By Matt Rooney
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Businesses are fighting for their lives across New Jersey.
One deemed “essential” – NJ Advance Media, the content-provider that operates NJ.com – took the unusual step on Tuesday afternoon of begging readers to sign up for $10 monthly online subscriptions.
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Yes, I’m serious! They stopped just short of asking for handout. Kevin Whitmer, the media company’s Senior VP for Content, penned the rare plea in a tone that was more reminsicent of what you’re accustomed to hearing on PBS than from a ‘major” newspaper:
The cost to produce the great journalism like you can find here — in time and money — continues to climb, and Covid-19 is taking advertisers and print subscribers from us. Our industry has been in financial crisis for at least 15 years and will not survive unscathed. Already journalists across New Jersey are being furloughed and laid off. Entire newsrooms will close.
We understand the timing is not ideal, even at just 33 cents per day. Worldwide, peers have been asking digital readers to pay for content through direct contributions, payments and subscriptions for years. Today, however, is the first time we are asking NJ.com readers like you for direct financial support.
NJ.com’s “journalism” has continued to take a hard-leftward turn in recent years, an editorial decision which undoubtedly makes its plea for salvation less-than-compelling for a significant portion of the people they’re trying to reach. Some of its news coverage isn’t even really “news” by even a generous definition; it’s clickbait, disaster porn, or just plain old inane:
Breaking news from The Star-Ledger. Apologize to @TheNJGlobe readers for missing this. pic.twitter.com/Gv5wMHOzx1
— David Wildstein (@wildstein) November 7, 2019
NJ.com editorial board chieftain Tom Moran recently SAVAGED GOP gubernatorial hopeful Jack Ciatterelli for having the temerity to question Governor Murphy’s ‘ethics panel’ that may decide which COVID-19 patients live and which get to bite it.
Arguably?
You could say that NJ.com’s decision to parrot the Murphy Administration’s coronavirus talking points (rather than soberly scrutinizing state government’s decision-making) is contributing to the death of the very businesses they’re complaining aren’t buying ads.
Sorry. Plenty of our fellow New Jerseyans need our help right now.
NJ.com is one patient that isn’t worth saving, and I don’t need a Murphy Administration ethics panel to tell me that.
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Save Jersey’s Founder and Blogger-in-Chief, MATT ROONEY is a nationally-noted and respected New Jersey political commentator. When he’s not on-line, radio or television advocating for conservative reform and challenging N.J. power-brokers, Matt is a practicing attorney at the law firm of DeMichele & DeMichele in Haddon Heights (Camden County).
