Top 10 Reasons The New York Times Will Fold Next Year

I started reading the Times every single day when I was 11. I had daily delivery in college. I run my fingers lovingly across A1 as I spread it out next to a cup of perfect coffee. Goodbye, old friend. I love you — I’ll miss you.

1: It is literally printed on Dead Trees

2: Matt Drudge. This “blogger” has news in his blood, more readers than the Times, and no editorial approval process. He gets news and publishes it. Crazy! Yes, sometimes it’s wrong, and yes, he’s an asshole. But those two traits can get you very very far these days. Care to argue? I didn’t think so.

3: One old crusty tone for everyone. One editorial voice means one editorial product in a world of niche interests and specialized news. Ends up seeming like the know-it-all at the party who plays Wilco and hits on my sister then leaves alone without saying goodbye.

4. The horrible web site. Is there really *really* not any new news for the Automobiles section since Friday a week ago? Same review of a irrelevant luxury motorcycle and a crappy new truck as headlines for 10 days? Great. I’ve heard rumors of changes at America’s two oldest automakers are happening daily. Like bankruptcies and stuff. Government takeovers. Insignias being shuttered and sold. Institutional upheaval and turmoil at the heart of American industry. Seems like maybe something you’d want to cover, or maybe send someone out to D-town. But no, there’s a sad car review in the section heading for weeks at a time.

5. The fact that you can never attempt to read the web site thoroughly and then hold a conversation with someone who has actually paid dollars to read the thing on dead trees. You always lose. Doesn’t work. Articles are hidden on the site so you will always look stupid. Did you read….? No. You didn’t. You can spend all day at the Times site and you still missed the piece that is about to blindside you. The site is only breaking news and features from last March. Count on it. The only thing that works online is the columnists and editorial pieces — probably, I guess, because that area grew up as a paid content service and they had to get used to serving readers in a timely and consistent manner.

6. The Sunday Times Magazine. Fun to read hungover on your couch. Have you read it online? No.

7. Jayson Blair. Saw him doing blow in Siberia Bar once. Is he gay?

8. Judy Miller and the war in Iraq. I am basically convinced that the Times could have reported facts and lies that led to war in Iraq and maybe helped prevent it. Instead they sat on Judy Miller’s story about Joseph Wilson and Valerie Plame for a year. Thanks a lot. There’s impact journalism for you. Somehow when Murdoch does that he gets rich and it’s cute. With the Times, it’s Shakespearean tragedy.

9. Real Estate. The enormously expensive and empty building they built. If the real estate section had journalists working for it they might have reported or predicted the real estate bubble. But they don’t.

10. You’re reading this. Here. Where is here? Nowhere. And that’s sort of the point.

–ab