Washington Post: Our Reporters Aren’t For Sale (Yet)
by Peter Kafka
Posted on July 2, 2009 at 7:58 AM PT
Want access to the Washington, D.C., elite? The city’s hometown paper is happy to arrange that for you provided you’re willing to pay between $25,000 and $250,000. The caveat: That fee won’t include access to the Washington Post’s (WPO) editorial staff.
That distinction popped up this morning after Politico detailed an “astonishing offer” by the paper’s business staff to lobbyists–a chance to underwrite “salons” with D.C. bigshots, hosted at the home of CEO Katharine Weymouth.
A promotional flier Politico got its hands on also promised that the Post’s editorial staff would be part of the events, including one scheduled for July 21. But that part isn’t true, a Post spokeswoman told me via email this morning:
The flier circulated this morning came out of a business division for conferences and events, and the newsroom was unaware of such communication. It went out before it was properly vetted, and this draft does not represent what the company’s vision for these dinners are, which is meant to be an independent, policy-oriented event for newsmakers.
As written, the newsroom could not participate in an event like this.
We do believe there is an opportunity to have a conferences and events business, and that The Post should be leading these conversations in Washington, big or small, while maintaining journalistic integrity. The newsroom will participate where appropriate.
OK, so that’s cleared up. But let me play devil’s advocate: What exactly would be so wrong about getting the paper’s reporters or editors to to participate in one of these?
This certainly wouldn’t be the first time that the Post has been at the nexus of power, money and influence. In fact, Weymouth’s grandmother, Katharine Graham, was famous for hosting gatherings much like these at her house. And publications of all stripes, including this one, as well as Dow Jones, which owns this site, frequently charge fees to attend networking events where their editorial staffs participate.
And you’re likely to see more of this stuff, not less, as publishers search for revenue streams besides advertising to stay afloat. Any tempest you see about this today is going to look quaint in a couple of years.
UPDATE: The ensuing uproar has forced the Post to cancel the events altogether. Post execs are now busy pointing fingers at each other, although it seems clear a lot of the blame is going to be laid at the feet of the paper’s conference group and/or marketing team.
But note Howard Kurtz’s report on his employers’ reactions to the reaction: Weymouth (or her proxies) say she was OK with the idea, but not the marketing; Executive Editor Marcus Brauchli says he was OK with the concept, but not this version:
Weymouth knew of the plans to host small dinners at her home and to charge lobbying and trade organizations for participation. But, one of the executives said, she believed that there would be multiple sponsors, to minimize any appearance of charging for access, and that the newsroom would be in charge of the scope and content of any dinners in which Post reporters and editors participated.
Brauchli said he had been involved in discussions, stretching back to last year, about newsroom participation in conferences of the sort commonly staged by major news organizations.
But he said he made clear to the company’s marketing officials that Post journalists would participate only if they could substantially control the nature of any such conference. Brauchli said he was blindsided by the wording of these fliers and that they are an embarrassment to the newspaper.
In the old days, the fact that this story broke just before the long holiday weekend would help the Post. But this story will now have legs, egged on by stuff like this:
Comments
WastingtonDC: Poetic justice delayed, is justice, none the less. It is perfect, for those of us praying for safe returns for our beloved family or friends rotating into and out of combat in Iraq, to read the “dying truth” about the Wastington Post’s long suspected sale of those “barrels full” of the tenets of journalism, long abandoned at the doors of it’s editorial offices. Now, albeit too long delayed, we can see the flyer with advertised prices at which those antiquated ideals were offered, finally transparently listed, on the same internet page with “Washington Post Profit falls 77% in 4th Qtr”. The last time I thrilled to news of the US MSM, which has not, as this article proves, been main stream, during my lifetime, and is no longer rightly the media, given that those of us disposed to peruse a dozen or two papers daily are rarely willing to burden ourselves, or our land fills with disposal of the dead trees, ink, and transportation costs, was the day I sold my -ZHOMB NYT $10 Jan 17, 2010 Puts for over 600 percent profit. I made the bet and have written about it, with great pleasure, as the NYT stock declined from $53 on Jun 20, 02, to just over $3.44 on Feb 20 this year, to emphasize that the fall of NYT stock, like last year’s reported dismissal of some 14,000 persons formerly employed as journalists may well be taken, in the same vein, as this remarkable revelation of the truth of the Wastington Post’s bargain sale of it’s vast store of the tenets of journalism abandoned by it’s liberal workers. The American Republic is all about “liberty and justice for all” meaning all humans, everywhere found, and there is a majority of tough minded sovereign citizens, from every party, faction, social origin, and all of our magnificent peoples of every race, creed, or color, who will dig out their uniforms, muster as ordered, and go and fight to preserve the last bastion of liberty on earth, or lift another nation’s enslaved peoples out of slavery, anywhere, anytime they are honored with that opportunity, to stand up for American ideals. Since people who work hard and do right, with their pens, or other combat tools, and show up when it is time to free another enslaved nation’s peoples from slavery also tend to come home and lead our nation, and or our churches, businesses, and other organizations, gaining wealth, and the leisure to read a dozen papers daily, after the wars are won, the wholesale peddling of American decline, and talking down our economy, and the value of “liberty and justice for all”, by any business firm is at last, being rightly rewarded with less sales, less power, and less employment for the talking heads, or writers, who make those mistaken arguments, in print, on television, or on the web. It is time America’s readers, and writers, seeing all sides of every issue on the web, put their money where their sovereign citizen’s unruly hearts abide. We will not pay for biased newspapers, or for bundled television packets filled with insulting drivel that could not be sold to any sapient being, but meets some special interest’s bent, and is thus included in fixed broadcast packets, to poison our youth, our paid voters, and our national conversation. The internet is not killing the NYT, BG, and WP, it is freeing up the conversation, and allowing all sides of any issue to be printed, without the censored approach apparent in those papers, where this comment would never see the light of day, simply because it is not of the liberal bent. The censored liberal rags are killing themselves, while English language newspapers worldwide, http://www.aldaily.com, print both sides of any issue, including any commentary that is not too obscene, and let freedom ring. The liberal 97% of the 14,000 newly unemployed persons formerly called journalists, equals some 13,580 folks more suited to flipping burgers at McDonalds, or steaming out their trash cans. At least, employed there, there would be almost no risk of their liberal bent destroying America, the last bastion of liberty on earth, or returning hundreds of millions of humans to slavery in Russia, the Levant, or China, by biased reportage, Good Riddance!
Posted by Franklin D Lomax Sr at July 4th, 2009 at 9:31 am