"If We Don't Have Something Original To Say, We Won't" --Bye, Bye, Newsweek?

Care to offer some info on that?
Really, I'm just curious. I only know of him from a Charlie Rose interview, where he was pumping his Andrew Jackson book.

Though I did wonder how the head man at a national news weekly in crisis had all that time to research and write a massive historical biography, while playing dad to the kids he talked about with Rose.

Made me think of certain newspaper bosses who didn't seem to work all that hard, relative to the foot soldiers.

 

He's a godbothering putz who keeps putting Jeebus on his covers.
Look at this week's NEWSWEEK cover and despair, all ye who enter here.

 

So affluent readers don't want to know about the news of the day? Hmmm

 

This is 99.9% likely to end in tears. On the other hand, if they do concentrate on "long reporting pieces" and meaty cultural features, it could possibly work. As long as they kept somewhat timely, with top-notch writers, it could be the equivalent to a national Sunday newspaper.

 

Here's the thing: If something happens on a Tuesday, what can Newsweek offer me on Monday — six days later?

Why not put "news of the day" on their website and give me lengthy, in-depth, meaty features each week?

And, you only get access to that "as-it-happens news" on the website if you subscribe to the magazine.

 

I worked for an alternative weekly. We goddamn well offered people something about events that happened six days previous, all the time. It takes hard work, intelligence, and the use of perspective. The idea that the first, immediate impact of news, the score, the fact a war started, etc. is all people want to know is bullshit.
Newsweek wants to be the Economist on the cheap. Well, you read the Economist, and there's a HUGE amount of weekly big story coverage in there.

 

The Economist is a tremendous read.
Feels like homework most of the time, but sill amazing.
The biggest problem with daily coverage is a big story on Monday gets bumped by Thursday for the next big story. That still doesn't mean that the story on Monday wasn't huge and that someone needs to put that story in perspective, what it means, five or six days later.
Weeklies still have a place.
It sounds like Newsweek has forgotten that.

 

I really treasure the moments, like this one, when F_B and I are in perfect lockstep agreement.