A number of media critics have questioned the hire, noting that -
- Mark Thompson has spent all of his media career at the BBC - a government-funded public service broadcaster. He seems to have no newspaper experience.
- While he was Director General during the times the BBC made considerable, generally successful, efforts moving into the online/mobile universe - most insiders felt that Thompson was seen as more of a "custodian and curator" than an innovator.
- Is Thompson's salary of $1 million a year reasonable for an organization that is still bleeding revenues profusely? ($140+ million in losses in the last quarter). But it's actually worse than that - Thompson's deal calls for a reported $8+ million in salary, incentives and prospective bonuses that he could receive by the end of next year.
On the business side, the latest financial reports see that ad revenues continue to decline at the Times, with print-ad revenues down a reported 7% in the last quarter (online ad revenues were also down). In the last quarter, the Times reported making more revenues from subscriptions than from advertising.
The bottom line is that a business-as-usual or custodial approach is not going to cut it at the NYT, not when revenues are declining as rapidly as they have been. And shedding some staff or tweaking the product with a few digital bells and whistles isn’t likely to accomplish much either. The legendary paper doesn’t need someone to manage its business; it needs someone to reinvent it on a fairly fundamental level. Whether Mark Thompson is the man for that particular job remains to be seen.
Sources - Is Mark Thompson what the NYT really needs right now?, GigoOm.com Tech News and Analysis.
NY Times boss Thompson eyes $8m payday, AFP/France 24
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