News commentary

Media Elites Are the Last People to Ask About the Future of Journalism

The Nation · Chris Lehmann · last updated

It’s an admittedly minor wrinkle in the mass derangement building up to the 2024 election, but future historians will be at a loss to explain why New York magazine chose this moment to roll out a cover package that ballyhoos the deep thoughts of media industry executives. The quote-stravaganza, assembled by the magazine’s apparently indefatigable processor of PR copy, media columnist Charlotte Klein, is a long and numbing cri de coeur from the C-suites—the very bosses who have irredeemably fouled up the underlying business model for mainstream journalism are tasked here with divining the industry’s path forward. The whole exercise is a bit like canvassing the designer of the Hindenburg on the future of air travel.

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