I read yesterday that according to its current share price, the New York Times Company’s market capitalization is about $1.43 billion. The NYTCo paid about $1.1 billion for the Boston Globe et al. in 1993. Adjusted for inflation, that would be more than $1.5 billion in today’s dollars. So the entire NYT empire is now judged by investors to be worth less than the Times Company paid for one of its pieces 15 years ago.
I’m no financial whiz, and maybe the company is currently undervalued, but these numbers give you a sense of how far the newspaper business has fallen in the last decade, don’t they? (In related news, The LATimes laid off another 10% of its newsroom staff this week, bringing it to just over half of what its size was a decade ago, the Christian Science Monitor went this week from being a daily newspaper to a weekly website, etc., etc., etc…)
9 responses so far ↓
coastalshelf // October 30, 2008 at 5:02 pm |
When will the NYT last publish a daily hard copy???
eric // October 30, 2008 at 5:29 pm |
And what will replace it/them?
David // October 30, 2008 at 10:28 pm |
Dec. 31, 2016? The Palin-Wurzelbacher ticket will get elected, then the Times will take advantage of the big holiday ad season, then they’ll close the printing plants for good and turn the company into a 24-hour-a-day online-only operation…
coastalshelf // October 31, 2008 at 5:50 am |
The younger generation, which can safely keep a laptop and latte on the same small table, doesn’t need paper, with its unequalled absorbant properties.
coastalshelf // October 31, 2008 at 10:43 am |
Wurzelbacher will not be the first phony plumber in the White House. Nixon had a whole team of them.
eric // November 2, 2008 at 6:13 pm |
I’m curious: have all of those most viewed posts been viewed in the last 24 hours? Or does the algorithm go farther back if it has to?
David // November 2, 2008 at 11:53 pm |
It’s pretty accurate. It shows a maximum of 12 posts, and if fewer than 12 have been visited in the past day or so, then the list is shorter. Most of the old posts listed are pages that people land at through google at least once a day — the Bellini post and the Secret Cove post are sometimes visited half a dozen times a day or more, although the Secret Cove traffic has died down a lot now that summer is over. The ode to Jenny 8. Lee, which was a post from 8/8/08, had a boomlet earlier this week because she stumbled upon it and then linked to it from her blog, but that little wave seems to have died down.
coastalshelf // November 3, 2008 at 3:47 am |
That Jenny–lucky as always, stumbling on the post and landing on her feet.
coastalshelf // November 4, 2008 at 3:41 am |
Today, the Citadel of Objectivity gives us Palin’s self-exoneration on page 1. Another nail in their own coffin.