Interesting news from The New York Times today that they have hired their first “social media” editor.
Jennifer Preston, a 25-year veteran of New York newspapers, announced her appointment, appropriately, on her Twitter feed.
“Hi, I’m the NYT’s new social media editor,” she wrote. “More details later.” Preston used the remainder of her 140-character allotment to ask: “How should @nytimes be using Twitter?”
According to a Times internal memo obtained by Harvard University’s Nieman Journalism Lab, Preston’s duties will include “expanding the use of social media networks and publishing platforms to improve New York Times journalism and deliver it to readers.
“An awful lot of people are finding our work not by coming to our homepage or looking at our newspaper but through alerts and recommendations from their friends and colleagues,” the memo said. ”So we ought to learn how to reach those people effectively and serve them well. Jennifer will work closely with editors, reporters, bloggers and others to use social tools to find sources, track trends, and break news as well as to gather it,” it said. ”She will help us get comfortable with the techniques, share best practices and guide us on how to more effectively engage a larger share of the audience on sites like Twitter, Facebook, YouTube, Flickr, Digg, and beyond.”
Interesting move by the NYT. Is this a good move by the Times or is it a desperate move by a company that is losing relevancy with each passing day.
I think it’s a great move. It will perhaps attract younger people who have abandoned newspapers and it will appeal to the baby boomers (like me) who are straddling the line between print and social media.
I absolutely don’t feel this is a “desperate” attempt at anything by the NY Times. They are, in fact, joining the thousands of companies in the U.S. who are embracing social media marketing as a fantastic way to engage in two way communication with their customers. Even their first post began as a dialog between them and their Twitter followers. More and more media companies are shedding the old notion that magazines and newspapers will only dilute their expert voice if they embrace online communities. I think it’s awesome that the NY Times has taken this step, and feel its the sign of a new time.