The problem with the moves by Bezos and Soon-Shiong is that they acted at the last minute, overturning their editorial boards and convincing absolutely no one that there was any principle behind their decision beyond not provoking the wrath of former President Donald Trump.
Dan Kennedy
Posted inOpinion
How a state commission could help ease the local news crisis
The local news crisis has become so acute that it’s time to consider some unconventional approaches, including a limited role for government in providing indirect support to outlets.
Posted inPolitics
Second life
Sometime this April, one of New England’s most venerable daily newspapers will cease to be a daily newspaper. The Christian Science Monitor, which marked its 100th anniversary this past November, is beginning its second century as a multi-platform, multimedia news organization. Central to this new identity will be its free website, CSMonitor.com, begun a dozen […]
Posted inPolitics
Local ink
It’s hard to be optimistic about the newspaper business these days, but Kirk Davis is trying. Davis is the president and publisher of GateHouse Media New England, which owns more than 100 newspapers in eastern Massachusetts — and which itself is part of GateHouse Media, a national chain of some 500 papers based near Rochester, […]
Posted inPolitics
Point of entry
we live in a time of demographic upheaval. We are becoming foreign-born, non-English-speaking, black, brown, yellow, and white. That’s as true in Massachusetts as it is nationally. In 2005, a MassINC study found that one in every seven state residents was from another country. Earlier this year, according to The Boston Globe, the state Department […]
Posted inPolitics
Your blog of blogs
Illustration by Nick Galifianakis HERE’S WHAT Adam Gaffin finds frustrating. He’s in his car, heading for a meeting in Framingham, where he works in tech publishing. He’s got the radio tuned to WBZ. And news is breaking — a fire, a shooting, a derailment on the MBTA, whatever. What he’d like to do is park […]
Posted inPolitics
No-shout zone
jerry from mattapan never knew what hit him. It’s a Monday evening in late October, and the journalist Sally Bedell Smith is a guest on NightSide with Dan Rea, on WBZ-AM (1030). For the past half-hour Rea has been interviewing Smith about her new book on Bill and Hillary Clinton, For Love of Politics. Now […]
Posted inPolitics
Plugged in, tuned out
it’s morning in Boston. Take a look around. Whether you’re on the subway, walking through downtown, or standing in line at Starbucks or Dunkin’ Donuts, you’re surrounded by young people—twentysomethings, thirtysomethings, maybe a few teenagers, all of them getting ready for work or for school. Now look more closely. What are they doing? Maybe a […]
Posted inPolitics
Full disclosure
less than a year after its launch, the New England News Forum is a work in progress. At a time when the mainstream media are under assault from bloggers, political partisans, and an unprecedented financial squeeze, the Forum has the potential to educate the public about the importance of journalism in a dem-ocratic society, while […]
Posted inPolitics
Disappearing ink
one of matt Storin’s last assignments before he retired as editor of The Boston Globe was to carry out a painful round of downsizing. It was the spring of 2001, and-in what has become a familiar story-circulation and advertising revenues were falling at the Globe and the Worcester Telegram & Gazette, both of which, then […]