My takeaway from the subscriber loss is that we still live in a world where there are consequences for something like this. They should be bigger, and maybe over time they will be, but at this...
My takeaway from the subscriber loss is that we still live in a world where there are consequences for something like this.
They should be bigger, and maybe over time they will be, but at this point any consequences at all are encouraging. The last year has been a masterclass in escalating insanity normalizing the previous insanity. And that's after the last 8 years, we jumped the shark a long time ago. It's easy for pretty much any story to get lost in the modern media landscape.
So it's encouraging to see 10% of their circulation evaporate over night. No small thing for a legacy media company. Cheers to everyone who cancelled their subscription!
That's a rather uncharitable take. The larger issue is that the billionaire owner is interfering in the The Post's journalistic independence due to his own business entanglements with the US...
That's a rather uncharitable take. The larger issue is that the billionaire owner is interfering in the The Post's journalistic independence due to his own business entanglements with the US government. In attempting to remove the appearance of bias, he ironically made the issue much worse. Readers must now ask themselves: would The Post be able to accurately report on misconduct by a future Trump administration, or would Bezos interfere if he thought Trump would retaliate by blocking AWS contracts, for example?
It also re-raises the existing issue of whether the Post can report on Bezos' companies without interference. Right now I'll assume not in the slightest based on this.
It also re-raises the existing issue of whether the Post can report on Bezos' companies without interference. Right now I'll assume not in the slightest based on this.
I'll assume good faith under the premise that you don't know the context since the OP article didn't really go into it and maybe you didn't read any of the comments here before posting. Others...
I'll assume good faith under the premise that you don't know the context since the OP article didn't really go into it and maybe you didn't read any of the comments here before posting.
Others have covered most of it, so I'll just summarize:
The post has been making endorsements for a very long time (with some breaks, none recently). This makes a non-endorsement significant.
The post has covered Trump, and the race, extensively. Based on the substance of their reporting, the endorsement they would make is a given (not Trump).
The non-endorsement was Bezos' call as reported by the post itself and essentially confirmed in Bezos' recent editorial.
Bezos has significant conflicts of interest, making it pretty much undebateable that his motivation is his business concerns. Trump went after him in his first term, leaving little doubt that he would do it again.
All of this calls into question the ability of the post to do honest reporting going forward, with Bezos now actively interfering.
The larger issue is that the media being influenced by billionaire owners and conglomerates for capitalistic reasons that supercede journalistic ethics is a genuine threat to the democratic process, especially at a time when misinformation is rampant. Reasonably trustworthy sources of news, as a counterpoint to social media hot takes, are in short supply.
In addition, the timing of this decision is notable. Had the decision been made more than a dozen or so days before the election and certainly far before the endorsement was drafted, the argument...
In addition, the timing of this decision is notable. Had the decision been made more than a dozen or so days before the election and certainly far before the endorsement was drafted, the argument that this is course correction back to proper journalism or what-have-you that Bezos tries to make in his editorial would maybe carry more weight. Maybe that is even the right call in the long term. But all the issues you highlighted still hold. Poor timing turns even good decisions into bad ones.
Just because something is widely assumed doesn’t mean it’s “undebatable.” Only Bezos himself knows his motivations; everyone else is guessing. He has claimed that, though poorly timed, it’s for...
Just because something is widely assumed doesn’t mean it’s “undebatable.” Only Bezos himself knows his motivations; everyone else is guessing. He has claimed that, though poorly timed, it’s for reasons of principle, and there’s only circumstantial evidence against that.
I think it was a terrible decision, and he’s more or less admitted to that, but hopefully the Washington Post will recover. They have good reporters.
You're right, the alternative explanation for choosing this timing is that he wasn't smart enough to understand it would hurt their credibility and tank 10% (and counting) of their subscriber base...
You're right, the alternative explanation for choosing this timing is that he wasn't smart enough to understand it would hurt their credibility and tank 10% (and counting) of their subscriber base as legacy media fights to survive.
As opposed to making the announcement at any other time during the 9 years he's owned the post, or after the election, when it would have had a minor impact.
So sure, since someone could hypothesize that Bezos is suddenly that dumb (brain tumor maybe?) I retract the "undebatable".
I'm thinking maybe he's gotten out of touch with what most readers think, perhaps due to being a billionaire. It wouldn't be the first time that's happened. (Not that I have all that much idea...
I'm thinking maybe he's gotten out of touch with what most readers think, perhaps due to being a billionaire. It wouldn't be the first time that's happened. (Not that I have all that much idea what billionaires are like.)
There’s a difference between what you describe and people canceling because the rich guy owner of the paper is meddling with the editorial direction of the paper.
There’s a difference between what you describe and people canceling because the rich guy owner of the paper is meddling with the editorial direction of the paper.
Not a surprise that people would be pissed at Bezos, though I doubt this hurts him all that much. Still, it is a visible protest and backlash. On a humorous, but perhaps not exactly related note,...
Not a surprise that people would be pissed at Bezos, though I doubt this hurts him all that much. Still, it is a visible protest and backlash.
I'm afraid it will just hurt The Post itself. Less customers means more Bezos ruthless "frugality" (an Amazon "value") at the expense of the staff and so the readers. Also, I cancelled mine. So....
I'm afraid it will just hurt The Post itself. Less customers means more Bezos ruthless "frugality" (an Amazon "value") at the expense of the staff and so the readers.
I'm sure it will. I'm not sure if there is anything to be done about that. With the Washington Post now so visibly, unmistakably compromised, it simply isn't what it once was - and that is...
I'm afraid it will just hurt The Post itself.
I'm sure it will. I'm not sure if there is anything to be done about that. With the Washington Post now so visibly, unmistakably compromised, it simply isn't what it once was - and that is incredibly harmful. This whole trend of consolidation and subversion of our news organizations is fundamentally damaging to our democracy. Yet another blow in a long series of blows.
While we're posting animated, fan made Bo Burnham music videos: this artist has one for the same song and another for Jeff Bezos 2 And one more of feel like sh*t for folks anxiously awaiting the...
While we're posting animated, fan made Bo Burnham music videos: this artist has one for the same song and another for Jeff Bezos 2
And one more of feel like sh*t for folks anxiously awaiting the American election
I saw a comment somewhere that rich assh*les like Bezos and Musk want Trump to win because Trump will burn the country down (on purpose or by accident, not sure..) and then the billionaires can...
I saw a comment somewhere that rich assh*les like Bezos and Musk want Trump to win because Trump will burn the country down (on purpose or by accident, not sure..) and then the billionaires can swoop in and buy assets for pennies on the dollar.
It's gross, to wish for the destruction of millions of lives so billionaires can make more money, but at least I can understand the reasoning behind it, I think that would be the only reason to vote for Trump that I can make any sense of.
Musk aside, I'm pretty sure Bezos is just hedging. His baby is blue origin, and blue origin requires deep government cooperation at all levels, from contracts to regulation. A vindictive Trump can...
Musk aside, I'm pretty sure Bezos is just hedging. His baby is blue origin, and blue origin requires deep government cooperation at all levels, from contracts to regulation. A vindictive Trump can easily shutter the whole company, and he'd be fully within his constitutional powers to do so.
The country doesn't even need a firesale if goodies are handed over for free in an orderly fashion. But yes they could also infinite dip with shorting any number of well timed shock announcements....
The country doesn't even need a firesale if goodies are handed over for free in an orderly fashion. But yes they could also infinite dip with shorting any number of well timed shock announcements. Many many golden eggs can be extracted while the goose dies. After that, the flood
So basically Bezos killed the Washington Post on purpose, similar to how Elon killed Twitter. Was anything of value lost? I remember WP articles being pretty good?
So basically Bezos killed the Washington Post on purpose, similar to how Elon killed Twitter.
Was anything of value lost? I remember WP articles being pretty good?
He kills the Post to protect Blue Origin. If Trump wins, Trump could kill contracts with Blue Origin and AWS, so this is Bezos sacrificing the Post as a hedge against Trump winning and going after...
He kills the Post to protect Blue Origin. If Trump wins, Trump could kill contracts with Blue Origin and AWS, so this is Bezos sacrificing the Post as a hedge against Trump winning and going after Blue Origin and AWS.
I agree. I don't agree. A 10% drop in subscribers hurts, but it's not a kill.
If Trump wins, Trump could kill contracts with Blue Origin and AWS, so this is Bezos sacrificing the Post as a hedge against Trump winning and going after Blue Origin and AWS.
I agree.
He kills the Post
I don't agree. A 10% drop in subscribers hurts, but it's not a kill.
I think the thing that kills it is not the immediate subscription loss, but the less definable loss of trust. Even for people who didn't cancel, some portion of them will care less about what WaPo...
I think the thing that kills it is not the immediate subscription loss, but the less definable loss of trust. Even for people who didn't cancel, some portion of them will care less about what WaPo has to say now that they have seen proof that it's Bezos' mouthpiece at the end of the day, and that can lead to changing subscription patterns over time.
I was being hyperbolic in my wording. But a newspaper loosing 10% of its revenue and a sizeable amount of eyeballs could cause a long slide into irrelevancy.
I was being hyperbolic in my wording. But a newspaper loosing 10% of its revenue and a sizeable amount of eyeballs could cause a long slide into irrelevancy.
They asked what Elon would gain from killing Twitter and look where we are, his new platform is massive and people still link to it all the time even though everyone knows it spews right wing...
They asked what Elon would gain from killing Twitter and look where we are, his new platform is massive and people still link to it all the time even though everyone knows it spews right wing bullshit.
Im confused. I dont understand how NOT endorsing a candidate is a bad thing. The media was never supposed to be biased, at least back in the day, it reported the news as best it could, from all...
Im confused. I dont understand how NOT endorsing a candidate is a bad thing. The media was never supposed to be biased, at least back in the day, it reported the news as best it could, from all viewpoints and left the decision making up to the reader. So why is it a big deal to not endorse a candidate. Seems like a step in the right direction back to proper journalism.
At least in the US, for my entire life, the editors of major papers have endorsed candidates. For me, the problem is that the endorsement was written and ready to go before Bezos intervention to...
At least in the US, for my entire life, the editors of major papers have endorsed candidates.
For me, the problem is that the endorsement was written and ready to go before Bezos intervention to stop it.
Is Bezos cowardly and dodging potential anger from Trump if he wins? Trump has talked about how his opponents are the enemy within.
Is Bezos a Trump supporter?
Either way I don't want the owners of newspapers doing this.
To highlight the problem, let me offer a contrasting example. Chapell Roan (a young pop star) refused to endorse a candidate, and I really respect and admire that. It was a principled, personal...
To highlight the problem, let me offer a contrasting example. Chapell Roan (a young pop star) refused to endorse a candidate, and I really respect and admire that. It was a principled, personal stance for her to take, and her reasons were well supported. The editorial board of WaPo didn't choose to take a principled stance, they were prevented from taking their chosen stance. You might say "well isn't Bezos entitled to take a stance like that?" And he is, as an individual, but he shouldn't be using a journalistic outlet to do it. He's made it clear that he controls the Washington Post and nothing they report can be trusted to be free of his control. Even if they report a story that's negative about him, I'm going to think the truth is probably even worse.
If the editorial board had chosen to do this on their own, it's very possible that I would admire the choice, depending on their reasoning, but they didn't.
To add on, I'll note that the Post staff have said that Bezos has never interfered in the news side of the paper. And I believe them. But I'd say he hasn't interfered yet. And my lack of...
To add on, I'll note that the Post staff have said that Bezos has never interfered in the news side of the paper. And I believe them. But I'd say he hasn't interfered yet. And my lack of confidence in that, combined with even less confidence that their readers will know when that line is crossed, has damaged my trust in the paper as an institution. I haven't cancelled, yet, but I also pre-paid for a year so I'd still be accessing what I paid for anyway, so we'll see where I land.
Well if one candidate wants to do facism in America and the other candidate wants to do a bit of infrastructure spending, make abortion legal again and not sell out to western adversaries then it...
Im confused. I dont understand how NOT endorsing a candidate is a bad thing.
Well if one candidate wants to do facism in America and the other candidate wants to do a bit of infrastructure spending, make abortion legal again and not sell out to western adversaries then it might be a good idea to endorse the one who doesn't want to turn the US into a dictatorship.
My takeaway from the subscriber loss is that we still live in a world where there are consequences for something like this.
They should be bigger, and maybe over time they will be, but at this point any consequences at all are encouraging. The last year has been a masterclass in escalating insanity normalizing the previous insanity. And that's after the last 8 years, we jumped the shark a long time ago. It's easy for pretty much any story to get lost in the modern media landscape.
So it's encouraging to see 10% of their circulation evaporate over night. No small thing for a legacy media company. Cheers to everyone who cancelled their subscription!
That's a rather uncharitable take. The larger issue is that the billionaire owner is interfering in the The Post's journalistic independence due to his own business entanglements with the US government. In attempting to remove the appearance of bias, he ironically made the issue much worse. Readers must now ask themselves: would The Post be able to accurately report on misconduct by a future Trump administration, or would Bezos interfere if he thought Trump would retaliate by blocking AWS contracts, for example?
It also re-raises the existing issue of whether the Post can report on Bezos' companies without interference. Right now I'll assume not in the slightest based on this.
I'll assume good faith under the premise that you don't know the context since the OP article didn't really go into it and maybe you didn't read any of the comments here before posting.
Others have covered most of it, so I'll just summarize:
The post has been making endorsements for a very long time (with some breaks, none recently). This makes a non-endorsement significant.
The post has covered Trump, and the race, extensively. Based on the substance of their reporting, the endorsement they would make is a given (not Trump).
The non-endorsement was Bezos' call as reported by the post itself and essentially confirmed in Bezos' recent editorial.
Bezos has significant conflicts of interest, making it pretty much undebateable that his motivation is his business concerns. Trump went after him in his first term, leaving little doubt that he would do it again.
All of this calls into question the ability of the post to do honest reporting going forward, with Bezos now actively interfering.
The larger issue is that the media being influenced by billionaire owners and conglomerates for capitalistic reasons that supercede journalistic ethics is a genuine threat to the democratic process, especially at a time when misinformation is rampant. Reasonably trustworthy sources of news, as a counterpoint to social media hot takes, are in short supply.
In addition, the timing of this decision is notable. Had the decision been made more than a dozen or so days before the election and certainly far before the endorsement was drafted, the argument that this is course correction back to proper journalism or what-have-you that Bezos tries to make in his editorial would maybe carry more weight. Maybe that is even the right call in the long term. But all the issues you highlighted still hold. Poor timing turns even good decisions into bad ones.
Just because something is widely assumed doesn’t mean it’s “undebatable.” Only Bezos himself knows his motivations; everyone else is guessing. He has claimed that, though poorly timed, it’s for reasons of principle, and there’s only circumstantial evidence against that.
I think it was a terrible decision, and he’s more or less admitted to that, but hopefully the Washington Post will recover. They have good reporters.
You're right, the alternative explanation for choosing this timing is that he wasn't smart enough to understand it would hurt their credibility and tank 10% (and counting) of their subscriber base as legacy media fights to survive.
As opposed to making the announcement at any other time during the 9 years he's owned the post, or after the election, when it would have had a minor impact.
So sure, since someone could hypothesize that Bezos is suddenly that dumb (brain tumor maybe?) I retract the "undebatable".
I'm thinking maybe he's gotten out of touch with what most readers think, perhaps due to being a billionaire. It wouldn't be the first time that's happened. (Not that I have all that much idea what billionaires are like.)
There’s a difference between what you describe and people canceling because the rich guy owner of the paper is meddling with the editorial direction of the paper.
Is this a purposeful misframing of the situation or do you not know what happened?
Not a surprise that people would be pissed at Bezos, though I doubt this hurts him all that much. Still, it is a visible protest and backlash.
On a humorous, but perhaps not exactly related note, have a music video of Bezos being a rich evil dick.
I'm afraid it will just hurt The Post itself. Less customers means more Bezos ruthless "frugality" (an Amazon "value") at the expense of the staff and so the readers.
Also, I cancelled mine. So....
I'm sure it will. I'm not sure if there is anything to be done about that. With the Washington Post now so visibly, unmistakably compromised, it simply isn't what it once was - and that is incredibly harmful. This whole trend of consolidation and subversion of our news organizations is fundamentally damaging to our democracy. Yet another blow in a long series of blows.
While we're posting animated, fan made Bo Burnham music videos: this artist has one for the same song and another for Jeff Bezos 2
And one more of feel like sh*t for folks anxiously awaiting the American election
I saw a comment somewhere that rich assh*les like Bezos and Musk want Trump to win because Trump will burn the country down (on purpose or by accident, not sure..) and then the billionaires can swoop in and buy assets for pennies on the dollar.
It's gross, to wish for the destruction of millions of lives so billionaires can make more money, but at least I can understand the reasoning behind it, I think that would be the only reason to vote for Trump that I can make any sense of.
Musk aside, I'm pretty sure Bezos is just hedging. His baby is blue origin, and blue origin requires deep government cooperation at all levels, from contracts to regulation. A vindictive Trump can easily shutter the whole company, and he'd be fully within his constitutional powers to do so.
The country doesn't even need a firesale if goodies are handed over for free in an orderly fashion. But yes they could also infinite dip with shorting any number of well timed shock announcements. Many many golden eggs can be extracted while the goose dies. After that, the flood
So basically Bezos killed the Washington Post on purpose, similar to how Elon killed Twitter.
Was anything of value lost? I remember WP articles being pretty good?
No. What would he gain from doing that?
He kills the Post to protect Blue Origin. If Trump wins, Trump could kill contracts with Blue Origin and AWS, so this is Bezos sacrificing the Post as a hedge against Trump winning and going after Blue Origin and AWS.
I agree.
I don't agree. A 10% drop in subscribers hurts, but it's not a kill.
I think the thing that kills it is not the immediate subscription loss, but the less definable loss of trust. Even for people who didn't cancel, some portion of them will care less about what WaPo has to say now that they have seen proof that it's Bezos' mouthpiece at the end of the day, and that can lead to changing subscription patterns over time.
I was being hyperbolic in my wording. But a newspaper loosing 10% of its revenue and a sizeable amount of eyeballs could cause a long slide into irrelevancy.
They asked what Elon would gain from killing Twitter and look where we are, his new platform is massive and people still link to it all the time even though everyone knows it spews right wing bullshit.
Also, they recently cancelled subscriptions (given free) to federal employees. Definitely couldn’t have helped their numbers.
Im confused. I dont understand how NOT endorsing a candidate is a bad thing. The media was never supposed to be biased, at least back in the day, it reported the news as best it could, from all viewpoints and left the decision making up to the reader. So why is it a big deal to not endorse a candidate. Seems like a step in the right direction back to proper journalism.
At least in the US, for my entire life, the editors of major papers have endorsed candidates.
For me, the problem is that the endorsement was written and ready to go before Bezos intervention to stop it.
Is Bezos cowardly and dodging potential anger from Trump if he wins? Trump has talked about how his opponents are the enemy within.
Is Bezos a Trump supporter?
Either way I don't want the owners of newspapers doing this.
To highlight the problem, let me offer a contrasting example. Chapell Roan (a young pop star) refused to endorse a candidate, and I really respect and admire that. It was a principled, personal stance for her to take, and her reasons were well supported. The editorial board of WaPo didn't choose to take a principled stance, they were prevented from taking their chosen stance. You might say "well isn't Bezos entitled to take a stance like that?" And he is, as an individual, but he shouldn't be using a journalistic outlet to do it. He's made it clear that he controls the Washington Post and nothing they report can be trusted to be free of his control. Even if they report a story that's negative about him, I'm going to think the truth is probably even worse.
If the editorial board had chosen to do this on their own, it's very possible that I would admire the choice, depending on their reasoning, but they didn't.
To add on, I'll note that the Post staff have said that Bezos has never interfered in the news side of the paper. And I believe them. But I'd say he hasn't interfered yet. And my lack of confidence in that, combined with even less confidence that their readers will know when that line is crossed, has damaged my trust in the paper as an institution. I haven't cancelled, yet, but I also pre-paid for a year so I'd still be accessing what I paid for anyway, so we'll see where I land.
See @post_below's comment here (it might be hidden).
Well if one candidate wants to do facism in America and the other candidate wants to do a bit of infrastructure spending, make abortion legal again and not sell out to western adversaries then it might be a good idea to endorse the one who doesn't want to turn the US into a dictatorship.
I was one of the cancellations
??? I don't understand the question.
Ignore the one liner, they haven't figured out this isn't reddit.
What did they even say?
It was just a rude comment.