Tuesday, January 09, 2007

Los Angeles Times

I love the Times, in all its dysfunction and believe that recently it's really been stepping up its game -- contrary to what a lot of media pundits have been saying. Really, about a month after the horrific redesign, The Times started really starting to cover stories like Kinsley suggested (More California, more Entertainment biz, more Latinio) and doing more indepth analysis of national and local stories.

Evidence of this can be found in the uptick in links from progressive blogs.

Now, I believe that Tim Rutten nailed it with his story on the WSJ and the future of newspapers in print and online. The future of journalism is back to the future -- morning papers and evening papers. The morning papers (now online editions) are for late breaking news while the evening papers (print) are for rich and contextual analysis.

In regard to online, The Times has some amazing print writers/photographers -- Al Martinez, Bill Plashke, Steve Lopez, Shawn Hubler, Mary McNamara, Carolyn Cole -- I hope they can entice them to blog and really turn the online Times into something with the personality of its great writing staff.

And, of course, I hope The Times can be taken out of the Tribune stable and returned to local ownership (whoever that might be from the Chandlers to Geffen to Burkle) and let it cry out in its unique voice far removed from the other power centers of the country. It's good for the city, it's good for the country and, in the end, it's good for the world.

2 comments:

AVN said...

Great ideas. It's good to see someone still pulling for the hometown paper. - AVN

Miles said...

Thanks. Even though Tribune has really tried to kill it, it still is one of the best papers in the world. Now, if it can really push a successful new web strategy forward, it has a strong chance to continue its excellence.