Posted on 07/07/2008 6:54:48 PM PDT by bd476
Signaling a generational change at one of the nation’s most influential newspapers, the new publisher of The Washington Post on Monday selected an outsider as the paper’s top editor.Marcus W. Brauchli, a former top editor of The Wall Street Journal, will become the executive editor of The Post on Sept. 8, at a time of great upheaval in the industry. At age 47, he is young enough to remain in place in for many years, working alongside the publisher, Katharine Weymouth, who is 42 and has been in her job for five months.
He will succeed Leonard Downie Jr., 66, who has led The Post’s newsroom for 17 years, guiding it to numerous accolades, including six Pulitzer Prizes this year, the most in its history.
But Mr. Brauchli (pronounced BROW-klee) and Ms. Weymouth take the helm at a time when The Post, like the newspaper industry as a whole, is buffeted by budget cuts, a shrinking newsroom, falling advertising revenue and declining circulation.
“I don’t think it’s a case of her wanting to shake the place up as much as her having to,” said Benjamin C. Bradlee, a former executive editor who is a vice president of the Washington Post Company. “She feels the urgency to change and adapt, and thank heaven.”
The Post is trying to meld its print and online news operations -- something The Journal has already done -- and that task is high on the priority list of Ms. Weymouth, the first Post publisher with direct control of its Web site. The two operations have been kept apart to a degree that is rare in the industry -- the Web site even has a separate newsroom, in Virginia -- which has bred duplication and turf wars.
(Excerpt) Read more at nytimes.com ...
OH ABB
Occasionally, you have to turn the compost pile. Hopefully, Mr. Broccoli can help guide the Washington Compost into something resembling a newspaper instead of a mouthpiece for the DNC.
That's a fine looking bird who undoubtedly has an important role within the animal kingdom and thus, has little or nothing in common with the subject matter. ;-)
Hopefully.
It’s hell to get old,I’m the same age as Marcus W. Brauchli;)
my bad...
We do not see the elephant.
We do not acknowledge the elephant.
Therefore, the elephant does not exist.
My Houston Chronicle is getting fewer and fewer pages each week. On Monday, it’s ridiculous. It’s like the small town newspaper I grew up with in a town of 20,000 population.
Seriously, on most days, the business section is only four pages. (Really one big one folded) Sometimes six. 10 years ago it was 16.
I do hope he is able to bring some sanity to their news and editorial staff.
It’s so left-wing that it will take years before it’s worth buying, though. And through that whole process, they’ll miff off their current liberal readers.
IIRC, Katharine Weymouth is a conservative. She was going to work for some conservative magazine or newspaper some years ago, so Mom brought her over to the Post in a high position and gave some room to allow her her conservative opinions. That was maybe 20 years ago, and I don’t know if Weymouth’s positions/philosophy have changed .. but a Wall Street Journal editor may be a clue.
Yes, that looks like what they're doing.
why do they have to
“signal”
?
They might be aware of the core problems yet are too used to doing things the same way they've always done them. Thinking outside the box doesn't seem to come naturally to some folks in the print media.
“She feels the urgency to change and adapt, and thank heaven.”
Sounds like the reporter is trying to send Pinch a message.
The Washington Post. If you don’t get it, join the club.
Hopefully the pendulum will swing the other way. I have mixed emotions about the current malaise in print media. I'm not overjoyed reading about all the cutbacks. If local reporters are laid off, who will replace them?
There are skills involved in reporting news events, getting just the facts into a story and then composing a cogent, brief summary. I doubt there would be many people willing to hone those skills, go to news events every single day and write stories for free. Just my opinion though.
Any idea of eventually having one centralized print news source for our entire country would be disastrous. Some early attempts in that direction haven't worked all that well. (USA Today and most weekly magazines.)
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