Maybe skip reading the NY Times today

December 8, 2022 9:24 AM

Many staffers at the New York Times are going on strike today.

From an NPR story about the strike: "From my point of view, this is an absolutely necessary shot across the bow," says guild member Michael Powell, a veteran reporter who covers free speech matters for the New York Times national desk. "We're approaching two years without a contract, which means we're approaching two years without a raise.... Each month that goes by, they're taking more money out of our pocket."

posted by hydra77 (59 comments total)

don't cross the picket lines

this also means no wordle, no crosswords, no nyt cooking, no wirecutter, and no transphobic op-eds for today
posted by i used to be someone else at 9:45 AM on December 8, 2022 [96 favorites]

Will somebody please interview some truckers in an Idaho diner to get their opinions on this?
posted by PlusDistance at 9:55 AM on December 8, 2022 [62 favorites]

I broke my 60-day Wordle streak in solidarity with the strikers. The very least I could do.
posted by agatha_magatha at 10:05 AM on December 8, 2022 [29 favorites]

Got it! Suspending crossword account until the strike is over!
posted by Abehammerb Lincoln at 10:08 AM on December 8, 2022 [4 favorites]

Wordle, Mini Crossword, Cooking.NyTimes.com, then front page of the paper. That's my daily morning routine. All have been skipped today. Solidarity!
posted by hydra77 at 10:11 AM on December 8, 2022 [6 favorites]

You could always go to strikle.org instead of wordle.
posted by aspo at 10:12 AM on December 8, 2022 [32 favorites]

Crap. I do Wordle as a proof-of-life thing with a friend who lives across the country. We do it first thing in the morning, and we already did it this morning. I knew about the strike, but hadn't connected it to Wordle. :(
posted by tllaya at 10:16 AM on December 8, 2022 [10 favorites]

I wonder how well this strike is working. I only heard about it last night by chance on Tumblr. But then, I don't use Twitter much anymore, so maybe that's down to me. I hope it at least makes a dent.
posted by Countess Elena at 10:35 AM on December 8, 2022 [1 favorite]

I only just heard about it, but hadn't done wordle yet today (phew!). Last night Apple news sent me some NYT article profiling an anti-abortion person which I didn't read (but the squib made it look sympathetic) so I'm already mad at them anyway.
posted by joannemerriam at 10:44 AM on December 8, 2022 [3 favorites]

Way ahead of you.
posted by Sphinx at 10:44 AM on December 8, 2022 [4 favorites]

Thank goodness for Quordle!
posted by hydra77 at 10:52 AM on December 8, 2022 [7 favorites]

A playwright I know has a "day job" as a fact checker for the NYT - on his behalf, thank you all for standing by the strike.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 10:55 AM on December 8, 2022 [14 favorites]

I clicked on a few newsletter links and thus accidentally read NYT stuff today, sigh. Oops.I guess someone got up early to watch Harry and Meghan and report on it anyway...

I wish them luck in this season of striking. I admit I'm curious to want to see how the front page looks, but it probably just has old articles or whatever online.
posted by jenfullmoon at 11:17 AM on December 8, 2022

*My comment is not linked to the strike but a comment generally on the NYTimes and wondering if others have experienced this*

NYTimes is my hometown paper and have been a reader since high school and a subscriber for many years. My concern about NYT is the quality has gone downhill in the past 5 years. Specifically, rampant grammatical and spelling errors. To the point that a friend and I regularly trade texts on the especially egregious errors. These errors are especially noteworthy on the smaller fluff pieces such as movie reviews, local interest, etc where the park their rookie journalists. Rookie journalists are just that but these errors and the stilted writing (oh boy!) read like high school newspaper articles. I am also concerned that they have drawn back from covering local NYC news. The NYTimes used to somewhat keep up with local stuff (thank you Sewell Chan and Jen 8 Lee!) but now, it can be several days behind what is local news or interest.

Unfortunately, I have to cobble together local NYC news from the NY Post which is almost a tabloid but is surprisingly fast at covering the latest albeit with a decided slant, Spectrum (formerly NY1) News, very local neighborhood papers with sporadic publishing schedules, and frankly, just gossip on the street and in my coop building gathered from Community Boards and schools.

Curious to hear thoughts from other folks?
posted by ichimunki at 11:25 AM on December 8, 2022 [10 favorites]

I admit I'm curious to want to see how the front page looks, but it probably just has old articles or whatever online.

Nope, looks pretty normal.
posted by kickingtheground at 11:26 AM on December 8, 2022 [1 favorite]

Honestly, I rarely read them anyway - mostly out of a lack of time than anything else. I have the AP news app and the BBC news app on my phones and get news that way, plus I listen to NPR in the morning (I stopped pledging years ago, but it's bland enough for me to listen to when half-awake in the morning).
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 11:28 AM on December 8, 2022

Unfortunately, I have to cobble together local NYC news from the NY Post

NO. Just NO. The post has good local on-the-beat reporters, but their coverage is sensationalised and in both their local and national coverage they are are direct supporters of the worst racism and fascism - the worst of the mainstream media.

If you buy the post, or click on their ads, you're supporting nazis.

Support real local journalism

https://gothamist.com/
https://www.thecity.nyc/
https://hellgatenyc.com/
posted by lalochezia at 11:44 AM on December 8, 2022 [27 favorites]

Damnit, I do the Wordle when I get up and the strike wasn’t on my pre-caffeine radar. Def breaking my streak tomorrow in solidarity, fuck NYT management.
posted by donatella at 11:45 AM on December 8, 2022 [1 favorite]

Maybe skip reading the NY Times entirely?
posted by Pyrogenesis at 11:46 AM on December 8, 2022 [8 favorites]

Not to worry - I did a bit of browsing on the NYT site in an attempt to negate some of the "solidarity" ppl.
posted by davidmsc at 11:50 AM on December 8, 2022 [1 favorite]

Not to worry - I did a bit of browsing on the NYT site in an attempt to negate some of the "solidarity" ppl.

Are you bragging about crossing a (digital) picket line?
posted by heteronym at 11:59 AM on December 8, 2022 [62 favorites]

I passed word to my union local and through Mastodon (where I'm not a whale, but not a minnow either) and other online places I socialize.

Maybe let's reserve judgment on the efficacy of the boycott until we hear something solid about it.
posted by humbug at 12:03 PM on December 8, 2022 [3 favorites]

Ooooooops. I do the puzzles first thing in the morning, before I come here or read/listen to any news. Now I feel like a rat.
posted by Daily Alice at 12:12 PM on December 8, 2022 [3 favorites]

For what it's worth, I've effectively been boycotting* the New York Times because of their platforming of transphobia. However, I do find the Wirecutter phenomenally useful. I can put off some purchases and product research in order to support the strike.

* Is it a boycott if you're just not using the product because it's terrible?
posted by explosion at 12:14 PM on December 8, 2022 [12 favorites]

Apparently I have been doing the same as explosion because I can't stand their race/politics coverage.
posted by toastyk at 12:18 PM on December 8, 2022 [1 favorite]

Not to worry - I did a bit of browsing on the NYT site in an attempt to negate some of the "solidarity" ppl.
posted by davidmsc at 2:50 PM on December 8

lol who does that
posted by ZaphodB at 12:22 PM on December 8, 2022 [17 favorites]

Not to worry - I did a bit of browsing on the NYT site in an attempt to negate some of the "solidarity" ppl.

You seem to be confusing the New York Times with the New Yorker if you're trying to get us to say "Christ, What An Asshole"
posted by miguelcervantes at 12:28 PM on December 8, 2022 [27 favorites]

I didn’t know about the strike, but was appropriately chastened when the Wordle solution turned out to be SCABS.
posted by vorpal bunny at 12:28 PM on December 8, 2022 [35 favorites]

Nikole Hannah-Jones on Twitter:

— There's something about this form that makes people act so ugly, but the NYT is not just journalists. We're striking for our lower paid colleagues, those who put out the paper, our security guards, our news assistants. That is the point of COLLECTIVE actions. We fight together.

— The people wittily saying our one-day strike makes you want to read the NYT, go for it. Those who stand in solidarity with workers and our right to have a say in our pay and working conditions, please do not read the NYT today. Thank you.

(Sorry, on my phone so can’t link.)
posted by neroli at 12:48 PM on December 8, 2022 [22 favorites]

Explosion: Is it a boycott if you're just not using the product because it's terrible?

I'm a Brit who has been living in NY for 30 years.

I continued to freelance (as a celebrity circuit hack) for the dreaded & dreadful Daily Mail long after we moved here. The money was fantastic, as long as you overlooked the paper's inherent racism, sexism, classism and everythingism (which I was astonishing good at doing - the overlooking bit...).

However.

The one thing the NY Times could learn from the dreaded Daily Mail: how to write an intro (or "lede").

I picked a random NY Times story today (to make sure I wasn't being an old fart & recycling a long out-of-date prejudice). And - nothing has changed.

This: WASHINGTON — The House on Thursday gave final approval to legislation to mandate federal recognition for same-sex marriages, with a bipartisan coalition of lawmakers voting in favor of the measure in the waning days of the Democratic-led Congress.

You would have been thrown out on your ear by Daily Mail sub editors for a lame, wan, lifeless intro like that. And they would have been right.
posted by Jody Tresidder at 12:54 PM on December 8, 2022 [9 favorites]

If we had the thread about striking Starbucks workers, how would we view people proudly announcing that they thought the coffee sucked?
posted by neroli at 1:04 PM on December 8, 2022 [4 favorites]

We would take it to Metatalk.
posted by Ice Cream Socialist at 1:07 PM on December 8, 2022 [5 favorites]

NeroliIf we had the thread about striking Starbucks workers, how would we view people proudly announcing that they thought the coffee sucked?

But...Starbucks is a chain?
The NY Times is sui generis?
Or have I entirely missed your point? (Highly possible.)
posted by Jody Tresidder at 1:24 PM on December 8, 2022 [1 favorite]

Whoops, another one that does wordle and then the daily set to wake up. Oh, well, along with donatella, I will be...
Def breaking my streak tomorrow in solidarity, fuck NYT management.

I actually kind of prefer hello wordle and dordle and do them in the evening as a wind-down. I do/did wordle because it was the original and the upscale version (Because I'm from Eye-de-ho and you know, it's the New York Times!)

And don't piss me off with your settlement terms, NYT management, because there's plenty of other games out there.
posted by BlueHorse at 1:33 PM on December 8, 2022 [2 favorites]

So I realized I need to clarify exactly what I mean by "reading" the NY Post. Note that I am focusing purely on NYC local news. I want to know what it is happening in my city. The NYPost has really sensationalized tabloid pieces on celebrities and just terrible schtick I do not read BUT the NYPost on the ground local reporters get to places faster than any of the other NY City new including Gothamist, AP, Reuters, ABC, NBC, etc. I read the NY Post purely to know the latest local crime especially in my neighborhood. For example, there were a ton of ambulances and police cars across my street on Monday. Something clearly big happened but what? NY Post had covered the story of the shooting and I heard not a peep from the other news sources. They write terribly and write it purely to instigate but the facts are there and I know someone was shot at a particular address.

For journalism, I subscribe to the Atlantic and the New Yorker with well written and thought out pieces. I read Gothamist occasionally but they are not as prolific lately. They underwent layoffs from WNYC last year. WNYC acquired Gothamist in 2018 after their billionaire owner, John Ricketts, abruptly shut them down a week after their staffers voted to join a union. Ricketts then went on to donate the money he would have spent on Gothamist to support Donald Trump so there was a lot of nastiness going on in the back scenes. I started subscribed to the Washington Post about two years ago. The WaPo was pretty solid although they are also going through transitions lately. Probably Bezos related? Who knows?
posted by ichimunki at 2:17 PM on December 8, 2022 [5 favorites]

Apparently there was a (paywalled) WSJ piece about it... So without doing something as crass as actually checking, I'm guessing the headline was one of these:

"Out of touch pinko union bites hand that feeds it"
"ROI impacted by pesky ingrates"
"Uppity serfs whine for unearned share in entrepreneurs' profits"

Any other guesses? (No peeking! Winner gets an Elon Musk bobblehead.)
posted by kleinsteradikaleminderheit at 2:27 PM on December 8, 2022 [8 favorites]

My concern about NYT is the quality has gone downhill in the past 5 years. Specifically, rampant grammatical and spelling errors.

No one wants to pay copy editors any more. I mean, Word has grammar and spelling checks, so why pay a person, right?

Which also explains why it's more common to see wrong-yet-correctly-spelled words in published books, magazines, and newspaper.
posted by kirkaracha at 2:34 PM on December 8, 2022 [9 favorites]

Does this mean I should pay the paywall now or after the strike.
posted by clavdivs at 2:56 PM on December 8, 2022

Rex Parker won't cross the picket line
posted by chavenet at 3:47 PM on December 8, 2022 [7 favorites]

The copy editing staff was severely cut in 2017, explaining the proliferation of errors and mistakes in the last 5 years. This attitude toward the expendability of staff is probably also why there’s a strike, presently. Here in NYC, both the New School adjunct staff and Harper Collins Union are also on strike. It’s an interesting time for union activity for knowledge workers.

I learned about Murdle here on MeFi the other and then tried my first couple of Wordles out of curiosity. D’oh, stopping now.
posted by inkytea at 3:59 PM on December 8, 2022 [14 favorites]

Can't live without your wordle? Try strikle instead
posted by ivan ivanych samovar at 4:31 PM on December 8, 2022 [4 favorites]

Wait the Wordle answer was SCABS?? Lololol

That was also the answer on an alternative game I played today...
posted by CPAnarchist at 4:42 PM on December 8, 2022 [2 favorites]

Not to worry - I did a bit of browsing on the NYT site in an attempt to negate some of the "solidarity" ppl.

Wow.. thakn you for sharing Sir !
posted by dusty potato at 5:47 PM on December 8, 2022 [1 favorite]

Hey did you know you can play Wordle on webarchive.org instead of NYT?
posted by evilmomlady at 6:00 PM on December 8, 2022 [2 favorites]

They say on (Metafilter)
That neutral acts are crimes
You’ll either back your union friends
Or click the New York Times.
posted by MarchHare at 7:18 PM on December 8, 2022 [3 favorites]

https://captainsaturn.com/wordhex
posted by 3.2.3 at 7:20 PM on December 8, 2022 [2 favorites]

rampant grammatical and spelling errors ... on the smaller fluff pieces ... where the park their rookie journalists

Heh.
posted by flabdablet at 11:36 PM on December 8, 2022 [1 favorite]

The copy editing staff was severely cut in 2017, explaining the proliferation of errors and mistakes in the last 5 years.

Wordle: we'll pay a million, no problem
Quality: gotta cut back there
posted by trig at 1:33 AM on December 9, 2022 [5 favorites]

The employees of the most important newspaper in the US go on strike because of decades long issues with management and half of you care more about a word game than the workers.
posted by octothorpe at 3:14 AM on December 9, 2022 [6 favorites]

...care more about a word game than the workers
Kindly: it can be both.
posted by evilmomlady at 3:31 AM on December 9, 2022 [7 favorites]

I stopped paying for the actual NYT ages ago because if you are on Twitter you can get the gist of any of the non-newswire articles from the thousands of people complaining about them. Why buy the cow, etc.

The puzzles and cooking are nice, though.
posted by kingdead at 5:38 AM on December 9, 2022

You're right, Octothorpe. Rather than joke about the Wordle most of us didn't play, and the alternative many of us did, we should've just come clap at those that did these things. You know. For the workers!

You have a path to further support these folks, or is it just insipid comments for solidarity today?
posted by CPAnarchist at 5:51 AM on December 9, 2022

Eh, I have grammatical errors on my comments. But hey, I'm not a journalist or a major newspaper.
posted by ichimunki at 8:10 AM on December 9, 2022 [1 favorite]

I quit doing business with the Times a month ago when some employee messed with my wordle and spelling bee, over something I posted in fanfare. The NYT folks can bite me. The NYT folks write a lot of articles out of here, using askmefi to gather info. The Times should be mefi's biggest donor.
posted by Oyéah at 9:14 AM on December 9, 2022 [1 favorite]

NY Mag: Just What Did the Times Walkout Change? Obviously articles were written ahead of time or not-so-urgent ones were published and the paper wasn't empty.

And according to a source familiar with audience numbers, Wordle use did not dip, despite calls from the unionized staff for Wordlers to lay off it for a day in solidarity with the stoppage.
posted by jenfullmoon at 10:37 AM on December 9, 2022

Jenfullmoon: And according to a source familiar with audience numbers, Wordle use did not dip, despite calls from the unionized staff for Wordlers to lay off it for a day in solidarity with the stoppage.

Does this mean at least one person here has told a five-letter porky?

[Noun. porky pie (plural porky pies) (Cockney rhyming slang, chiefly in the plural) Lie (false statement).
posted by Jody Tresidder at 12:04 PM on December 9, 2022

I think a lot of people hit Wordle first thing in the morning, so it wouldn't surprise me if usage didn't change much. I didn't skip it yesterday because I did it before I checked metafilter.
posted by potrzebie at 3:14 PM on December 9, 2022

Democracy Now, the War and Peace Report. Worth your (listening) time if you’re looking for news.
posted by beckybakeroo at 8:35 PM on December 9, 2022

WaPo: Wordle players break streaks to support New York Times union walkout
posted by jenfullmoon at 2:54 PM on December 10, 2022