I I just saw this post today, so I am a few months late responding to a mischaracterization. I love attending Burning Man, and I can assure you that I am not someone who "wears ugly shirts in public or running off to Burning Man to sit in drum circles and work on macramé, or whatever they do at Burning Man, we don’t know, we don’t suck enough to spend a week burning our skin off in the desert with a bunch of tech moguls microdosing ketamine." My skin does not burn off, nor do I microdose on ketamine, nor do I hang out with tech moguls. Nor do most of the 70,000 participants who have a really good time at a festival celebrating art, music, performance, and camaraderie. And burn a wooden man. I do agree with the assessment of Bezos being the descriptor of the quote above. But to him and his cronies alone, not the rest of us. Thank you.
I didn't even get past the Bloom County cartoon yet without needing to come in here and say how much I loved that comic strip as a 6 year old. I had my political tastes at that age even, yes. 😅
I loved Bloom County too, although I was a lot older than 6! Got stuck in Oklahoma for a couple of years in the mid-eighties -- the Daily Oklahoman actually ran Bloom County, although they'd already ditched Doonesbury for dissing conservatives. That all came to an end when the story line that had Bill the Cat hanging out with Jeane Kirkpatrick, Reagan's "sadist-in-chief", ended with Kirkpatrick swimming to Cuba with a knife between her teeth.
Gaylord, the publisher (and founder's son) of the Daily Oklahoman, axed it immediately. I was so sad -- stuck in OKC with not even regular Bloom County OR Molly Ivins...
core doctrine of American journalism: that editors and publishers are not supposed to interfere with their own newsrooms’ coverage of issues in which they have a personal conflict of interest.”
Lol
WSJ, NYT, CNN, Fox....WaPo is just catching up is all
I just dropped them (again...) and they offered me a $29 annual subscription when I did so (currently $48). Nope. NYT subscription will lapse this year and while I do appreciate some of their columnists, their election coverage and normalizing of elected Republican officials, "policies" and voters is just too much.
They gave me a $1/month rate the last time I dropped them -- as much as I'll miss their sudoku and "keyword", it's just not worth supporting Murdoch-adjacent assholes... dropped the Times over 20 years ago when they colluded with the Bush administration to push a completely false narrative.
On a lighter note, this took me WAAAAAAAY back to my young, carousing days........I so miss the Bloom Beacon......I mean, any paper that has Opus running the 'personals' desk (google 'Personal ads' youngsters) has my subscription for life.......
As I understand it (not much), headlines optimized for clicks are not usually the briefest ones. You need to get your power adjectives and calls to action in there.
It's actually better to bury an inflammatory two-word phrase in a long headline that's difficult to grasp at a glance. Your goal is to trigger an impulse, not to help readers comprehend.
Watching the rapid decline of WaPo headlines has been a dismal obsession.
I I just saw this post today, so I am a few months late responding to a mischaracterization. I love attending Burning Man, and I can assure you that I am not someone who "wears ugly shirts in public or running off to Burning Man to sit in drum circles and work on macramé, or whatever they do at Burning Man, we don’t know, we don’t suck enough to spend a week burning our skin off in the desert with a bunch of tech moguls microdosing ketamine." My skin does not burn off, nor do I microdose on ketamine, nor do I hang out with tech moguls. Nor do most of the 70,000 participants who have a really good time at a festival celebrating art, music, performance, and camaraderie. And burn a wooden man. I do agree with the assessment of Bezos being the descriptor of the quote above. But to him and his cronies alone, not the rest of us. Thank you.
I didn't even get past the Bloom County cartoon yet without needing to come in here and say how much I loved that comic strip as a 6 year old. I had my political tastes at that age even, yes. 😅
I loved Bloom County too, although I was a lot older than 6! Got stuck in Oklahoma for a couple of years in the mid-eighties -- the Daily Oklahoman actually ran Bloom County, although they'd already ditched Doonesbury for dissing conservatives. That all came to an end when the story line that had Bill the Cat hanging out with Jeane Kirkpatrick, Reagan's "sadist-in-chief", ended with Kirkpatrick swimming to Cuba with a knife between her teeth.
Gaylord, the publisher (and founder's son) of the Daily Oklahoman, axed it immediately. I was so sad -- stuck in OKC with not even regular Bloom County OR Molly Ivins...
"Bloom County" was such an unbelievably funny strip.
I was reading this yesterday and Lewis apparently has the blessing of Bezo's to turn the newspaper into the Daily Sun...
We've seen the damage inflicted at the opinion sections of the NYT, WSJ, and the Wapo when they go GQP whole hogging.
WAPO explains that British journalists are coming to the US because they're more "cutthroat." Just ask Diana Spencer!
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/06/08/business/media/british-invasion-media.html?smid=nytcore-android-share
core doctrine of American journalism: that editors and publishers are not supposed to interfere with their own newsrooms’ coverage of issues in which they have a personal conflict of interest.”
Lol
WSJ, NYT, CNN, Fox....WaPo is just catching up is all
I just dropped them (again...) and they offered me a $29 annual subscription when I did so (currently $48). Nope. NYT subscription will lapse this year and while I do appreciate some of their columnists, their election coverage and normalizing of elected Republican officials, "policies" and voters is just too much.
They gave me a $1/month rate the last time I dropped them -- as much as I'll miss their sudoku and "keyword", it's just not worth supporting Murdoch-adjacent assholes... dropped the Times over 20 years ago when they colluded with the Bush administration to push a completely false narrative.
Fuck them all.
A brilliant read about epic incompetence. Thanks, Gary!
"..the lofty spaces where various organs of American media interact."
Not really the image I wanted in my head.
The Britification of a previously great American newspaper.
I canceled my long-standing subscription, only to be promptly inundated with half-price offers to renew.
It’s not the cost, you losers. It’s the fact that you’ve turned a newspaper I trusted over to Rupert Murdoch and his acolytes, who I don’t.
If I wanted to read the WSJ or the Daily Fail, I would. I don’t.
Democracy Dies In Darkness, my hind parts.
Still can’t mash the like button. Consider this liked, please.
What was that noise? Oh, just Ben Bradlee and Katharine Graham rolling over in their graves...
On a lighter note, this took me WAAAAAAAY back to my young, carousing days........I so miss the Bloom Beacon......I mean, any paper that has Opus running the 'personals' desk (google 'Personal ads' youngsters) has my subscription for life.......
Run that baby!
If my mom were still around, she'd probably tell you that DC no longer had a newspaper after the Washington Star went out of business in 1981.
Or at least after the Washington Post went... Whatever the hell it went.
Ta, Gary. This is really sad.
Maybe it's time for the Sacramento Bee to purchase the Washington Post.
As I understand it (not much), headlines optimized for clicks are not usually the briefest ones. You need to get your power adjectives and calls to action in there.
It's actually better to bury an inflammatory two-word phrase in a long headline that's difficult to grasp at a glance. Your goal is to trigger an impulse, not to help readers comprehend.
Watching the rapid decline of WaPo headlines has been a dismal obsession.