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| Fifth Column |
| NYT Gave MoveOn.org Huge Discount For Their Attack Ad |
| 2007-09-12 |
| Jake Tapper at ABC News reported that MoveOn.org paid $65,000 for its full page anti-war advocacy sliming of General David Petraeus. This figure raised the suspicions of attentive blogger Confederate Yankee whose intuition appears to be correct. (h/t Michelle Malkin) While looking up the current New York Times rate book he discovered that MoveOn.org received a $102,000 discount on the standard political advocacy rate that is advertised at $167,157. For a newspaper that pretends to be objective purveyors of news this discount seems a bit steep for the deep pocketed liberal advocacy group. In fact the amount MoveOn paid is less than any rate listed in the New York Times schedule. ThereÂ’s not much to say about the character of the New York Times that hasnÂ’t been said already. For a paper that has been paying its investors back with lead weighted returns IÂ’d be a little irritated if I had a stake in a venture that puts the subjective political agenda of the editorial staff above the fiduciary duty of the corporation to its investors. Especially considering that MoveOn.org could easily afford the going rate and likely would have run the ad without such a lavish discount. But then again advocacy as a business plan is exactly what the newspaper is about. When trying to explain how the New York Times Co. managed to shave 50% off the bottom line between 2002 and 2006 some analysts felt that editorial content was not the problem. They looked at other indicators such as poor cost control. They were wrong in my eyes. The arrogance of the people running the New York Times Co. is a reflection of the paper and its approach to journalism. IÂ’d consider this an example of how editorial persuasion reflects much of the back room operations at the newspaper if not the company as a whole. Yesterday the New York Times Co. reached a simultaneous low while its crown jewel newspaper reached a new low by running a personal attack ad against a war hero. Their stock reflected their standing in the world of character by ending the day with a five year low of $20.72. What a perfectly deserving reflection of the quality of the product coming out of the nationÂ’s biggest clearing house for advocacy journalism. |
| Posted by:Anonymoose |
| #9 The New York Times has been dealing with sinking revenues along with every other newspaper in America. The newspaper business has been losing out to the internet, both as a news medium and as a way of passing time. Ad revenues are getting stomped by the internet as well. That's what Google and Yahoo are doing - they're sucking up all the revenues that used to go exclusively to newspapers. If anything, they are more liberal than the New York Times. Note that the New York Post, which is pretty conservative, hasn't made money in all the years that Murdoch has owned it. The Wall Street Journal, which has a conservative editorial page, has been doing so poorly that it had to be put up for sale. The fact is that the economics of the newspaper business aren't what they used to be, as shareholders and the hapless victims of layoffs are rapidly finding out. |
| Posted by: Zhang Fei 2007-09-12 23:19 |
| #8 The only way to read the news is to avoid any story with a NY Times byline. The NY Times ranks below the newspaper that used to print stories about the "bat boy" that the FBI was chasing, and about Hillary's alien lover, and about those seven U.S. Senators who were really aliens from outer space. The Washington insiders thought that the newspaper had it wrong and that there were at least 15 aliens in the Senate. At least that newspaper, now defunct, had a sense of style, a sense of what was important, and never pretended to let the facts get in the way of a good story. Perhaps things would improve if the NY Times would stop pretending to be a fact-based paper. |
| Posted by: whatadeal 2007-09-12 20:38 |
| #7 Why put it in the Times? Isn't that kinda like preaching to the choir? Helluva waste of money if you ask me. |
| Posted by: tu3031 2007-09-12 20:08 |
| #6 And the NYT wonders why it's readership is falling like a brick. |
| Posted by: DarthVader 2007-09-12 18:42 |
| #5 Sorry, this isn't news and isn't important, and for a couple of reasons: 1) the NYT is a private company, and can give a discount to whomever they want, for whatever reason they want (excepting discrimination, of course). 2) ev'ryone knows that the NYT and MoveOn are sympatetico. It's their paper -- only people who should be complaining are the shareholders, and we already know what Pinchy thinks of them. |
| Posted by: Steve White 2007-09-12 18:36 |
| #4 I'll bet the Ad backfired, and I'll bet the NYT gets some of the splashback. |
| Posted by: Bright Pebbles 2007-09-12 18:34 |
| #3 New York Slimes and moveon.whorg A match made in heaven. |
| Posted by: gorb 2007-09-12 18:04 |
| #2 And we are suprised? What shocks me is they did not run it for free. |
| Posted by: 49 Pan 2007-09-12 18:00 |
| #1 Who cares what the list price is. The value of a single page ad in any newspaper is falling like a rock. The relevant question is how does the $65k rate compare to other one time only ad placements? |
| Posted by: Nimble Spemble 2007-09-12 17:20 |