Jeff Bezos is good for journalism

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Washington Post — which marked the first Trump administration by adding the motto “Democracy Dies in Darkness” to its masthead — produced an editorial supporting Kamala Harris. Its owner, Amazon’s Jeff Bezos, shut it down, saying the paper would not endorse any candidate, now or ever again.

Fury ensued. The employees quit. About 200,000 readers have canceled their subscriptions. Writers who wrote about writers had a hand in something that the Post writers did not write about.

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The level of outrage was the same as if Amazon had ended free shipping, except it affected far fewer people. Bezos rushed to write his own editorial, entitled: “The Harsh Truth: Americans Don’t Trust the Media.”

He argued that too many readers believe the media is biased, and editorial support tends to confirm this view without having any impact on voters. So it’s better to give them up altogether.

Bezos denies that he stopped the Post from endorsing Harris because he wanted favors for his companies from the incoming Trump administration.

“When it comes to creating conflict, I am not the ideal owner of The Post,” Bezos wrote. “Every day, somewhere, some (executives of) … charities and companies that I own or invest in are meeting with government officials,” he wrote. “The Post is a ‘complexifier’ for me.” “That’s true, but it turns out I’m also making it harder for The Post.”

“You may view my wealth and business interests as protection from intimidation or as a web of conflicting interests.”

This is what Donald Trump has been talking about for nine years; his personal wealth makes him immune to donor pressure. If he had depended on the Republican donor class, they would have sidelined and forced him out long ago. Many progressives who hate him would prefer he be less independent, so big money has more influence.

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The Democratic donor class demonstrated that power with brutal efficiency this summer, cashing out the incumbent and installing Harris as his replacement even though she never won a single vote in the primary.

The same writers who complain that big-money Bezos prevented them from supporting Harris would never have gotten Harris’s support if big-money Democrats hadn’t vetoed the choice of Democratic primary voters. So big money is ambiguous.

Bezos keeps money-losing Post afloat. Its wealth supports the historic title and ensures journalism of a certain quality. Without Bezos, the Post’s coverage would be more saturated with celebrity gossip than it is now. Daily Mail is the world’s number one news site and seller of monetized angry podcasts and YouTube.

Are Bezos and his wealth good or bad for journalism? Democratic countries need news, especially reporting, not commentary. If the market does not provide this sufficiently, then who will? Philanthropists are one answer. Generous. Mail lost $77 million last year.

Government is another option. This was partly Canada’s response: federal government subsidies are paid to media companies, including Postmedia. Many voices condemn this, fearing that it means government control, or at least subsidized journalists who abandon their efforts for fear of losing public money.

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There is more logic than evidence in this. National Post suddenly became friendly to Trudeau? Stephen Harper signed checks for CBC for nine years. Did this affect their reporting?

Someone has to pay for the news. Readers paid only part. Local newspapers had a quasi-monopoly on readership, collecting huge sums for advertising from every supermarket, car dealership and cinema in the city, and thick publications appeared daily on doorsteps.

The imagined promise of the digital world was that many readers paying small sums would compensate for the disappearance of big advertisers. This was only feasible for a very few outstanding publications – even Washington Post.

Relatively few journalists running small media outlets produce high-quality commentary that reaches paying audiences. But reporting is scarce—and expensive—and the news produced is meager compared to what Metro newsrooms once produced.

Thirty-six years have passed since Noam Chomsky published Consent to production. The left then attacked the “corporate media” that supported a system of control that in turn protected and promoted moneyed interests. Now, “corporate media” is a term more frequently discussed on the right, for many of the same reasons.

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The media business model has changed radically; The digital age seeks not to create consensus but the opposite, dividing readers and viewers into very small segments of shared outrage.

Journalists don’t like being subsidized by the government. They don’t like having one billionaire owner who can call the shots, even if he rarely does so. But the preferred cashiers advertising the chicken sale or the latest romantic comedy are no longer paying.

Has quality journalism become something like an art, supported by a combination of subscribers, government subsidies and philanthropy? Has the news become like hockey arenas and international sporting events, where public money is used under the guise of promoting a vaguely defined but deeply felt public good?

The rage against Bezos is a protest against the philanthropic model of the media. But in many places without a benefactor like Bezos, the voices of protest have long since disappeared.

National Post

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