NY Times SE "Bumped" Upstairs

I love the NY tab covers.

But like it or not, the NYT is read by the AP suits in the Big Apple, and yes, they still do set the national agenda to an extent. The tabs own the city.

 

Giving your readers a need to seek out nuts-and-bolts via a competitor is never a good idea. If you've already lost them to other media outlets, I guess you then focus on your niche (hyperlocal for many, this esoteric stuff for the Times apparently). But they're the NYT, for crying out loud. They should be one of the few for which people forsake their other (dying) papers.

Jolly's we're-going-to-be-different conceit ceded turf and made them less relevant.

 

Joe, I disagree with them ceding nuts-and-bolts. I think that they do a very adequate job with nuts-and-bolts. They do a better job with that than my local metro, plus they give me a whole lot more.

The only people they shortchange might be the really hardcore NY metro sports team fans. But the hardcores probably read more than one paper or read one paper and check out other paper websites.

I actually think the move has made them more of a must read. While most of the NYC market papers are fighting over the same story or one of two or three stories, the Times is often off finding something that's more interesting.

There was a time when a reader could go to one of a handful of top regional papers across this country and get a really good sense of what was going on in the sports world. I don't think that's the case any longer. Not with all the cutbacks in terms of space, bodies, etc. The NYT is the closest thing to a complete read that's out there.

 

The Times is a national paper. It has to have a national focus in its sports section to some extent.

 

ok, accguy, so where does this leave us on the issue of why jolly was bumped outta sports? i mean, we've long debated whether the change of direction by the times sports section was a move for the better or worse? do you have any insight into why jolly was bumped then?

 

The Times moves its mid-level editors around pretty frequently, or at least freely. It's not always a sign of dissatisfaction that someone moves. Often as not, it's to keep that editor/that section/that staff from getting stale or complacent.

 

Who's going to replace him?

I can't even imagine who would be on the short list.

 

Ahem.

 

I see quite a few people on the subway reading the Times. But yeah, I'd say most of them aren't reading it for the sports section.

 

Yeah, I feel like it's usually the National or Business section. If I see someone reading sports it's usually the Daily News or the Post. Overwhelmingly, though, it seems that most people in the morning, if they're reading a paper are reading one of the free ones. But I also spend most of my time on the subway reading books so I could be missing it.

 

Why can't you cede turf? Many companies do that because they don't want to appeal to the lower common denominator. A fine restaurant isn't going to have a dollar menu and the Times isn't going to have a Page Six.

 

By the way, the night news editor is a more responsible job at the Times than at most places. He'll be the last grown-up standing, who makes all the tough calls after the editor and managing editor go home -- what breaking news goes onto page one, for example, what projects get held for another day, what stories trim 500 words because something better came along. The Boston Globe editor, Marty Baron, once had that job.