4 ms·

Let's be clear, here: WaPo is not in the same category as most of your other examples. It just has a different owner, and the prior owner (the Graham family),

Let's be clear, here: WaPo is not in the same category as most of your other examples. It just has a different owner, and the prior owner (the Graham family), while not as rich as Bezos, was still plenty rich. Don Graham famously tried to invest in Facebook as early as 2005: https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffbercovici/2012/02/02/facebook-and-don-graham-have-been-very-good-to-each-other/#3a2e789328ba https://www.forbes.com/sites/jeffbercovici/2012/02/02/facebo... Bezos, while involved, has not changed the basic tenor of its journalism beyond maybe souping up some of its technology. Also, WaPo publishes pieces critical of Amazon and its subsidiaries all the time: https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/12/07/amazon-wants-a-key-to-your-house-i-did-it-i-regretted-it/?utm_term=.da8c5883ff1d https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/the-switch/wp/2017/12/07... https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/is-amazon-getting-too-big/2017/07/28/ff38b9ca-722e-11e7-9eac-d56bd5568db8_story.html?utm_term=.062539b02c1a https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/is-amazon-getting-to... https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/whole-foods-places-new-limits-on-suppliers-upsetting-some-small-vendors/2018/01/05/7f58b466-f0a1-11e7-b390-a36dc3fa2842_story.html?utm_term=.e99a4ce3315d https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/economy/whole-foods-... (Also, but on a different note, GigaOM was sold off because it had previously shut down and laid off all its writers.)

gkoberger 9y ago
I agree with you. They're all done for different reasons. I'm 100% pro-Bezos buying WaPo, especially since it seems he hasn't touched the editorial side of things. BUT it has been used to discredit legitimate WaPo journalism by Trump ("Amazon's Washington Post" / "Bezos Washington Post" / etc) I included GigaOM because it's probably closest to Gawker (relatively small blog, shut down due to external forces, and brought back with a new name). I didn't mean to imply all of these were nefarious changes. Rather, they're examples of people hijacking well-trusted (or well-known) brand names, which in the world of blogs/twitter/rumors are hard to come by.
- emodendroket 9y ago
  Remember that story with the company management stepping in because a feud between Bill O'Reilly and Keith Olbermann was starting to get into unsavory business of the networks' parent companies? The idea that Jeff Bezos could influence the Post's coverage isn't outlandish, even if Trump rather cynically invoked the concept.

gkoberger 9y ago

I agree with you. They're all done for different reasons. I'm 100% pro-Bezos buying WaPo, especially since it seems he hasn't touched the editorial side of things. BUT it has been used to discredit legitimate WaPo journalism by Trump ("Amazon's Washington Post" / "Bezos Washington Post" / etc) I included GigaOM because it's probably closest to Gawker (relatively small blog, shut down due to external forces, and brought back with a new name). I didn't mean to imply all of these were nefarious changes. Rather, they're examples of people hijacking well-trusted (or well-known) brand names, which in the world of blogs/twitter/rumors are hard to come by.

emodendroket 9y ago
Remember that story with the company management stepping in because a feud between Bill O'Reilly and Keith Olbermann was starting to get into unsavory business of the networks' parent companies? The idea that Jeff Bezos could influence the Post's coverage isn't outlandish, even if Trump rather cynically invoked the concept.