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Jon Landman Is New NYT Culture Editor
NYTimes.com Editors Don't Give a Damn About Web Traffic
'Times' Talks Turkey Online and Smack on Murdoch

'New York Times' Rolling Out Moderated Comments On Articles

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SaraRueful
09/15/09

In reply to Jon Landman Is New NYT Culture Editor
The "hero" of the Jayson Blair saga was a woman who Landman foisted Blair off on to try to get him to get his shit together. She is the one who told Landman that Blair shouldn't work for the Times. Landman took the glory and the woman was demoted to copy editor, where she remains today.
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labyrinthine IS DOING THIS
09/15/09

In reply to Jon Landman Is New NYT Culture Editor
'sup, Mister Rogers!
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Phyllis Nefler promoted this comment

Phyllis Nefler
09/15/09

@labyrinthine IS DOING THIS: That picture is truly divine.
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kimsama
09/15/09

In reply to Jon Landman Is New NYT Culture Editor
Wow, I'm going to estimate about -7.5 or -8.0 diopters, there. Definitely a good sign.
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labyrinthine IS DOING THIS
09/15/09

@kimsama: wow indeed.

I look at the picture and I can't NOT see that. jeez.
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Phyllis Nefler promoted this comment Edited by labyrinthine IS DOING THIS at 09/15/09 11:56 AM

wertherian
07/23/09

In reply to NYTimes.com Editors Don't Give a Damn About Web Traffic
And yet, and yet:

http://siteanalytics.compete.com/nytimes.com+gawker.com/

Ah the enigmas of the internet.
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TheHamBeast
07/23/09

In reply to NYTimes.com Editors Don't Give a Damn About Web Traffic
Editorial integrity or not, ignoring your own traffic is insane. It's common practice among web publishers to vary the rates they charge for advertising on different sections of their site BASED ON THE TRAFFIC THEY GET. No wonder they're considering charging visitors because they're flushing free money down the toilet every day.
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Cynical Media Bitch
07/23/09

@TheHamBeast: Ignoring it completely, yes, that's insane. Not so much if you're making it one of many factors.

I have to say that I'm a little surprised to hear them flat-out deny any interest in their stats. I'm always curious to see what my sections have been doing, and to learn what's just not working at all.
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badasscat
07/23/09

In reply to NYTimes.com Editors Don't Give a Damn About Web Traffic
Maybe they actually have some, you know, journalistic standards. I would certainly hope that any actual news source would not be tailoring the news they present based on web traffic but instead on what's actually important.
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Botswana Meat Commission FC
07/23/09

@badasscat:
Yeah, I mean... the end result of chasing pageviews is the sort of coverage you see regularly on the NY Post site or Forbes.com... salacious garbage about Erin Andrews or made up Listicles.
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misslinda
07/23/09

@Botswana Meat Commission FC: Quite certain if the Times switched things up based upon page views, we'd have a front page filled with Palin, the Gosselins, and baby animals doing cute things. Thank you, NY Times, for going down the crapper with integrity. You will be sorely missed.
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Cynical Media Bitch
07/23/09

@badasscat: It depends on whether your mission is to draw eyeballs to your site, or to maintain an image as the newspaper of record. There's no reason why those are incompatible.

I check the Times front page every hour or two just for giggles, and I look at the "Most Read" and "Most Emailed" tabs. It's an interesting way to look at the site, even if I seem to be more interested in the NYT's page stats than its own Webxecutives.
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The Cajun Boy
07/23/09

@Cynical Media Bitch: I often do the same thing. The "most emailed" and "most blogged" lists always get my attention.
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LolpantsofArabia
07/23/09

In reply to NYTimes.com Editors Don't Give a Damn About Web Traffic
I used to work for a paper that worried about web stats. When I joined, it was a quality paper, with proper news. When I left, it was running stories about Amy Winehouse getting her tits out on a beach and a 16yo girl with a bat in her bra.

Focusing on web stats is inevitably a race to the bottom, as you chase the lowest common denominator. Any news source that wants to maintain any kind of reputation for quality has to ignore them.
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Botswana Meat Commission FC promoted this comment Edited by LolpantsofArabia at 07/23/09 8:29 AM LolpantsofArabia was starred LolpantsofArabia was unstarred

Magister
07/23/09

In reply to NYTimes.com Editors Don't Give a Damn About Web Traffic
While I believe they might want to look at trends, I'm glad they don't tailor their product to the lowest common denominator.

It's sort of like the difference between The NewsHour and the ratings-driven content of their commercial competitors. The NewsHour and NYTimes.com tell me what's important, rather or not the majority of people would like to hear.
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Edited by Magister at 07/23/09 8:26 AM Magister was starred Magister was unstarred

Cynner
07/23/09

In reply to NYTimes.com Editors Don't Give a Damn About Web Traffic
I read The NY Times, LA Times and other newspapers for their 'unique' stories and writer's prespectives. They're doing something right, whether or not they follow their 'traffic' of hot stories. If they only followed their hot stories, The NY Times would become a gossip and 'murder' story newspaper instead of remaining reading worthy when you're tired of the news of death, decay and deceit.
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momo
07/23/09

In reply to NYTimes.com Editors Don't Give a Damn About Web Traffic
It's called having an editorial point of view.

Once upon a time this site took a stand and banned coverage of Paris Hilton. It was at a time when people were falling over themselves to create traffic from Hilton stories. As Gawker has become downgraded from a premium to a mass brand, these types of calls don't seem to be made as you basically more chase stories that everyone else is chasing more than find unique points of view.

NYT retains premium branding by maintaining a point of view. That's a good thing.
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