Tuesday, August 6, 2013

Washington Post to be sold to Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon


Washington Post to be sold to Jeff Bezos, the founder of Amazon

Video: Donald Graham, the Post Co. chairman and chief executive, explains why he came to believe Amazon founder Jeff Bezos offers the Post the best chance to thrive after 80 years of Graham family ownership.
The Washington Post Co. agreed Monday to sell its flagship newspaper to Amazon.com founder and chief executive Jeffrey P. Bezos, ending the Graham family’s stewardship of one of America’s leading news organizations after four generations.
Bezos, whose entrepreneurship has made him one of the world’s richest men, will pay $250 million in cash for The Post and affiliated publications to The Washington Post Co., which owns the newspaper and other businesses.
Timeline
The major events that have shaped the Washington Post Co.

Bezos is known for his patience

Bezos is known for his patience
His willingness to pursue a long-term vision was critical to the rise and persistence of Amazon.

Bezos’s buy harks back to days of the wealthy at newspapers’ helms

Bezos’s buy harks back to days of the wealthy at newspapers’ helms
News of Internet pioneer buying legacy paper is being viewed as a bet on the future.

A family synonymous with The Post

A family synonymous with The Post
How the Grahams left a lasting impression on journalism and D.C.

Details of Bezos deal to buy Post

Details of Bezos deal to buy Post
The $250 million purchase price is richer than many of those received by other legacy print media properties in recent years.

How The Post could help Amazon

How The Post could help Amazon
WONKBLOG | A newspaper could be just what Amazon was missing.

Jeff Bezos and the future of media

Jeff Bezos and the future of media
WONKBLOG | Jeff Bezos is buying us. Here's what that has to do with the future of media.

Post sale hailed by business leaders

Post sale hailed by business leaders
A few wonder if the paper they read over morning coffee will change under new leadership.

Jeff Bezos on Post purchase

Jeff Bezos on Post purchase
In letter, he tells employees, “The values of The Post do not need changing.”

Katharine Weymouth letter to readers

Katharine Weymouth letter to readers
The publisher addresses the sale of the newspaper.

Grahams to sell The Post

Grahams to sell The Post
The company has agreed to sell its flagship newspaper to the Amazon.com founder.
Seattle-based Amazon will have no role in the purchase; Bezos himself will buy the news organization and become its sole owner when the sale is completed, probably within 60 days. The Post Co. will get a new, still undecided name and continue as a publicly traded company without the newspaper.
The deal represents a sudden and stunning turn of events for The Post, Washington’s leading newspaper for decades and a powerful force in shaping the nation’s politics and policy. Few people were aware that a sale was in the works for the paper, an institution that has covered presidents and local communities and gained worldwide attention for its stories about theWatergate scandal and, in June, disclosures about National Security Agency surveillance programs.
Post Co. chairman and chief executive Donald E. Graham and Post publisher Katharine Weymouth, his niece, broke the news of the sale to a packed meeting of employees at the company’s headquarters in downtown Washington on Monday. The mood was hushed; several veteran employees cried as Graham and Weymouth took turns reading statements and answering questions. “Everyone who was in that room knows how much Don and Katharine love the paper and how hard this must have been for them,” said David Ignatius, a veteran Post columnist who was visibly moved after the meeting.
But for much of the past decade, The Post has been unable to escape the financial turmoil that has engulfed newspapers and other “legacy” media organizations. The rise of the Internet and the epochal change from print to digital technology have created a massive wave of competition for traditional news companies, scattering readers and advertisers across a radically altered news and information landscape and triggering mergers, bankruptcies and consolidation among the owners of print and broadcasting properties.
“Every member of my family started out with the same emotion — shock — in even thinking about” selling The Post, Grahamsaid in an interview Monday. “But when the idea of a trans­action with Jeff Bezos came up, it altered my feelings.”
He added: “The Post could have survived under the company’s ownership and been profitable for the foreseeable future. But we wanted to do more than survive. I’m not saying this guarantees success, but it gives us a much greater chance of success.”
Bezos, 49, will take the company private, meaning he will not have to report quarterly earnings to shareholders or be subjected to investors’ demands for ever-rising profits, as the publicly traded Washington Post Co. is obligated to do now. As such, he will be able to experiment with the paper without the pressure of showing an immediate return on any investment. Indeed, Bezos’s history of patient investment and long-term strategic thinking made him an attractive buyer, Weymouth said.
 
nunyo555
8/6/2013 4:49 AM GMT+0800
Fire all the opinion writers.

Hire fact checkers and editors.
Michael in Manhattan
8/6/2013 5:15 AM GMT+0800
But the reporters have descended into opinion writers. We need real investigative reporting. And I hold no hope that the new owner will make that sort of change.
fairfaxvoter1
8/6/2013 5:18 AM GMT+0800
Again, the Post is doing incredible journalistic work on the unfolding gifts scandal in Richmond. And that's just one of many examples. What seems to be happening is that people from outside the region read only opinion pieces and then decide that the paper only runs opinion pieces. If you wander around to the major news headlines each day, you will discover tough, top-level reporting. "Investigative" reporting is always a sub-set of reporting as a whole (for example, reporting about the bizarre green-paint vandalism of several major DC sites, including the Lincoln Memorial wasn't investigative, but it was needed). But we see investigative work as well as regular reporting all the time at the Post.

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