ANOTHER year has come and gone in my stint as public editor, which began in September 2012.
Or, to use another measure, that’s about 45,000 emails — more than 800 a week. Times readers have written to me on topics ranging from the global (whether to show images from ISIS videos) to the local (credit to other publications in New Jersey’s “bridgegate”). They’ve shared their views on the serious (a report on torture) to the silly (a trend story on monocles).
Some of the reader complaints or requests make their way into my blog posts or Sunday columns, often with responses from editors and reporters. Others result in behind-the-scenes conversations with desk editors, including those in charge of corrections or departments such as business or Washington news.
Still others are sent, sometimes with comment, to editors or writers. Some are responded to directly. But this much is certain: All are read and considered. (My assistant, Jonah Bromwich, gets first crack at the daily email queue, and he deserves many thanks here.)
Let’s review a few of the overarching topics and where they stand.
ANONYMOUS SOURCES I launched a feature this year called “AnonyWatch,” intended to draw attention to the gratuitous use of unnamed sources, and I’ve written on this many times, to little apparent avail. The overuse of anonymous sources still flourishes in The Times. Here’s an example from a front-page article this month about a Brooklyn teacher accused of sexually abusing students.
“I looked up to him,” a former high school classmate said, speaking on the condition of anonymity for fear of retaliation. “I remember thinking that he was very talented, just in general. I would have thought he’d gone to an Ivy League school. He was an exceptional student. I saw him as an exceptional person.”
I talked to the executive editor, Dean Baquet, about this subject last week, asking him why Times editors and reporters don’t follow the paper’s own written rules, which allow granting anonymity only as a last resort. He agreed that editors need to tighten up on this: “It is something we need to be more vigilant about.”
Mr. Baquet said that, until that point, he had not spoken forcefully to department heads about the practice but that he intended to do so at their next meeting. He said that the use of confidential sources is sometimes necessary and important. “They’re never going to go away,” he said, “but we need to limit it more than we do.” I couldn’t agree more and will continue to monitor their use and push for such limits.
FALSE BALANCE Readers often let me know that they don’t appreciate “he said, she said” reporting that leaves them in the dark about what to believe. Here, I see some progress. It seems to be semi-regular practice these days, on some subjects, for The Times to state established trust in its own voice rather than give equal weight to unequal views. For example, a Sept. 5 story on an Ohio federal court ruling included this unattributed sentence: “There has been virtually no in-person voter fraud documented in the country.” This kind of thing doesn’t happen every time it might (it was largely missing in more recent stories about voter identification laws in Wisconsin and Texas) and I continue to hear complaints.
COVERAGE OF THE ENVIRONMENT The Times recently put together a new team of particularly talented and hard-hitting reporters to cover climate change and the environment. It’s “the biggest subject going,” the science editor, Barbara Strauch, told me. A solutions-oriented series called “The Big Fix” is also underway. That’s very good news, especially because that coverage had fallen off in the past year or so with the dismantling of an earlier reporting group and the demise of the Green blog.
DIVERSITY ON THE TIMES STAFF After writing about this recently, in the context of a much-protested television piece on the producer Shonda Rhimes, I followed up with Mr. Baquet. At the time of that piece, he told me that he felt a strong responsibility to diversify the staff, including its 20-member staff of critics, which does not include a black critic. (Mr. Baquet is the only black member of the newly reorganized news masthead, the highest ranking editors.)
How, exactly, I asked him, can he diversify the staff at a time when he is simultaneously charged with reducing the newsroom’s numbers? He was quick to answer that it will take place “through hiring and promotion.” Mr. Baquet told me that he believes that “entry-level hiring at The Times has become much more diverse,” and, he said, “We’re not going to stop hiring — I don’t believe in hiring freezes.” In addition, he said, he intends to make diversity a priority when making internal promotions.
Staff diversity — of all kinds, not just racial — makes a real difference because it inevitably brings a wider range of points of view and experience. That can only benefit the journalism.
BUSINESS CHALLENGES Like other newspaper companies, The Times is grappling with major changes in its business model — particularly the decline of print advertising revenue. It has had real success with its paid digital subscriptions; they now stand at about 870,000. And The Times, according to Ken Doctor’s calculations in Nieman Journalism Lab, has more paying readers now than it did in 1999. That’s remarkable.
Not every foray has succeeded, and some revenue-seeking efforts — like “native advertising” — come with the unfortunate possibility of confusing the reader for the advertiser’s benefit. What’s more, readers frequently complain about the intrusive nature of some online advertising. Jim Kelley of Coral Springs, Fla., put it this way: “As an online subscriber for many years your home page is becoming onerous to say the least. I know communications and social media is changing and you need to make a buck; but the pop-ups, intrusive ads and other distractions makes the NY Times online difficult to use.”
This month, The Times pulled the plug on its months-old Opinion app, and it will change strategy on its NYT Now app, too. Recently, Times brass announced the need to reduce staff by 100 in the newsroom. That’s bad, but Mr. Doctor described a bigger picture: “While the overall number of newspaper editorial staffers has declined across America (down 20,000 jobs, about 30 percent of the total, in seven years), the Times has been bolstering its staff.” Even after the planned cutbacks, the newsroom number — around 1,230 — will be larger than it was in 2011.
“We’re still going to have the biggest, most robust newsroom” in America, Mr. Baquet told me. He added, “This is a period of turmoil, but we also know that all the change and turbulence is not going to go away.” Maintaining top-quality journalism is a great way to battle business headwinds, but it’s not going to be easy.
As I head further into Year Three, I will keep trying to hold The Times to its own high standards and to represent the best interests of readers. Oh, and — thanks for writing.
Recent posts to the Public Editor’s Journal took up reports on James Risen’s legal battle and whether a columnist should disclose his son’s role in the Israeli military.
An earlier version of this column misstated the outlet in which a piece by Ken Doctor appeared. It is Nieman Journalism Lab, not Nieman Reports.