guttentag's Journal: Why Are NY Times stories so prevalent on Slashdot?

Let's look at newspaper front pages from a recent big news day (Thursday):

I would post examples from The NYTimes, but they don't let you see previous issues of the paper online for free. However, as I recall their picks closely mirrored The Washington Post's:

The Washington Post
Top Story: Cyber-Attacks by Al Qaeda Feared
No. 2 Story: SEC Charges WorldCom With Fraud
No. 3 Story: U.S. Court Votes to Bar Pledge of Allegiance

The Los angeles Times
Top Story: 'Tweens: From Dolls to Thongs
One of the store mannequins wears a fringed denim skirt riding low on the hips and a top pushed high on the midriff. Another has shorts that roll down on the tummy and a one-shoulder top.
No. 2 Story: Pledge of Allegiance Violates Constitution, Court Declares
No. 3 Story: WorldCom Hit With Federal Fraud Lawsuit

The Los Angeles Times shows a consistent bias toward "Reader's Digest" type stories that are entertaining and give you something to gossip about but don't really tell you anything of value. I also get the sense that many LA Times reporters are really failed screenplay writers who can't let go of the need to create drama. However, they do occasionally print something worth reading.

The LA Times is owned by The Chicago Tribune , which puts even less original content on its Web site and is more "in-your-face" about pressuring you to subscribe.

I suspect Slashdot would link to The Wall Street Journal more often if the paper made more than 1% of its content available to non-paying subscribers. (I had a paid subscription to wsj.com for about a year, but I no longer do because it's just not worth that much to me.)

I'd like to read Le Monde , but the French refuse to publish an English version. Go figure.

All of Knight-Ridder's newspapers (The San Jose Mercury News , Miami Herald , Philadelphia Inquirer , et al) have been crippled by the "RealCities Network" which forces all of its sites to use the same content-poor, ad-rich design. The saddest story of the group is the SJMercury though, which has just fallen apart since the parent company began slashing costs and forcing the RealCities conformity on its once industry-leading site. The Miami Herald is an unofficial training school for future Washington Post reporters, but that doesn't matter if you can't find their content on the Web.

Slashdot doesn't link to the Financial Times often (ever?), though it's a great paper. It just doesn't turn out a lot of unique content that's of interest to most Slashdot readers.

Newspapers aside, Slashdot has linked to CNN and the BBC in the past, though not the CBC . ABC, CBS and NBC generally provide watered down news for people who don't like to read newspapers -- not Slashdot readers.

Slashdot often links to MSNBC , but I expect that will begin to decline -- MSNBC.com's founding editor (Merrill Brown, a former Washington Post reporter) recently announced that he's resigning after 6 years to pursue other, undisclosed "opportunities." The New York Times noted on June 12 (you'll have to pay for the archived version of the story) that he offhandedly mentioned that MSNBC.com is about to be swallowed by MSN for economic reasons. (In other words, Microsoft put its foot down and said financial concerns outweigh editorial concerns.)

The International Herald-Tribune writes some of its own content, but a lot of the paper is an amalgamation of New York Times and Washington Post stories.

I haven't read the Seattle Post-Intelligencer or the Seattle Times in a while, but you may find some good technology stories there.

Bottom Line: Slashdot links to a disproportionate number of New York Times and Washington Post stories because both papers' sites post a lot of content and that content is top notch. It also helps that they're among the most recognizable names in journalism, but the Slashdot system is set up to allow editors to pick from the best stories that are submitted, regardless of the content provider's brand recognition. If you read a good story somewhere, submit it -- the quality of the story is more important than the misguided registration policies of the content provider. And if I've missed a good site people should be reading, reply to this message and let people know.

Slate Today's Papers

[Safety Cap]

Slate [slate.com] used to have a daily email "Today's Papers" that was a summary of the top (American) papers. Then they went and reorged -- along the way that feature was "droppped." :(

The current "Today's papers" is a link off their main page -- but it is not static so you can't link to the most current one. :(

To find it, click on news, and hunt for it in the menu.

Re:Slate Today's Papers

[guttentag]

The Wall Street Journal's Opinion Journal has a similar daily email (Web edition here [opinionjournal.com]) called "Best of the Web." Sometimes it's insightful and enlightening, sometimes it's a bit too satirical for my taste (and I love to read and write satire), and sometimes it's just so blatantly biased and ignorant I consider cancelling my free subscription. So it's worth mentioning, but I wouldn't recommend it to the general public, who take anything in "print" seriously.

washingtonpost.com also has a politics-specific [washingtonpost.com] news summary email. I used to know the guy who wrote it -- my desk was about five feet from his. I don't know if he's still writing the summaries, or if they're just shoveling existing content into the email now, but this guy really knew what was going on -- even if it was a bit overwhelming at times.

One day he was on the phone with Jesse Jackson when someone came over and said there was a congressman on the other line for him. He asked Jackson if he could hold on for a second, switched to the congressman and told the congressman he'd call back. He then hung up the phone and noticed that I was staring at him in disbelief.

"Did I just put Jesse Jackson on hold?" he asked. I nodded in amazement and he grabbed the phone. "Reverend Jackson? Are you still there? Sorry about that..."