How big is the newshole at the
New York Times? In an
interesting
conversation with "public wditor"
Byron Calame, managing editor
John Geddes, the
Times' space maven, discusses the issue.
For example, he says, the paper's newshole hasn't changed in
at least five years. (Contrast that with the industrial-strength
space-tightening at many U.S. daily papers, and you've got to be
impressed with the
Times' resolute defense of journalism and its value
proposition for its audience.) Geddes talks about the demands of big
news stories, the cutoff for expanding the paper (and even the occasion
when the
Times pulled an ad to fit in a story on the death of Chief
Justice
William Rehnquist), and more. "It is a zero-sum game. If something is
more important, something else may be a little less important, a little
less deserving of space," he said.
As for Hurricane Katrina, no additional space was allocated
overall. "We said we're going to take two columns from each section's
budget and devote it to a generic Katrina pool for the remainder of the
year."
It may be a failing of Calame, or it may be a failing of
Geddes, or it may not be a failing at all, but it's certainly curious
that the words "Web," "Internet," and the like never appeared in the
interview. Does the
Times not think of the Web as an alternative
location for content that won't fit in the newspaper that purports to
offer "All the News That's Fit to Print"? Of course it does. (Witness
the excellent content and Web-plus packages on NYTimes.com.) Do Geddes
and Calame not think of it that way? Perhaps they do -- but it wasn't
reflected in this discussion, which may have been limited in length due
to space considerations.
If they
had talked about it in an
expanded discussion, it could have been posted, yup, on the website.
Which is, of course, where I saw the article in the first place.
