Oh god that New York Times social networking thing is live, for everyone(?), and it's popping up on top of everything we're trying to read. Go away! We don't want to join TimesPeople, a network of Times readers. Honestly the last thing the internet needs is another method of forwarding Krugman columns to people who already fucking read them. [PaidContent]
What does it take to get American editorial pages honest-to-God riled up about something? In addition to the expected criticism from the left, Hank Paulson's $700 billion bank bailout has been savaged by no less a conservative than Newt Gingrich, who wrote, "we’re using the taxpayers’ money to hire people to save their friends with even more taxpayer money." Among the more strenuous Congressional opponents is the Republican senator from Alabama who chairs the Senate banking committee and said he worries the bailout "is neither workable nor comprehensive despite its enormous price tag." The Monday plunge in the dollar and U.S. stocks was widely seen as rendering judgement on the cost and effectiveness of the plan, unveiled over the weekend. And yet, save for some quibbling about oversight, the Times' Tuesday editorial on the matter treats the bailout as a given:
TimesPeople is a new feature on the Times' website that lets logged-in members "share articles, videos, slideshows, blog posts, reader comments, and ratings and reviews of movies, restaurants and hotels." It's been in beta as a Firefox plugin for months, but will go live as a built-in website service and a Facebook app Tuesday morning. Having not tested the real thing yet, I have no witty insights to add.
Hah. So. John McCain's campaign got pissed off at the New York Times for reporting a kinda tenuous connection between McCain campaign manager Rick Davis and Fannie Mae. So strategist Steve Schmidt (pictured), who is increasingly insane and unhinged and so un-Rove-like in his Rovian tactics, held a conference call to attack the Times. "Whatever the New York Times once was, it is today, not by any standard a journalistic organization. It is a pro-Obama advocacy organization that every day attacks the McCain Campaign, attacks Senator McCain, attacks Governor Palin, and excuses Senator Obama," Schmidt sputtered. So, hah, if Politico's Ben Smith's writeup of the call is any indication, this media-attacking will backfire! "But the call was so rife with simple, often inexplicable misstatements of fact," Smith writes, "that it may have had the opposite effect: to deepen the perception, dangerous to McCain, that he and his aides have little regard for factual accuracy" Oh no! They certainly wouldn't want anyone to think they play fast and loose with facts! The lies:
Today in Twitter Journalism, it's our man at the Times, Damon Darlin. You've probably heard about, but haven't read, lovable IT crank Nick Carr's anti-Internet essay, "Is Google Making us Stupid?" Darlin helpfully pares Carr's 4,175-word article down to a single tweet. Then, contrary to what you'd expect from the Gray Lady's newsroom, he says there's a basic human fear over new communications technologies that goes all the way back to the original master of irony. We fed Darlin's essay into our shiny new 100-word-version machine:
Emma Gilbey Keller's new book "The Comeback" is, in part, about emerging from under the shadow of her husband, Times editor Bill Keller. Good luck with that. In the insular world of publishing, the Times Book Review still reigns supreme, and the positive Sunday notice on Emma Keller's title has already arched some eyebrows. Sure, the Keller family connection is disclosed. But people are already wondering about self-dealing at the Times after recent gushing praise for a book by a New York Times Co. executive and four separate plugs for a book by the husband of a company director — whose book-writing son also got notice in the paper. Then there's the efficient praise the Times had for Emma's last book. Newspaper gossips will remember it from the author.
The Federal Reserve announced the conversion of the last two independent investment banks into bank holding companies. The change means Goldman Sachs and Morgan Stanley can borrow money from the Federal Reserve past January but will be more tightly regulated and must hold larger capital reserves. As the Wall Street Journal dramatically put it:
If there's one thing we're absolutely sick of it's journalists complaining about other journalists for no reason except to revel in the glorious, righteous contrarianism of complaint. And we are about to complain about it. Ha, cause we're so contrarian! Check out my surprising viewpoint, baby! I'd like to start off my complaint by telling Washington City Paper editor Erik Wemple to shut up. Wemple's column, which I am now whining about, is him whining about the whining of the New York Times. Specifically, about the Times being disappointed at the fact that their pretty fucking awesome Sarah Palin blowout story last weekend didn't have the same resonance that it would have had in times past, because the media is overcrowded these days. ***WHICH IS TRUE.*** Okay then. Go, Wemple:
Wall Street has been on a historic roller coaster all week, and there's no doubt it's tiring out some business reporters. It was only Monday morning that Times business writer Andrew Ross Sorkin said on CNBC, where he puts in the extra multimedia shift now common to newspaper reporters, that he was operating on just two hours sleep. So perhaps it should not have been entirely surprising that the Times business desk printed Thursday a sensational quote it has now retracted, because it seems no one ever said it.
♦ She's only been on the air a week but Rachel Maddow has already usurped Keith Olbermann in the ratings. [HuffPo]
♦ The New York Times Co. reported today that ad revenue in August dropped 14 percent compared to the same period a year ago and total revenue declined 8.8 percent for the month. [E&P]
♦ A libel lawsuit against author John Grisham has been dismissed. [AP]
♦ Is Al Gore buying a magazine? [Portfolio]
♦ The Atlantic's website has witnessed a surge of traffic thanks to those gross pics of John McCain drinking blood. [Portfolio]
♦ CNBC's Erin Burnett suggests that short-selling is unpatriotic; Jim Cramer says it may be terrorism. [CJR]
The Dow Jones Industrial Average is more like the "Down Jones" this week, with major financial firms folding left and right. But there are two big winners — the websites of the Wall Street Journal and the New York Times. While the Journal might not have picked the most auspicious time to launch a redesign, its site racked up record traffic on Monday. As did the Times on Tuesday. [Beet.tv]
The Times reported on the front page of the paper today that Morgan Stanley CEO John Mack approached Citi chief Vikram Pandit on Tuesday night about combining the two banks. "We need a merger partner or we're not going to make it," Mack allegedly told Pandit. True? Probably not! Remember when Times said that Zoe Cruz would succeed Mack as Morgan's CEO and then she was fired 19 days later? Exactly. Well, the Times has since backpedaled: "The Times's two sources have since clarified their comments, saying that because they were not present during the discussions, they could not confirm that Mr. Mack had in fact made the statement. The Times should have asked Morgan Stanley for comment and should not have used the quotation without doing more to verify the sources' version of events." Maybe the Times also should try and spell names correctly when issuing corrections? [NYT]
♦ Rupert Murdoch says he has no plans to buy the New York Times. He also wants you to know that Fox News chief Roger Ailes is staying put: "He's not going anywhere. He's very happy. I'm very happy with him. We're good friends and we get on well" [SAI]
♦ Katie Couric's interview with Sarah Palin is official. [AP]
♦ A day in the life of Brian Williams and Erin Burnett, courtesy of the Observer's Meredith Bryan. [NYO]
♦ Newark's Star-Ledger may go under. [NYP]
♦ Consumers don't actually want to surf the web, talk on their cell phones, read a newspaper, and watch TV all at the same time. [AdAge]
♦ The New York Times will begin providing business commentary from Breakingviews.com. [NYT]
♦ Ariel Foxman is the new managing editor of InStyle. [Gawker]
♦ Ratings for the fifth season premiere of House were down from last year's debut, but Fox still managed to beat the competition last night. [TV Decoder]
♦ Craziest idea ever: Steve Irwin's 4-year-old son Bob wants his own wildlife TV show. [NYP]
♦ NBC's Ben Silverman says he hasn't managed the "unrelenting press attention" as well as he could have, and he's doing better than most people assme, a sentiment echoed by his close pal, Donny Deutsch. [TVDecoder]
♦ Harbinger's Phil Falcone says he has no plans to dump his investment in the New York Times. [Reuters]
♦ MTV is pulling the plug on TRL. [WSJ]
♦ Mark your calendars: Jeanine Pirro's court show debuts next week. [HuffPo]
♦ Current and former staffers at the LA Times are planning to file suit against owner Sam Zell. [LA Observed]
♦ How writers in Hollywood are dealing with the "new comedic landscape." [NYO]
♦ Product placements have earned less airtime on network TV compared with the same period last year, according to Nielsen. [AdAge]
♦ How the financial meltdown will affect Hollywood. [THR]
♦ Jeff Zucker, Mel Karmazin and Steven Rattner weigh in on the state of the media biz. [Portfolio]
The morning news is terrifying even before the ominous opening of U.S. markets today, and was also scary hours ago before overseas markets opened and U.S. stock futures fell sharply. The bankruptcy at Lehman Brothers, the takeover of Merrill Lynch and the plea by insurance giant AIG for $40 billion in federal aid made for scary front pages (pictured, click for larger image) and heated chatter on CNBC. And no one wasted any time telling everyone how bad things really are. The "American financial system was shaken to its core," the Wall Street Journal said, warning of a "crisis on Wall Street." Other media outlets were scarcely more comforting:
Times editor Bill Keller's hand was suspected in the May departure of Michael Oreskes from the Times-owned International Herald Tribune. "Fiercely ambitious" Oreskes once vied for editorship of the Times itself, the Post's Keith Kelly reported at the time, and may have been made to pay for a "long history of animosity" with Keller. Now another IHT hand, Serge Schemann is being nudged out the door after accusations of disloyalty to Keller, an email tipster claims. His supposed crime: A meeting with former IHT publisher Michael Golden, the rival and cousin to Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger, just hours after a "make or break" November IHT meeting in Manhattan, a meeting that presumably involved Sulzberger underling Keller.
