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Walter Shapiro and Jodi Kantor

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from: Jodi Kantor

The New York Times as Urban Planner

Posted Thursday, Aug. 5, 1999, at 10:47 AM ET

Hello Walter,

The New York Times built a neighborhood again today.

A "House & Home" section story announced that the previously indeterminate area between 23rd and 42nd streets on the East Side should now be referred to as NoMad, for north of Madison Park. (In this town, one sure mark of a commercial-turned-residential neighborhood is a syllabic acronym. Soho stands for south of Houston, Tribeca is the triangle below canal, and Dumbo is down under the Manhattan Bridge). The story does not reveal how many New Yorkers have rented or bought apartments in NoMad recently. Instead, it features a few fashion industry execs and designers who moved there in search of stately prewar buildings, fantastic restaurants, and affordable housing prices. The fashion director of Elle magazine, for example, pays a mere $5,000 a month in rent.

The Times does this at least once a year. Last year it instructed us to start calling a desolate stretch on the West Side TunJav (the area is between the Lincoln Tunnel and the Jacob Javitz convention center). The name never took off, and neither did the neighborhood.

And when will the Times lay the "Circuits" section to rest? When it stops bringing in so many ads, I guess. Today the "Technology Journal" section of the Wall Street Journal reports that Microsoft is trying to steal AOL's dial-up business by offering the same service for little or no money. AOL currently has 17 million customers, and the $21.95 per month they pay for the service generates two-thirds of AOL's revenue. So AOL could soon join Lotus and Netscape in the Microsoft price-cutting mausoleum. In contrast, "Circuits" prints stories on teenagers working in tech-oriented summer jobs and on password proliferation. OK, so the section isn't devoted to hard tech news. But it makes digital culture seem so dull that it's probably keeping a couple thousand Times subscribers offline.

I see I've turned this message into a harangue against my beloved Times. I feel guilty, like I've just publicly insulted my mother.

Until later,
Jodi

the breakfast table
entries
12345678910111213141516171819
from: Jodi Kantor

The New York Times as Urban Planner

Posted Thursday, Aug. 5, 1999, at 10:47 AM ET
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Walter Shapiro is the political columnist for USA Today. Jodi Kantor is an associate editor at Slate.
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