Katherine Boyle, an ex-staffer with the Washington Post and co-founder of American Dynamism, has taken to social media to share a candid critique of The Post's evolution under Jeff Bezos.
Boyle left the Washington Post more than a decade ago and had a few bits to share about the mishandling of the newsroom. She said the paper's transformation from a “For and about Washington” ethos to a sprawling enterprise chasing expensive and less-relevant coverage has brewed larger problems, which have now culminated in massive layoffs.
The Washington Post cut almost one-third of its newsroom staff on Wednesday, February 4. The Post has shuttered its sports desk and reduced the international desk significantly.
Read more: Laid-off Washington Post journalist shuts down troll who said ‘Go back to India’
Boyle's criticism of Post's strategy shift
In the X post, Boyle reflected on the papers' newroom culture before Bezos's purchase. She recalled that the paper once had a clear local and national focus. The motto at the time she was with the Post was “For and about Washington.”
{{/usCountry}}In the X post, Boyle reflected on the papers' newroom culture before Bezos's purchase. She recalled that the paper once had a clear local and national focus. The motto at the time she was with the Post was “For and about Washington.”
{{/usCountry}}After Bezos acquired the newspaper from the Graham family, that motto was replaced with the now-well-known slogan “Democracy Dies in Darkness.”
Boyle detailed that Bezos's ownership did the “opposite” of what the newsroom assumed Bezos would change. She described that Bezos’s ownership eventually led to what she described as a “blank check” era.
“He poured obscene amounts of money into a cash incinerator. He gave the Post a fancy new building,” Boyle wrote. She further added, “He subsidized every section of the paper, even the ones with no readers. He gave the newsroom a blank check for over a decade.”
She said that costly expansions into international desk, podcasts, and video content diluted the Post’s focus. Those investments also, according to critics, made journalists less attuned to sustainable strategies as digital media consumption changed.
“Rather than pursuing a strategy based in reality, the Post newsroom became very accustomed to a billionaire patron giving them everything they wanted in perpetuity,” Boyle wrote.
Read more: Pulitzer-winning journalist among 300 laid off by Washington Post
“Post's brand was and is Washington politics”
Boyle emphasized on the brand that The Washington Post began with in the first place.
She wrote, “The Post’s brand was and is Washington politics. It’s the seat of American power. It should be focused on covering politics from its premier perch in DC.”
She further says that the Post “should have never been distracted by anything else” and that the Post's strongest suit has always been politics. “It lost sports to the Athletic. It lost International to The Times,” she wrote.
She called out the lack of strategy in the newsroom and wrote, “The old Post died many decades ago. Pretending Bezos killed it isn’t true.”
However, Boyle hopefully wrote with her advise that, “The Post can still own politics, and every story, feature and reporter should be focused on covering it. But it needs to stop pretending that the world didn’t change 20 years ago and start listening to its readers again.”