The Decline of a Newspaper
Posted on July 31st, 2007 in Uncategorized | 19 Comments »
Reading the “World” section of the Globe today, I see…
Bush, Brown commit to unified Iraq stance (By Michael Abramowitz, Washington Post) Awaiting key bills, Iraq’s Parliament adjourns (By Qassim Abdul-Zahra, Associated Press) Oxfam calls for more aid to relieve country’s woes (By Damien Cave, New York Times News Service) DAILY BRIEFING: Diplomat clarifies criticism of Saudis (Today’s Globe) Iran slams US arms deal for Middle East (By Robin Wright, Washington Post) ‘Acts amount to war crimes’ (By Bradley S. Klapper, Associated Press) China turns again to ancient ethics (By Maureen Fan, Washington Post) Taliban kidnappers kill 2d Korean hostage (By Sayed Salahuddin, Reuters) Philippines called hot spot for terror (By Manny Mogato, Reuters) China’s military marks 80th anniversary, amid concern (By Christopher Bodeen, Associated Press) Japan’s opposition party calls on prime minister to resign (By Hiroko Tabuchi, Associated Press) Taliban backers seize Islamic shrine in Pakistan (By Riaz Khan, Associated Press) Not one piece is original to the Globe. (No, not even the “Daily Briefing,” which presents itself as Globe-specificâit’s AP copy.) The same is largely true of the “Nation” section.
You Boston folks probably know this, but the Globe has become a local paper with wire stories about things going on in places other than Boston….
19 Responses
7/31/2007 7:57 am
Yes, Richard we are well aware of this and it is mainly the NYT’s fault.
You remember we went over this several months ago. Back in 1994/5 the Taylor family decided to sell the Globe; wanted to sell to the Post but Warren Buffet who sits on the Post board advised Kay Graham that there wasn’t enough “penetration” in the Globe market. So it was sold to the Times.
Now one other reason Bostonian’s don’t read the thing-when the Globe decided to go after the Catholic Church in Boston it exposed and rightfully so the crimes perpetrated by clergy. Bostonians read the reporting begrudgingly since it is widely known that the Globe has always been anti-Catholic but it needed to be exposed.
Rather than stop there, the NYT took the reporting and fashioned it into a bestselling expose on the scandal making huge profits off of the misery of poor innocents. No money from the sale or proceeds of the book was ever offered or donated to the victims and thus they were victimised again by the greed of the press who as we know are only gathering information on any story to sell papers.
Don’t want to hear any high-minded stuff about fourth estate-it is a business plain and simple and it, by its work (lack thereof), management(no talent) and actions (biased and partisan), has rendered itself irrelevant.
Oh, the sports reporting isn’t bad in the Globe-wonder if that is because the NYT is a limited owner of the Red Sox and even the Times knows not to mess in that sandbox.
So, if WSJ is sold to Murdoch do you think it will improve or will it suffer the same fate as the Globe?
Perhaps it is no wonder the younger generation gets it’s news from Steven Colbert.
7/31/2007 9:10 am
And it’s not just the younger generation that doesn’t know how to keep its “its”es straight.
Too many years of reading the Globe, perhaps?
7/31/2007 9:22 am
thanks Richard for posting an entry that invites thoughtful discussion. The blog has been very much on a summer light mode lately. Perhaps to be expected this time of year when your usual contributors are not reading or posting.
Surprised you missed this? sounds like the kind of thoughtful reflection that calls for a little discussion… but then again, maybe leave it for the fall when people return.
http://margaretsoltan.phenominet.com/2007/07/return-with-ud-to-fair-harvard-days-of.html
7/31/2007 11:46 am
The above link
7/31/2007 11:47 am
Third time’s a charm, maybe: link
7/31/2007 11:50 am
So, if the Globe had been sold to the Post and not the Times, would the M-Bomb have been told to leave Larry alone?
7/31/2007 12:12 pm
are you saying she was told to leave Larry and Harvard alone by the Times?
7/31/2007 12:30 pm
She wasn’t told to stop by the Globe.
7/31/2007 12:34 pm
And, if the Globe had no compunction about the frontal assualt on the Boston Archdiocese (which the Globe’s dislike and bigotry towards the institution had before only been more inferred or understood) do you think it, being under new management as it is, will really care about dismantling another old rich institution such as Harvard?
Larry may have only been the beggining….
7/31/2007 1:35 pm
The Globe better not DARE to touch Harvard. Of the two institutions only one has the might to wipe the other out, and it is not the Globe.
7/31/2007 2:07 pm
Margaret Soltan goes after the Big H again.
This part is best:
The striking thing about Harvard University, the talked-about thing, the thing much more notable than its professors and its libraries (which, as Tim points out, aren’t as impressive as you might think given all that cash), is a degree of wealth unmatched by many nations of the world. What sort of power fantasy is Harvard playing here? Why has it, in gaining wealth obscenely disproportionate to any other institution of higher learning in the world, and obscenely disproportionate to anything that Harvard University might need to maintain and improve itself, removed itself from the fellowship of universities?
http://margaretsoltan.phenominet.com/2007/07/tim-burke-weighs-in-on-endowment.html
The instigator was apparently this post by Timothy Burke at Swarthmore:
http://weblogs.swarthmore.edu/burke/?p=409
7/31/2007 2:31 pm
i think you just did dare them.
7/31/2007 2:34 pm
The Globe single handedly took down the church in Boston and caused a furore worldwide. I wouldn’t double dare Tommy Farragher or Walter Robinson.
7/31/2007 9:01 pm
I think, Richard, that you are mistaken. You are NOT reading the Boston Globe online, you are reading something called Boston.com, also owned by NYT, but not a very faithful mirror of the paper copy of the newspaper. The Globe, the paper product, is still dominated by locally-reported stories, but Boston.com is free to choose wire stories over Globe-authored material, and often does, for weird internal reasons.
Oh, and in case you hadn’t noticed, daily journalism in general is in a steep and seemingly irrreversible decline, and the Globe has suffered much LESS (in terms of layoffs, budget cuts, cuts in local content) than once-great papers like the Philadelphia Inquirer.
Not that I am uncritical of the Globe, (there are as many Cambridge, MA datelines in the Wall Street Journal, many weeks, as there are in the Globe) but I don’t think your comment hits the target it aims for.
7/31/2007 9:19 pm
No, 9:01, I’m reading the Globe. If you click on “Today’s Globe,” you can check for yourself.
7/31/2007 10:30 pm
definitely a hot summer in Cambridge. This blog is melting down. It’s much more engaging in the fall, winter and spring. Which of the following could be the reason for this?
a) The synapses of cantabrigians slow down in the summer becaus of the excessive heat.
b) Only those with access to air conditioned rooms are inclined to spend time in front of a computer
c) The really smart people move to the Vineyard, or other places, and do not read this blog regularly
d) Nothing interesting happens at Harvard in the summer
e) All newsworthy people at Harvard are on vacation.
f) All fools normally the object of attention of this blog are on vacation.
g) Richard is still under the influence of the explosion of the steam pipe in front of his office building and his contributions reflect a recent post-traumatic stage.
h) The shock of the explosion has Richard pondering the meaning of life and asking himself whether continuing this blog makes sense
i) is not that the quality of this blog during the summer, but rather that some readers become grouchier because of the excessive heat.
j) All of the above
k) None of the above
l) Some of the above
m) Sam Spektor has decided not to blog again.
n) Standing Eagle has disabled this blog.
o) The Harvard Management Company is the major investor in 02138
p) Richard Bradley is really Larry Summers
q) Larry Summers is really Cornell West
r) Cornell West is really Richard Bradley
7/31/2007 10:33 pm
Here’s another answer for my slender blogging of late: Richard Bradley is finishing a book and helping to put out a magazine at the same time. Sleeping and blogging are paying a price…..
8/1/2024 9:56 am
The American press has the blues. Too many authorities have assured it that its days are numbered, too many good newspapers are in ruins. It has lost too much public respect. Courts that once treated it like a sleeping tiger now taunt it with insolent subpoenas and put in jail reporters who refuse to play ball with prosecutors. It is abused relentlessly on talk radio and in Internet blogs. It is easily bullied into acquiescing in the designs of a presidential propaganda machine determined to dominate the news. Russell Baker in the NY Review of Books
8/1/2024 12:36 pm
Russell Baker is still alive?