Mr. Zell, not satisfied with the slow decline in advertising and audience his recently purchased newspaper empire (which includes the Chicago Tribune and LA Times) will most certainly experience over the next decade, decided to quicken the pace by trimming news pages across the board and inserting more simple to digest graphical content (a la USA Today). Additionally, in an unprecedented move it was announced that control of the LA Times Magazine would be turned over to the business side of the company (after replacing the entire editorial staff, natch) in what I can only assume will be the making of a giant advertorial for whomever is buying. Sam Zell’s magnanimous failure as a media baron will be clearly marked by these enormous blunders and I suppose the only winner in this is for the NY Times as readers will likely flock to them for in-depth reporting on news stories.
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I’ve been agonizing over the slow march towards the inevitable death of the LAT for years now. Zell is cattle-prodding the Times toward its demise and this saddens me. So much potential, so many powerful journalists, but SZ has no regard for the paper that Otis built.
A damn shame to think that this great bastion of reportage will soon be fish-wrap tabloid junk.
I dunno. Do you pull the bandaid off one hair at time or get it over with in one quick tug? The end result is the same either way.
@ KevinG: True but you have to hang onto the part of the newspaper that matters most. Investigative journalism, holding the government accountable, in depth reporting and fact checking.
Newspapers must do things only newspapers know how to do. There’s a point of equilibrium where they exist far into the future with a smaller staff and an emphasis on filling an important role in society. I don’t think catering to advertisers and creating dumbed down graphics is something we can live without.
I emphatically agree — I’m just less optimistic, I think, about the size of the role at the point of equilibrium.
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