The New Republic upheaval - December 2014

It has been the main topic at Mediagazer from Thu, Dec 4 through Tue, Dec 9.

http://jothut.com/cgi-bin/junco.pl/replies/48500

http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2014/dec/09/silicon-valley-journalism-chris-hughes-new-republic-buzzfeed

The irony of the New Republic’s retreating elite posting their displeasure on Facebook was heightened by Hughes publishing a defense of his plans for the magazine – plans which recently-appointed chief executive Guy Vidra described as changing the publication into a “vertically integrated digital product”, whatever that means – through that most traditional of outlets: the Washington Post.

http://www.theatlantic.com/politics/archive/2014/12/the-new-republic-an-appreciation/383561/?single_page=true

That explains why the family rows at TNR's virtual funeral look like the "Whites Only" section of a Jim Crow-era movie-house. For most of its modern history, TNR has been an entirely white publication, which published stories confirming white people's worst instincts.

http://www.newyorker.com/news/news-desk/inside-collapse-new-republic

Hughes’s eroding relationship with the staff took on an ideological edge. On the morning that Tim Cook, the C.E.O. of Apple, announced that he was gay, MacGillis wrote a note to “the Plank,” T.N.R.’s internal e-mail listserv for writers and editors. “I see the celebration of his announcement, while entirely justifiable, as another sign of what’s happened to liberalism today, where rights/identity liberalism trumps economic liberalism,” he wrote. “This is, after all, a guy who embodies so much of what’s amiss in the age of inequality—pulling down $378 million in 2011 alone; Apple skirting taxes more brazenly than anyone else—yet those revelations have caused barely a stir.”

Hughes responded to the note six minutes later: “I think those are valid issues, although Apple has acted squarely within the law,” he wrote. “The law itself is fucked up. But I don’t think you can underestimate the difficulty of his decision or how tone deaf that argument would be today.”

The other editorial employees on the list were surprised by the response. It was an internal listserv for writers and editors, and the staffers didn’t realize that Hughes, who had relinquished his title as editor-in-chief when he installed Vidra, was on it. MacGillis responded by saying that he would hold off on writing, but added, “Just for the record, though, it is not so clear that Apple acted squarely within the law. The law’s a mess, but Apple pushed the bounds of it more than anyone.” He pasted text from a piece in the Times that questioned some of Apple’s practices.

“I’m confused,” Hughes wrote back. “Has anyone, including this article, said what they did was illegal? Companies have an obligation to their shareholders to maximize shareholder value, including through strategic tax planning.”

But if TNR was known for writing about policy, then why not use the magazine to write about an effed-up law that encourages tax cheats?

In early October, Wieseltier appeared on “The Colbert Report” to promote a book of essays from T.N.R.’s history called “Insurrections of the Mind.” “Chris seemed pretty pissed about Leon’s ‘Colbert’ appearance,” a staffer who is still at the magazine told me. “Editorial people were talking about how great Leon was, and Chris was angry that the first thing Leon said was what’s wrong with American culture is ‘too much digital.’ ”

Control-freak.

Now the humor ...

n the morning of October 24th, Vidra made his first appearance at T.N.R.’s Washington offices for a presentation to the whole staff. He opened a PowerPoint slide show and stood up to address the group. “I like to walk around when I speak,” he said. He offered a series of statements intended to describe a transformation that could make the magazine profitable, but it came across to the editors as a jumble of clichés and tech jargon. “We’re going to be a hundred-year-old startup,” he said. The magazine needed “to align ourselves from the metabolism perspective” and create “magical experiences for both the content and the product design” and be “fearless in innovation and experimentation” and “change some of the DNA of the organization.” He said that he wanted to institute “a process for annual reviews” and effect a “cultural change where we need to just embrace innovation, experimentation, and cross-functional collaboration,” and said that the editors, writers, and business side would need to “speak to each other much more effectively and efficiently in our gatherings” in order “to take us to the next stage.”

Vidra didn’t mention the magazine’s journalism. “Never did he once allude to the history of the magazine,” a former staffer said. “It was just terrifying rhetoric about change without any substance to back it up.” To some staffers, it felt as if Hughes had sent Vidra to scare them into writing more, buzzier Web items or risk being replaced.

Vidra ended his talk with a speech that T.N.R. writers and editors would quote mockingly for weeks. “They say that there’s two types of C.E.O.s,” he said. “There’s the peacetime C.E.O. and the wartime C.E.O. Not to be overly dramatic about it, but this is sort of a war. This is a wartime period. That just means that we need to change a lot of things. We need to just break shit. Sorry to say, we’ve got to break shit and embrace being uncomfortable sometimes. And it’s scary. It’s definitely a scary thing to do. But it’s also fun: you know, lean up against the wall and break it.”

He paused, and then continued in less dramatic fashion. “So, I hope you guys are as excited as I am about it. I think it will be a super adventure! Any questions? I have no answers, but feel free.”

I'm surprised staffers didn't resign immediately at that point. Sounds like something from Dilbert.

Wieseltier responded to Hughes with a message about stewardship. “We are not only disruptors and incubators and accelerators,” he said, seemingly mocking the language that Hughes and Vidra often used. “We are also stewards and guardians and trustees.” He went on,“The questions that we must ask ourselves, and that our historians and our children will ask of us, are these: How will what we create compare with what we inherited? Will we add to our tradition or will we subtract from it? Will we enrich it or will we deplete it?”

Maybe Hughes and Vidra are not in the intellectual class of some TNR staffers.

After speaking with Hughes, Foer walked into Wieseltier’s office and told him that he was resigning immediately. Wieseltier, who had survived numerous changes in editor, told Foer that he would quit with him. The two men addressed the staff.

“I want to be clear that I’m not resigning because anyone did anything personal to me,” Wieseltier said. “I’m resigning because I believe the principles of my work are being violated. A great cultural institution in America is being vandalized, and I don’t approve of the direction in which this magazine is being taken. In my legendarily long work life at The New Republic, I have never seen someone treated as shabbily as Frank Foer.”

Foer pointed toward the bound volumes along the wall. “You know how Leon and I feel about this place,” he said. “We love it so deeply that you’d have to scrape us off the walls. For us to arrive at the point where we feel compelled to leave tells you everything you need to know about what’s happening.”

After Foer and Wieseltier’s announcement, the New York editorial staff gathered at an editor’s nearby apartment; most of the Washington editorial staff met in the T.N.R. library, and the two groups dialed into a conference call. They talked about their frustrations with Vidra’s seeming lack of interest in the magazine’s content. But most of all they talked about what they considered the dishonesty of Hughes and Vidra.

Why should anyone believe anything said by Hughes and Vidra now and in the future?

“There was very little sense that The New Republic was something that could be saved,” an editor who was there told me. “After months—literally months—of being lied to and bullied around and made to feel like shit, all the while being studiously jargoned at when we asked for specifics about T.N.R.’s future, most people had had enough. It wasn’t just about the way Frank was fired, though that was awful. And it wasn’t just about Gabe’s hiring, though some had misgivings. It was more about: How can we work for these people?”

#media