As the hardworking staff has diligently chronicled, the New York Times is turning itself into a full-service, well, service.
Travel agency, tchotchke shop, conference center – you name it, the Times will do it.
For money, of course.
Now comes the Grey Lady’s latest money-making scheme: The Corner Office Master Class, touted in this full-page ad in Wednesday’s Times.
Nuts ‘n’ bolts graf:
Hosting the master class is Times reporter Adam Bryant, “a celebrated authority on leadership,” who writes a column called, yes, Corner Office. As our kissin’ cousins at Sneak Adtack recently noted, the Times is “increasingly blurring the line between advertising and editorial” in its efforts to offset knee-buckling declines in print ad revenues.
(See Jeff Gerth’s major Columbia Journalism Review takeout for further details.)
We totally get the need for newspaper organizations to find new sources of revenue. But there’s a fine line between selling Times coffee mugs and selling access to Times journalists.
Here’s hoping the Grey Lady doesn’t cross it.
Campaign Outsider 
Selling access to journalists is bad enough. Promising “significant improvement in leadership skills and potential” after a two-day workshop sounds like a come-on from Trump University.
Excellent point, my friend.
It’s interesting, Jon, that the Times fails to offer up their two best examples of lousy leadership:
Publisher Arthur Sulzberger, Jr. and Executive Editor Dean Baquet.
After the string of disasters that they have lead the Times to make for themselves, one would think that they could headline the segment on what NOT to do,
Who knows, Mudge – if that has revenue potential, they might yet do it.
“fine line” or “bright line” ?
Actually, both.