dossier" with sexual allegations, communication via mass marketing emails and so on. How it was beautiful and effective, and then everyone went too far and it ended up as a very expensive, counterproductive and embarrassing affair.
Also I wonder to what degree the journalists and anchors involved actually believe those things, or they simply know what to sell and do it regardless of their personal convictions in the matter.
Re: The New York Times Is Eliminating Its Public Editor Role
#14Unfortunately, the thing that will always stick in my memory about Liz Spayd is her criticism of the New York Times for refusing to give more credence to the claim that junk emails about Trump hotels were a secret communications channel with Russia: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/20/public-editor/trump-russi... (Seriously. Every single piece of evidence pointed to the communications being mass marketing emails, from…
Wouldn't be surprised if in a few years there will be studies about the "Russia" propaganda campaign. How first it was very effective, everyone repeating the same things, the infamous "dossier" with sexual allegations, communication via mass marketing emails and so on. How it was beautiful and effective, and then everyone went too far and it ended up as a very expensive, counterproductive and embarrassing affair. Als…
I'm not sure you understand. It's not about what journalists genuinely believe, it's about what narrative creates the most polarizing, emotional and long-standing controversy, because those traits result in eyeballs and therefore revenue.
That's why Trayvon Martin was such a massive story... two polarized, completely entrenched sides battling at it endlessly. Truth didn't matter, the hyped up emotionalism of it all was a windfall for the media.
Re: The New York Times Is Eliminating Its Public Editor Role
#15Unfortunately, the thing that will always stick in my memory about Liz Spayd is her criticism of the New York Times for refusing to give more credence to the claim that junk emails about Trump hotels were a secret communications channel with Russia: https://www.nytimes.com/2017/01/20/public-editor/trump-russi... (Seriously. Every single piece of evidence pointed to the communications being mass marketing emails, from…
Wouldn't be surprised if in a few years there will be studies about the "Russia" propaganda campaign. How first it was very effective, everyone repeating the same things, the infamous "dossier" with sexual allegations, communication via mass marketing emails and so on. How it was beautiful and effective, and then everyone went too far and it ended up as a very expensive, counterproductive and embarrassing affair. Als…
Did you read what you're replying to? The New York Times didn't buy into some sort of "propaganda campaign", nor were they part of it.
If anything it proves that journalism is doing quite well at the NYT, and the narrative of "bias" and "propaganda campaigns" is undermining civil society, and unfairly accusing people doing the best they can and mostly succeeding.
Re: The New York Times Is Eliminating Its Public Editor Role
#16Earlier quoted context omitted.
Wouldn't be surprised if in a few years there will be studies about the "Russia" propaganda campaign. How first it was very effective, everyone repeating the same things, the infamous "dossier" with sexual allegations, communication via mass marketing emails and so on. How it was beautiful and effective, and then everyone went too far and it ended up as a very expensive, counterproductive and embarrassing affair. Als…
I'm not sure you understand. It's not about what journalists genuinely believe, it's about what narrative creates the most polarizing, emotional and long-standing controversy, because those traits result in eyeballs and therefore revenue. That's why Trayvon Martin was such a massive story... two polarized, completely entrenched sides battling at it endlessly. Truth didn't matter, the hyped up emotionalism of it all w…
I'm not sure you understand: the Times didn't publish those stories, precisely because they didn't feel they had proof, and in doing so they were willing to miss out on the eyeballs and revenue that would have come with publishing.
Re: The New York Times Is Eliminating Its Public Editor Role
#17Good take on this from Politico: http://www.politico.com/magazine/story/2017/05/31/good-ridda...
Re: The New York Times Is Eliminating Its Public Editor Role
#18So they think that they can just replace that role with social media? Wasn't the whole issue with newspapers in the 2016 election was they relied far too much on social media and ended up in a bubble? I don't see anything in the article that makes me feel like they are interested in fixing that problem.
Nate Silver has done some good work on what exactly went wrong, and it was a combination of factors:
- (some) polls were systematically off, mostly because they underestimated white non-college turnout and overestimated black turnout. Note that poll errors were actually lower than for any other election–only this time they actually got the winner wrong.
- Most of the poll aggregators operated under the assumption of statistical independence of state-level results. This was a serious mistake, and both Huffpost as well as The Upshot (to a lesser extend) should be somewhat ashamed. 538, by the way, did this right and had Trump at 3X% on election day.
- There actually was some significant change in voters' intent in the last days, possibly fuelled by all the news stories the FBI directors was generating. It's highly likely that an election two weeks earlier or two weeks later would have ended differently.
It's also important to note that newspapers aren't really in the business of predicting the future. If they "relied too much on social media" for any facts they reported, I'd love to see some examples.
Re: The New York Times Is Eliminating Its Public Editor Role
#19So they think that they can just replace that role with social media? Wasn't the whole issue with newspapers in the 2016 election was they relied far too much on social media and ended up in a bubble? I don't see anything in the article that makes me feel like they are interested in fixing that problem.
ended up in a bubble? Yes they did. They know it. And they don't really give a fuck. After the election they did some public navel gazing about what went wrong. To prove they were serious, there was even an editorial about The Future of the Times . So I wrote to Ms Spayd. I challenged her, at the next meeting of journalists and editors, to say something like: "show of hands, who voted for Donald Trump for president".…
Employing Trump voters would create an unsafe work environment for women and minorities.
Re: The New York Times Is Eliminating Its Public Editor Role
#20On one hand, having an ombudsman (whatever you want to call it) is a good thing for an institution like the Times. On the other hand... having Liz Spayd in that role is pointless, so this isn't a loss. The past year has shown us how the New York Times has let false equivalence and the need to sell newspapers to both sides of the aisle has severely damaged the quality of the paper's coverage, and Spayd has continually…
I'd feel more able to agree with you if the NYT didn't carry water for some whoppers ("you can keep you doctor", "insurers will compete for your business", etc.) back when the ACA was passed in the first place.