It was this time final yr that New York Occasions media columnist Ben Smith introduced he’d be giving up probably the most coveted jobs in journalism. The previous BuzzFeed editor’s abrupt departure rapidly sparked a guessing sport amongst media-watchers and members of the newsroom as to who would take his place. Whereas Smith went on to construct and launch Semafor, his new media start-up with cofounder Justin Smith, the Occasions has but to fill his outdated slot.
I’m instructed folks concerned with hiring have solicited beat memos from journalists each inside and outdoors the paper, although it’s unclear what, if something, has come of them. Just a few names outdoors have emerged as contenders, together with the Washington Publish media author (and former Self-importance Honest particular correspondent) Sarah Ellison, former CNN anchor Brian Stelter, and Puck media columnist Dylan Byers; all three had conversations with newsroom leaders, based on sources. (Semafor’s Max Tani reported earlier on potential candidates in Smith’s new media e-newsletter, which is now blasted out on Sunday nights across the similar time his outdated Occasions column used to look on-line.) I’m instructed that Byers was in talks with administration concerning the job however took himself out of the working late final yr. Stelter, in the meantime, has had extra conferences with the Occasions in current weeks.
It’s stunning for such a high-profile perch—one which Smith made a weekly vacation spot for media junkies not seen for the reason that David Carr period—to be dormant for this lengthy. A Occasions insider final yr instructed me that Smith’s departure offered a possibility “for rethinking the main focus” of its signature column. And but, one one that talked to the Occasions for the gig instructed me they acquired the impression that the Occasions was nonetheless attempting to determine what they have been doing with the column—and on the lookout for a columnist to come back to them with a transparent imaginative and prescient for it. “We proceed to hunt to fill the place,” a Occasions spokesperson instructed me, “however don’t have something additional to share on our personnel processes.”
In the meantime, the paper’s media protection is and not using a everlasting media editor ever since editor Jim Windolf moved to a brand new function in Kinds a couple of yr in the past. Joe Plambeck, an editor on the Enterprise desk, has been enhancing numerous the part’s copy within the interim. The Occasions approached Monetary Occasions US enterprise editor Andrew Edgecliffe-Johnson concerning the media editor job, based on a supply conversant in the data. (Edgecliffe-Johnson declined to remark.)
Maybe, one contributing issue to the delay is the variety of cooks within the kitchen—amongst these concerned within the columnist hiring course of is enterprise editor Ellen Pollock, deputy managing editor Sam Dolnick, and, in fact, govt editor Joe Kahn—and the truth that the Occasions doesn’t appear to know what it even desires the column to be. That’s in stark distinction to Smith’s appointment, which famously got here collectively after then govt editor Dean Baquet, figuring out precisely what he needed, took Smith out to a midwinter Lambs Membership lunch.
