New York Times

Last week, Executive Editor Bill Keller told The New York Times newsroom at his bi-annual State of the Newsroom address that the reporting job to cover the Obama White House would be "pretty goddamn amazing." Likewise, Jill Abramson gushed to a crowd of Times readers on Election Night that the Obama administration would change Washington "hugely" and that "the Obamas have a kind of celebrity that remind me a little bit of the Kennedys in 1960."

Okay!

So who are the lucky folks who get to get the most prized job at the paper?

Michael Calderone of Politico is reporting that Obama campaign beat reporter Jeff Zeleny, foreign affairs reporter Helene Cooper, and Times Magazine contributor Peter Baker will all be heading to the White House for the paper. Additionally, Sheryl Gay Stolberg, the current Bush White House reporter (not exactly a prized job) will stay on the beat.

Newspapers dead?

Today's day-after the election issue of The New York Times—the one with the OBAMA banner headline that the paper's masthead decided on after consulting some of its readers—is selling out fast. (Need proof: Check out this photo from Gawker.)

The paper's spokeswman, Catherine Mathis, has told us that the paper is printing an extra 50,000 copies for the afternoon rush at transit-hubs like Grand Central, Penn Station, and Port Authority. It's a veritable P.M. editition of The Times!

"We had increased our print run for single copy sales today by about 35%," she writes. "In 2004 we saw an increase in sales of around 50,000 copies the day after the election and based on what we've seen today, we expect to significantly surpass those sales.  read more »

Before the New York City Council decided last week to vote in favor of Michael Bloomberg’s plan to extend term limits, attorneys were already challenging the new law in court.

Reports after the Council voted made note of two lawsuits, one filed by members of the Council who opposed the majority and the other, filed on October 22, on behalf of,  read more »

At yesterday's Times State of the Newsroom meeting, a staffer asked executive editor Bill Keller if the paper was running out of money. Mr. Keller handed the mic over to New York Times President and General Manager Scott Heekin-Canedy who said, definitively, no.

"We have the ability to pay our debt, we're not concerned about it, we're watching it carefully in these credit markets, our liquidity is sound and our pension funds are fully funded and will be all through 2009 and beyond as far as we can see," he said.

The staffer also asked about an item written by Silicon Alley Insider co-founder Henry Blodget that followed this premise with an argument about the Times Company's financial position:

the New York Times (NYT) is approaching the point where it will have to manage its business primarily to conserve cash and avoid defaulting on its debt.  read more »

Bill Keller wrote a speech for each of the three "Throw Stuff at Bill" sessions he had today. [Update, October 28th: The Times sessions are actually called "Throw Stuff at Bill."]

Highlights include: No Coldplay! No layoffs! The paper came under budget this year! Lots and lots of praise to Larry Ingrassia and BizDay for coverage of the financial crisis! Updates on copy flow! Or, make that last a low-light ...

Here's what the Times staff heard today (n.b.: these are remarks as prepared):

In case you're wondering, the music you've been listening to is not Coldplay.
It's Verdi, and it is not a random choice. Does anyone want to guess why we are listening to Rigoletto? No, it has nothing to do with the fact that the protagonist of the opera is a deformed court jester.

 read more »

In Adam Nagourney’s piece today on the McCain campaign's how-we-can-still-win scenario, McCain strategist Steve Schmidt made the following assertion:

"The McCain campaign is roughly in the position where Vice President Gore was running against President Bush one week before the election of 2000."

False.

Here are the results of the 10 most recent independent national polls:

Obama, 52-39 (CBS/New York Times)

Obama 52-45 (Rasmussen)

Obama, 50-43 (Hotline)

Obama, 54-43 (ABC/Washington Post)

Obama, 49-46 (Battleground)

Obama, 51-41 (Zogby)

Obama, 52-42 (NBC/Wall Street Journal)

Obama, 51-45 (Gallup)

Obama, 49-40 (Fox)

Obama, 44.8-43.7 (IBD/TIPP)

That last poll, from IBD/TIPP, has been pushed exhaustively by the McCain-leaning pundits, but there's good reason to discount it. As FiveThirtyEight.com points out, the 1-point race that they found is the result of a dubious 74-22 percent advantage for McCain among 18-to-24-year-olds.  read more »

Another bit from rthur Sulzberger, Jr.'s WebbyConnect speech: Those Apple ads that have taken over the Times' home page several times over the past year are "very exciting" and are doing very well.

"There are some ad campaigns that we’ve run on our home page—the Apple ad campaign which I hope you've enjoyed which is very exciting and done very well—but there’s going to be more work," he said.

We sort of know how much he likes them. Earlier this year, a spokeswoman told us that the home page would run the ad only once a month. After we saw it run on consecutive Fridays, that statement was revised: "While that remains the rule, there is some flexibility regarding timing as this is a test and learn situation."

Will The New York Times ever reward writers for generating page views, à la Gawker?

Arthur Sulzberger, Jr. fielded that question at the WebbyConnect conference. His answer? No and yes.

First, he scoffed at the idea since, he argued, Frank Bruni shouldn't be valued any more than Adam Liptak:

At About.com, page views and unique users are part of the compensation for our guides. Not the whole compensation but it's part of it. At The Times that's not going to be the case, because quite frankly a Supreme Court reporter isn't worse than a restaurant reviewer. And a restaurant reviewer is going to get more page views.

 read more »

That's what Times op-ed editor Andy Rosenthal told a Columbia j-school class last night, Radaronline.com's Ben Chapman reports.

The U2 frontman will write between "six and ten" columns next year, and he's doing it ... pro bono.

Other Rosenthal dish from last night:

• He admires the work of The Atlantic's Megan McArdle and The National Review's Byron York
• "Condoleezza Rice is a particularly bad op-ed writer."
• Tom Wolfe writes too long

Zachery Kouwe, the New York Post's mergers and acquisitions reporter, is heading to The New York Times. We hear he'll be writing for the paper and the web site and working on the DealBook blog, with Andrew Ross Sorkin.

Former New York Times reporter Linda Greenhouse tells Radaronline.com's Charles Kaiser that the most "gripping scene" she ever saw at the Supreme Court was when the 2003 decision of Lawrence v. Texas came down:

I think that was probably the most gripping scene I ever witnessed at the Court—when Kennedy read the majority opinion in Lawrence v. Texas. Usually, when you go up to the Court, you don't know what's coming that day. But it was the last day of the term, and Lawrence was the last undecided case. So everybody knew, and the Court was filled with gay and lesbian members of the Supreme Court bar.

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The New York Times Company has hired "internet professional" Joseph Seibert, formerly an executive at Marc Ecko. Mr. Seibert will become the company's new chief information officer.

He's been its COO since 2006 so he presumably had a role in the Air Force One ad campaign that ad guru Andrew Essex described this way: "As a result of this, Mark Ecko no longer advertises in GQ and Details, my former publications. ... If advertisers can turn themselves into news and content, what is the role of a magazine?"

(And what does that mean for the future of the Times' content?)

Anyway, Mr. Seibert will replace David Thurm, who has been promoted to a new position called senior vice president, operations, which will oversee outside printing, New York production and building operations.  read more »

The Times' B-section is no longer the Metro Section; it's now the Business Section.

And here's Metro's new placement—renamed "New York"—on A21.

Today is the first day that the Metro section merged into the A-section; it comes after Foreign news and National news. Tomorrow, Sports will merge with the Business section.

Read our earlier coverage of the Times' section consolidation.

In this week's New York, Joe Hagan writes a portrait of the 27 members of the fifth-generation of Sulzberger-Ochs family, the part of the family who will someday run The New York Times.

The stakes are high, and these kids started the family business from an early age. Mr. Hagan writes:

Sulzberger has said that his clan starts going to family meetings when they’re 10 years old and by 15 they understand their roles as caretakers of the New York Times. There’s also a one-day orientation session for kids turning 18 or 21—or people marrying into the family—to learn about the legacy of the Ochs-Sulzbergers.

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Mike Nizza, blogger behind The New York Times' The Lede is moving over to The Atlantic to do web projects. Nizza had been a web producer at The Times since 2000, and was a key player into the growth of nytimes.com. He left the producing ranks in 2007 to became a blogger for the paper's news digest blog after founding blogger Tom Zeller left for National Geographic.

Memo from digital news editor, Jim Roberts after the jump:  read more »

Steve Schmidt, a senior advisor for John McCain, attacked The New York Times today. He said, among other things, that the Times is “an organization that is completely, totally 150 percent in the tank for the Democratic candidate, which is their prerogative to be.” And that “whatever the New York Times once was, it is today not by any standard a journalistic organization.”

All rather typical stuff from Camp McCain. Michael Calderone reached out to Bill Keller, and, in a sober response, the Times' executive editor didn't take Schmidt's bait:

"The New York Times is committed to covering the candidates fully, fairly and aggressively. It's our job to ask hard questions, fact-check their statements and their advertising, examine their programs, positions, biographies and advisors.

 read more »

Emma Gilbey Keller, the wife of New York Times executive editor Bill Keller, has a book review this Sunday in The New York Times Book Reviewfor her new book, The Comeback: Seven Stories of Women Who Went From Career to Family and Back Again.

Eugenie Allen, the reviewer for the book, is a fan. Ms. Allen says the book is a "breezy, feel-good book," and only quibbles with Ms. Keller's choice of people for the book to fit her larger theme of women who transition back to work after they leave to raise the kids. (Ms. Keller argues all her subjects are middle class; Ms. Allen disagrees.)  read more »

Does print journalism matter in this election?

“It’s obvious, and no crime against humanity, that the world has many, many places to turn for information, misinformation, analysis, rants, etc,” wrote Bill Keller, the executive editor of The New York Times, in an e-mail. “We—The Times, The Washington Post, Politico, the news outlets that aim to be aggressive, serious and impartial—don’t  dominate the conversation the way we once did, and that’s fine, except it means some excellent hard work gets a little muffled.

“But we do want our work to be noticed,” he wrote, “and I’ve been repeatedly surprised at the rich, important stories that fail to resonate the way they deserve.  read more »

Between Joe Sexton's "maudlin" note, his follow-up request to "Be Not Afraid," and now the latest, an invitation to drink with and yell at Bill Keller, it's a hard time for the Metro department; there are certainly a lot of invitations to drink.

Here's Keller's e-mail to the Metro team from today:

Folks,
I know this has been a hard time for Metro, and I know it will take more than a beer to make up for the loss of your section and the attendant anxieties.
But I figure a beer can't hurt. I'm buying.

Come, drink, vent if you like, or just drown your sorrows. Next [redacted] on [redacted]
Best,
Bill

Back in early June, Rachel Donadio wrote an item for The New York Times' Papercuts blog about a vacation she'd taken in Rome. The long-planned trip meant that Ms. Donadio, an editor at the Times Book Review who regularly contributes essays on various literary topics to the section's back page, could not attend Book Expo America, the publishing industry's annual trade show that was happening at the same time.

You might say Ms. Donadio had chosen Rome over books that week!

Now she's doing it again, this time for keeps. According to an e-mail she sent to friends this morning, Ms. Donadio (a former Observer reporter) is leaving the Book Review and relocating around Labor Day to Italy full time to serve as The Times' Rome Bureau Chief.  read more »

We all know that ad revenue for newspapers is tanking, but apparently it's even worse than we thought. Richard Pérez-Peña is reporting in The Times this morning that newspapers are on pace for their all-time worst ad revenue year. He reports:

Over all, ad revenue fell almost 8 percent last year. This year, it is running about 12 percent below that dismal performance, and company reports issued last week suggested a 14 percent to 15 percent decline in May.

“Never in my most bearish dreams six months ago did I think we’d be talking about negative 15 percent numbers against weak comps,” said Peter S.  read more »

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So Victor Ganzi quit as CEO of Hearst yesterday, and with some shades of Jane Friedman's departure from HarperCollins, no one really knows why.

In The Times, Richard Pérez-Peña writes that "Mr. Ganzi’s fall after six years came as a surprise to executives at Hearst and some of its major joint venture partners, and to investment bankers who track the company closely." Likewise, Keith Kelly reported that it was a "move that stunned many inside and outside the far-flung media empire." And: "I am stunned. I am honestly shocked," said one executive to Kelly.

It is Hearst, a traditionally non-leaky place, so the fact it's a surprise isn't much of a surprise.  read more »

That's what Richard Perez-Pena asks in this morning's Times, and he hears a mixed response.

A former executive at Gannett, Allen Neuharth, says that Zell is just doing what he has to do. In order to prevent newspapers to go the way of the steel industry in the 1980s, preemptive steps have to be made.  read more »

We just got a tip that a man is currently scaling up the north side of the New York Times tower, and he's about half way to the top! 41st Street has completely stopped to a halt, and Times reporters and editors—and construction workers and cops—have spilled onto 8th avenue and 41st Street and are looking up and staring. He has hung up a banner along the building saying something to the effect of: Global Warming Kills.

We'll have updates—and images!—as soon as they come in.

Update, 12:25 PM: City Room has a full account. Apparently the man scaling the building is named Alain Robert, a usual suspect. And C.E.O. Janet Robinson isn't one bit amused! "This is a publicity stunt, it looks like," Janet L. Robinson, the chief executive of The New York Times Company, said as she entered the building. "There is definitely going to be an arrest."

Update, 1PM: Our trusty intern Louise McCready made her way to 41st Street and reports back that all is under control again! Mr. Robert made it to the roof where he was apprehended by police. His neon green banner is still waving from the ninth floor. For the most part, people have stopped gawking, and have returned to work.

One businessman, however, named Bawa Jain still couldn’t contain himself. “Incredible. Impossible. My heart was in my throat! I thought he was going to fall!”

This weekend, Paul Goldberger was on with Bob Garfield on NPR talking about a story he wrote in The New Yorker last year on the design of newsrooms. In the article, Goldberger talked about the cold feel to the Times newsroom, but he elaborated on that with Garfield. He said:  read more »

Jacques Steinberg at The Times poses a question: Did Howie Kurtz do anything wrong when he brought a client of his wife's onto his show? Kurtz's wife, Sheri Annis, did PR work for Kimberly Dozier's memoir, Breathing the Fire, which was the centerpiece of an interview Dozier had with Kurtz on his CNN show, Reliable Sources. Kurtz made a brief disclosure at the end of the show, but even so, is it kosher?  read more »

The New York Times' Eric Konigsberg was hired by the Metro section to write about the lifestyles of the rich. He wrote for magazines like The New Yorker and Rolling Stone before coming on board, and had never had a job at a newspaper. In any event, when he was hired in August 2006 he told Joe Sexton that he'd run to cover a Jersey City fire when duty called. "I told him to bring his track shoes," said Mr. Sexton in a memo announcing the hire back then.  read more »

David Chen, the longtime Trenton reporter for The Times, is replacing Diane Cardwell as the paper's City Hall bureau chief, according to an internal memo. Mr. Chen will join Michael Barbaro and Fernanda Santos in Room 9.

Mr. Chen's departure means there's a vacancy in Trenton, but at this point it's unclear whether the paper has any intention of filling it.  read more »

David Barboza, the Times' business reporter based in Shanghai, has won the paper's internal business award, the Nathaniel Nash Award. The award is named after Mr. Nash, who died in a plane crash in Croatia while on assignment for the Times. With the award, Mr. Barboza gets a check for $1,500!

After the jump, Times Executive Editor Bill Keller's memo to the staff.  read more »

Times publisher Arthur Sulzberger Jr. and his wife of 33 years, Gail Gregg, are separating. In a statement, they said, "We have made the difficult decision to separate after 33 years of marriage. We are fortunate to have the love and support of our two children, other family members and close friends and colleagues. This is a private matter and we will not discuss it further.”  read more »

A day after the Times announced that there will be layoffs--perhaps around 15--the paper has picked up a star: Charlie Savage, a Pulitzer-winner on his coverage of Bush-Cheney White House, is moving to Dean Baquet's Washington bureau.

On Monday, MSNBC kicked off The New York Times Special Primary Edition, a new irregularly recurring daytime political show hosted by John Harwood in which Times scribes chew over news from the campaign trail.

So how did the show's premier do?

Not great!

According to Nielsen data, "The New York Times Special Primary Edition," finished fourth among cable news networks in the 2 P.M. time slot.  read more »

There will be layoffs at The Times. In an emotionally charged memo, Bill Keller writes that the vast majority of the 100 newsroom job cuts he announced back in February will come through buyouts, but the paper is "forced to resort" to laying the rest off. He said the paper will not disclose numbers or names in this "usettling and dispiriting time."

In the memo, he vehemently thanks reporters and editors at the paper for their service, as well as the Sulzbergers, and then says, "it is time to regroup."

He writes:

Most important, we retain the strongest team of talented journalists in the business, and they—you—remain the key to all of our ambitions.

Now it is time to regroup and move forward. In the coming weeks we will be working with department heads to reorganize and reimagine our coverage to ensure the quality journalism that is our standard. When we met in the Times Center in February, I told you that we were facing two seemingly contradictory challenges in the coming year. On the one hand, we must reduce our staffing and costs. On the other hand, we must do whatever we can to strengthen our competitive position. As I said then, that will mean our staff cuts will be offset a little by some investments to ensure, among other things, that we are well equipped to navigate the passage to our digital future.

Entire memo after the jump ...  read more »

The Times and MSNBC are joining forces for a new cable show. Today is the debut of The New York Times Special Primary Edition, a new political show hosted by John Harwood where Times-journos will handicap the election. From a Times memo, it appers these shows will appear as specials--that is, they won't run every week, but whenever MSNBC and the paper choose to do it.

Today's program will preview the Indiana and North Carolina primaries and Adam Nagourney, Pat Healy and Gail Collins are included guests.

Here's the memo:  read more »

One year after the New York Times moved into its shimmering new tower, the paper is ready for a dramatic software upgrade. Welcome to Microsoft Office 2003! The brand newish software was installed in the third-floor newsroom last night, and the culture department on the fourth floor is on-deck for tonight. The Times is also finally abandoning the old Eudora e-mail system for the mysterious but apparently very reliable "Outlook" e-mail. Memo, sent last night, after the jump:  read more »

There's some movement on the local political beat!  read more »

This morning, the New York Times announced the recipients of their 2007 Punch Awards. The awards, named after the nickname of former Times honcho Arthur Ochs Sulzberger, have two categories: "journalistic or editorial excellence" in community service and "business accomplishments."  read more »

The Post's Keith Kelly hears that 70 Times staffers are going to take buyouts, which means that about 30 are on the chopping block and it'll be Joe Sexton's Metro team that'll take the brunt of the hit.  read more »

Times metro-staffers were sent a sorta friendly-not friendly reminder this week that they work at a newspaper, and as such, shouldn't be spending too much money on lunch. Apparently, lunches with sources lately "have gotten stuck on posh." So there are new spending restrictions and a suggestion of also eating in their "zippy new cafeteria!"

Other problems: some metro staffers appear to be guilty of filing expenses for things like water and Cheez-its while they're still in the city (that reminds us of Jayson Blair!) Also some of them are filing expenses without receipts! Also, they should take the subway.

Full memo after the jump.  read more »

Arthur Sulzberger, Jr., who is speaking right now at the Times Building for the paper's annual shareholders meeting, declared the newspaper is not for sale. Choire Sicha sends in this dispatch, via text:

Sulzberger: "This company is not for sale." Media reports are "ill-informed."

Newsday, which is close to being sold to Rupert Murdoch, is "our closest competitor" on the web.

The Times copy chief Merrill Perlman is on the buyout list, said a newsroom source. Apparently, she's making her way around the newsroom today to announce her departure. Ms. Perlman has been an institution at the paper for nearly 25 years, and was one of the biggest voices in helping finish up the most recent version of New York Times Manual of Style and Usage. Why doesn't the paper use the serial comma? She explains here.  read more »

New York Times CEO Janet Robinson in today's conference call:

From a standpoint of coverage, I think it's clear The Wall Street Journal is positioning quite differently in terms of overall coverage, broadening very much in the international and political arena, and, with the launch of their magazine, entering into broader lifestyle coverage.  read more »