Hard Times Ahead for the MSM

This one will make you stand up and cheer. From David Carr in the New York Times:

While it’s great news that the economy is (slowly) coming back, it’s important to remember that a rising tide does not necessarily lift all boats. That is especially true in the media industry, where a bad stretch of advertising and extensive challenges to existing business models have clobbered many legacy outfits.

Now that the economic cycle is no longer creating such stiff headwinds, though, excuses will be tough to come by. Next year will not only be a period of continued disruption, but a reckoning as well.

According to Carr, heads on the chopping blocks include folks running movie studios or theater chains (Hollywood just had a lousy year); MSNBC’s Phil Griffin; the guy who runs Viacom (whose brands are tanking); Brit flavor-of-the-month Deborah Turness at NBC News; what’s-his-name at the newly spun-off and almost certainly doomed Time Inc.; and Mark Thompson, the head of the New York Times Company recently imported from the BBC, who happens to be Carr’s boss.

Keep in mind I could be wrong about a lot of this speculation, and if I am, my own chair may heat up a bit. In an increasingly fraught environment, no one in media-land can expect to live a life beyond consequence.

The Times, they are a’changin’.