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Speaker 1: Welcome to Fear and Greed Q and A where we

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Speaker 1: ask and answer questions about business, investing, economics, politics and more.

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Speaker 1: Oh Michael Thompson, and good morning, Sean Aylemark.

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Speaker 2: Good morning Michael, Sean.

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Speaker 1: Today we've heard over the last couple of days about

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Speaker 1: layoffs at the Washington Post, which is a very prestigious newspapers, famous,

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Speaker 1: of course for the exposa of Watergate that brought down

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Speaker 1: Richard Nixon. It was bought in twenty thirteen by Amazon

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Speaker 1: founder Jeff Bezos for two hundred and fifty million US dollars.

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Speaker 1: The business has not flourished in recent years, and this

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Speaker 1: week it was three hundred journalists were told that they

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Speaker 1: were losing their jobs. Is about a third of the newsroom,

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Speaker 1: and the changes include everything from scrapping the sports section

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Speaker 1: just before the Winter Olympics, a lot of the foreign bureaus.

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Speaker 1: There was one journalist, one Washington Post journalist who was

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Speaker 1: reporting from Ukraine posted online about being made redundant while

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Speaker 1: in an active war zone. And you had the executive editor,

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Speaker 1: Matt Murray saying the cut the cuts were painful but necessary,

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Speaker 1: saying that the paper could no longer be everything to

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Speaker 1: everyone's the that's the context for this, But in your

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Speaker 1: previous career you had a lot of experience in this

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Speaker 1: space and with these kind of difficult decisions because you

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Speaker 1: worked first as a journalist and then in a senior

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Speaker 1: role within media organizations, overseeing and leading newsrooms across the country,

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Speaker 1: and you had to make some really hard decisions and

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Speaker 1: have a lot of very hard conversations. When you saw

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Speaker 1: this story about the Washington Post, what came to mind

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Speaker 1: immediately trauma.

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Speaker 2: So at Fairfax we certainly reduced the number of journalists,

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Speaker 2: and I was responsible for the journalists at the time,

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Speaker 2: and it was a really difficult period with Fairfax. It

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Speaker 2: was a listed company. You could see how much revenue

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Speaker 2: was coming here in costs going out, and with it

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Speaker 2: we would have gone bankrupt. And it's as simple as that.

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Speaker 2: With the Washington Post. It's privately held, so it's a

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Speaker 2: bit more difficult to actually see the numbers. There is

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Speaker 2: no doubt though, that newspapers are in really dire straits.

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Speaker 2: What I think the person Marty Barron, was the editorial

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Speaker 2: director of the Washington Post when Bezos came in from

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Speaker 2: twenty thirteen to about they're a f eight or nine

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Speaker 2: years or so, I mean, he would have better insight

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Speaker 2: than most, and he absolutely hammered the decision for these layoffs.

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Speaker 2: He said, he understands the financial need, but the direction

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Speaker 2: of the paper had resulted in a bunch of subscribers leaving. Now,

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Speaker 2: you have to make revenue somehow when you're running a newspaper,

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Speaker 2: right as is one way. Subscriptions are the other. They're

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Speaker 2: the two main ways you do it. A few other

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Speaker 2: things around the edges, like events and whatnot. What Marty

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Speaker 2: Baron said is because Jeff Bezos had directed the Washington

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Speaker 2: Post to become much more pro Donald Trump in the

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Speaker 2: past couple of years, literally thousands of people stopped subscribing,

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Speaker 2: and therefore Washington Post was losing its place, as I

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Speaker 2: mean with the New York Times. I think Washington Post

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Speaker 2: is probably next in line in terms of those media

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Speaker 2: mass heeads. But because it was becoming pro Trump, people

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Speaker 2: were deserting it. And so what Marti Barron's argument is

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Speaker 2: that Jeff Bezos's editorial interference had triggered a decline in revenue,

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Speaker 2: which triggered the need to cut jobs, losing a whole

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Speaker 2: sports departments phenomenal.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, the numbers on that are in terms of the

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Speaker 1: political the interference quite extraordinary because it came to a

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Speaker 1: head really when Bezos instructed the newspaper essentially not to

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Speaker 1: endorse Karmala Harris, so were not going to do an

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Speaker 1: endorsement this time. And you and I talked about that

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Speaker 1: at the time, about why newspapers choose to endorse a

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Speaker 1: political candidate and the fact that it is generally done

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Speaker 1: by pretty much all of these all of these mast heads.

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Speaker 1: But when that decision was made, apparently that led to

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Speaker 1: a loss according to the post itself, of at least

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Speaker 1: two hundred and fifty thousand subscribers that decision, and in

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Speaker 1: June of last year, the newspaper circulation fell below one

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Speaker 1: hundred thousand for the first time in fifty five years.

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Speaker 2: One hundred thousand. Wow, that is, that's minuscule in a

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Speaker 2: population of three hundred million. That's interestingly New York Times.

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Speaker 2: When Donald Trump came to power in twenty sixteen, its

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Speaker 2: subscriptions went through the roof and people wanted independent journalism. Yeah,

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Speaker 2: and clearly the and what Marty Barron did say, Jeff

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Speaker 2: Bezos stood by him for the first eight years, for

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Speaker 2: his eight years up until Trump so the first Trump administration,

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Speaker 2: he stood up against Trump. This is Jeff Bezosiana. And

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Speaker 2: then the Biden administration. But since then, obviously he has

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Speaker 2: changed his mind for whatever reason.

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Speaker 3: What's really hard.

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Speaker 2: There are a bunch of journalists, a bunch of people,

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Speaker 2: really hard working, great journalists out there who are just

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Speaker 2: lost their jobs, you know, I mean, doing what they

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Speaker 2: believe in, what they love. The story of you know,

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Speaker 2: you mentioned the story of foreign correspondence actually losing their

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Speaker 2: jobs whilst in really dangerous positions, the Sports department ahead

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Speaker 2: of the Winter Olympics being dumped. It is pretty brutal.

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Speaker 1: Yeah, pretty brutal.

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Speaker 2: The other thing I think about immediate media outlets are

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Speaker 2: a little bit different to many organizations because there's a

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Speaker 2: social good in them. They have a license to go

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Speaker 2: out and it's a little bit different now because of

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Speaker 2: social media. But the respect they've built up over many,

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Speaker 2: many years, they've actually kind of got to tell the truth.

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Speaker 2: And even the Fox News is of the world or sorry,

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Speaker 2: the Guardian lovers. I know you're going to hate me

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Speaker 2: for saying this, but the Guardian, when you have a

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Speaker 2: certain leaning, people know that leaning, but they're still doing reporting.

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Speaker 2: I mean, Fox, you may say it's far too conservative

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Speaker 2: and it loves Donald Trump, but it is still doing reporting,

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Speaker 2: and I think that's something that you have to hold

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Speaker 2: really really deer. And the problem when you have Jeff

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Speaker 2: Bezos coming and saying, don't endorse Kamla Harris b pro Trump,

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Speaker 2: you're kind of playing with that five you're playing with that,

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Speaker 2: and that flows through which it has done in this case.

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Speaker 1: How much pressure do you think it puts on media

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Speaker 1: organizations to become more than just sources of news, because say,

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Speaker 1: the New York Times has grown at the same time

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Speaker 1: as the Washington Posters declined, the New York Times has grown,

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Speaker 1: and that's partly though, because of some of the other

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Speaker 1: things that it's doing at the same time. It's got

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Speaker 1: I think that like the Wirecutter product recommendations, and it's

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Speaker 1: got The other big one is it's games in terms

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Speaker 1: of word a word all for instance, and connections, which

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Speaker 1: have brought so many people into the New York Times ecosystem.

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Speaker 1: So I was just like, do you need to be

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Speaker 1: more than just good reporting if you're going to cut

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Speaker 1: through in twenty twenty six.

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Speaker 2: Yeah, totally. You need a revenue model and New York

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Speaker 2: Times seems to have worked it out better than most.

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Speaker 2: I've told the story before on this show when the

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Speaker 2: Cindney Morning Herald went from broadsheet to tabloid style, the

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Speaker 2: biggest complaint wasn't about the journalism. It was about the

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Speaker 2: font size on the crossword and the amount of whitespace

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Speaker 2: around wordwit those sorts of games. They are almost utility value.

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Speaker 3: You must have it.

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Speaker 2: But why it shares like us often talk about markets

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Speaker 2: and stuff because people just need to be updated. It's

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Speaker 2: kind of utility value, and New York Times has done

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Speaker 2: that so very, very well better than any other organization

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Speaker 2: I think.

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Speaker 1: Anyway, a very tough week then for the journalists at

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Speaker 1: the Washington Post. And as soon as I saw that,

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Speaker 1: I did think of you and the fact that You've

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Speaker 1: had a lot of these kinds of conversations in the past,

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Speaker 1: and it's never easy, and especially with journalists because in

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Speaker 1: so many cases they truly believe in the job that

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Speaker 1: they are doing as.

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Speaker 3: Yeah, it's a vocation for many of these people. Yeah, indeed,

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Speaker 3: all right, thanks very much, Sean, Thanks Michael. If you've

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Speaker 3: got something that you would like us to delve into,

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Speaker 3: can be anything at all, send it through on LinkedIn,

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Speaker 3: on Instagram, or at Fearangreed dot com dot au.

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Speaker 2: I'm Michael Thompson.

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Speaker 3: Can listen Fear and Greed Q and A