Ben Smith, the former top editor of BuzzFeed, on Monday inaugurated his first media column for the New York Times by nibbling the hand that now feeds him — suggesting the Times is becoming a monopoly that’s “bad news for journalism.”
Smith noted that the paper had recovered from its financial slump of just six years ago by selling off businesses and focusing on growing digital subscriptions — a gambit that has paid off since the company, he noted, currently has more digital subscribers than The Wall Street Journal, The Washington Post and 250 local Gannett papers combined.
And as much of the news media has seen mass layoffs of reporters and editors and major slump from investors, the Times has tripled its share price since 2014 and added 400 new employees — and now has an industry-high 1,700 journalists on staff.
“The Times so dominates the news business that it has absorbed many of the people who once threatened it,” Smith wrote, noting that the paper has hired former top editors at digital upstarts such as Gawker, Recode, Quartz and (in his own case) BuzzFeed.
“I worry that the success of The Times is crowding out the competition,” Smith wrote, adding a prediction by Axios founder Jim VandeHei that the paper “is basically going to become a monopoly.”
And some feel that the paper already holds that status as industry consolidation has mushroomed in recent years and local papers have either shut down or scaled back coverage. “The moat is so wide now that I can’t see anyone getting into it,” former Vice News SVP Josh Tyrangiel told Smith. “There’s no new thing coming. And the editor of BuzzFeed News, who was probably the chief insurgent, is now writing this column for you at The New York Times.”
Times publisher A.G. Sulzberger — whom Smith said he once tried to hire to join BuzzFeed — shrugged off the suggestion of a Times “monopoly” even as the paper is now seeking to expand its influence in the podcast space with the likely purchase of Serial Productions.
“What I actually think you’re seeing is not a winner-take-all dynamic — what you’re actually seeing is a rising-tide-lifts-all-boats dynamism,” Sulzberger told Smith.
But one sign of the Times dominance is the very fact that Smith is no longer working at a digital upstart in the media space. “I’m proud to be leaving BuzzFeed News as one of a handful of strong, independent newsrooms still standing amid the rubble of consolidation,” Smith wrote in his column. “But I miss the wide open moment 10 years ago, when we were among a wave of new players reimagining what news meant.”
9 Times New York Times Editorial Made Everyone Freak Out
Bari Weiss: We're All Fascists Now
The New York Times opinion editor set the Internet ablaze after going after college students who she said were trying to shut down free speech. Critics pointed to Weiss mistakenly linking two fake ANTIFA Twitter accounts
MSNBC
David Brooks: 'Girl I Want Your Body'
New York Times Op-Ed columnist David Brooks offered his spin on the MeToo movement in November. But his attempt to speak the language of sex and passion led him to write some lines like "girl I want your body" and "sex is a gold nugget" and the Internet went nuts.
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Bret Stephens' "A Defense, of Sorts, for Harvey Weinstein"
The October, 2017 piece was actually titled "Weinstein and Our Culture of Enablers," but Stephens couldn't resist throwing in the trollish alternative headline see above into a tweeted description of the article -- which promptly precipitated an Internet meltdown
YouTube
David Brooks Urges "Respect to Gun Owners" After Parkland, Florida Massacre
David Brooks set passions aflame after urging "respect" for gun owners after 17 children were killed at a school shooting in Parkland, Florida. "So if you want to stop school shootings it's not enough just to vent and march. It's necessary to let people from Red America lead the way, and to show respect to gun owners at all points," he wrote.
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Quinn "Been Friends with Various Neo-Nazis" Norton
The New York Times got more than they bargained for when they hired tech writer Quinn Norton. Almost immediately after the news was announced old tweets began to emerge including where Norton said she had "been friends with various neo-nazis" and used the N word. The Times cut her loose just hours after she was hired.
YouTube
Bari Weiss Attacks Aziz Ansari Accuser: 'I'll Get Crushed for This'
Weiss risked more wrath on the set of "Morning Joe" in January after blasting a woman who accused comedian Aziz Ansari of sexual misconduct. "It's called bad sex," she told Joe and Mika. "I'll get crushed for saying this."
TheWrap
Bari Weiss Quotes Hamilton: 'Immigrants: We Get the Job Done"
Anti-Weiss Internet mobs were set ablaze after she tweeted out "Immigrants: we get the job done," in response to Olympian Mirai Nagasu's triple axel. Nagasu was born in California to immigrant parents and Twitter furiously dragged her for not paying sufficient deference to the decision.
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James Bennet Diversifies the Times Opinion Pages
Editorial Page Editor James Bennet has said his mission is to broaden editorial diversity on the Times newsroom. The initiative has often been rocky and the paper has been beset by online criticism of hiring choices, and targeted leaks by Times employees unhappy with his changes.
YouTube
David Brooks Sandwich-Shames Less Educated Friend
Perhaps most egregious of all in the mind of Internet warriors was Brooks' confession in a July, 2017 column that he once took a friend "with only a high school degree" into a gourmet sandwich shop but decided to pull a quick switch for Mexican food after, so he said, she appeared overwhelmed by words like Soppressata and Capicollo.
Creative Commons
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Most of the recent fire and fury comes from the paper’s editorial pages
Bari Weiss: We're All Fascists Now
The New York Times opinion editor set the Internet ablaze after going after college students who she said were trying to shut down free speech. Critics pointed to Weiss mistakenly linking two fake ANTIFA Twitter accounts