'The remarkable decline in the WSJ's long-form journalism'

The chart tells it all:

http://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/04/the-remarkable-decline-in-the-wall-street-journals-long-form-journalism/275075/

 

Since Murdoch bought the paper the emphasis has clearly shifted to become breaking news oriented paper. Before Murdoch the paper religiously placed two long features on their front page and would often ignore breaking non-business news stories. Personally, I read the New York Times for breaking news and the Wall Street Journal for features and I really miss the demise of their long features.

I think that this change is due to the fact that Murdoch believes only one national newspaper will survive. So the WSJ had to start featuring breaking news to compete against the New York Times. I believe previous publishers thought the WSJ and the NYT hit different parts of the market. And if it is true only one will survive it will be the WSJ because of deeper corporate pockets.

 

Not necessarily anymore since the spinoff of Murdoch's print operations from the big News Corp. umbrella forced by the phone hacking scandal.

 

But I believe that the News World publishing operations will receive a dowry and be debt free. The Times owes 1.7 billion in long-term debt and back pension liability that I think will eventually doom it.