A director who noisily resigns, her successor who quits and an proprietor who’s focused by his newspaper columns: the influential Washington Put up, owned by Jeff Bezos, is in deep disaster.
On the coronary heart of the storm is WaPo’s new CEO, British William Lewis, who was given a transparent mission by Amazon founder Jeff Bezos when he appointed him final fall: to as soon as once more elevate the profile of this historic newspaper.
The Washington Put up continues to win Pulitzer Prizes half a century after the Watergate scandal broke, however in 2023 it misplaced $77 million, regardless of layoffs and the closing of its Sunday insert.
However this veteran and tried and examined journalist, who even carries the laurels of a landmark exclusivity within the late 2000s on MPs’ spending within the UK, sees his place turning into more and more weak. For weeks, revelations have been mounting about his function within the early 2010s in dealing with a high-profile unlawful wiretapping scandal by the Information of the World tabloid when he labored for the Murdoch household’s conservative media group.
Yesterday, Friday, William Lewis discovered himself once more on the middle of an investigation by his personal journalists. In response to the Washington Put up, he allegedly gave the go-ahead in 2011 for 1000’s of emails to be destroyed, fueling suspicions that he destroyed proof, which he denies.
Requested by AFP after this text was printed, the Washington Put up didn’t reply.
Because the US presidential election approaches, the case is now poisoning the lifetime of a prestigious publishing home that’s “not doing effectively financially,” Dan Kennedy, a journalism professor at Northeastern College, instructed AFP.
Like different media shops, the Washington Put up benefited from the turmoil of Trump’s years within the White Home (2017-2021): “it was seen as reliably and uncompromisingly overlaying” the Republican president’s doings, the professor provides.
However when Donald Trump left the White Home, readers misplaced their urge for food. “The ‘Put up’ was hit notably exhausting. It is a newspaper that appears to say, ‘We’re The New York Instances, however with much less to supply,’” provides Dan Kennedy.
In response to the Wall Road Journal, the newspaper had 2.5 million subscribers on the finish of 2022, up from 3 million firstly of 2021, when Joe Biden took workplace. It’s removed from the circulation rise of the New York Instances (over 10 million subscribers), which was the results of a strategic diversification into lighter content material (video games, recipes, sports activities), with out the New York newspaper renouncing the basics of journalism. .
“We’re dropping some huge cash,” “folks do not learn your articles anymore, I am unable to gild the tablet anymore,” William Lewis mentioned in early June throughout a tense assembly with the board, in line with US media. data.
The day before today, Washington Put up reporters had discovered of the sudden resignation of their editor, Sally Busby.
The latter reportedly expressed her disagreement with Lewis’s technique, which envisages a re-establishment of the editorial board with three poles: two poles, which exist already, for data and opinion, and a 3rd for “specialist data and the social media”.
The define of this “third pole” of editorial stays unclear, however it appears to be aimed on the newspaper reaching a youthful readership and creating extra worthwhile content material, a leap into the unknown for a fairly lean paper.
Inside the Murdoch household group, William Lewis had additionally been the top of the Wall Road Journal (2014-2020), one other jewel of the American press.
However articles within the New York Instances and the Washington Put up pointed to questionable strategies by him or by Robert Winnett, certainly one of his former colleagues whom he chosen to succeed Sally Busby, resembling paying informants or utilizing wiretapped telephone information.
Following these revelations, Robert Winnett resigned on June 21.
For Dan Kennedy, William Lewis can have no alternative however to go away in flip as a result of he “would not have the belief of the workforce”.
“The transplant did not work,” wrote WaPo veteran David Maraniss on his Fb web page.
“If she is just not in a position to encourage the employees (…) the ‘Put up’ will sail with out path and its greatest components will depart,” provides Dan Kennedy.
In response to observers, the end result of the disaster is within the palms of Jeff Bezos, who acquired the Put up in 2013 for $250 million. At current he has supported his basic supervisor.
Learn additionally
Kasselakis challenges Tsipras: Come and take over and I will likely be a soldier, in any other case help me with out video games
INE GSEE survey: The nice unemployment of staff is driving the economic system in Mitsotakis’ Greece
Loud intervention of Tsipras by companions: “It is a disgrace that he did not assist Avgi”
Hydra: The contradictory stories of the Fireplace Division and the birthday of one of many defendants from Kazakhstan
SSY in collapse: Cockroaches, humidity, discredit and exploitation at Amfissa hospital (Pictures)
#Washington #Put up #Jeff #Bezos #Newspaper #Management #Resignations
