Derek Thompson

But when national advertising emerged in the 20th century, the party press era went away.

Department stores and other marketers wanted their ads placed next to neutral, objective, you could even say boring, or milquetoast reporting.

And so this age of advertising led to a neutered, detached style of journalism, the so-called view from nowhere to avoid offending companies.

In the 21st century, we are back to the past.

Google and social media companies like Facebook and TikTok have gobbled up advertising revenue, and that has forced newspapers to go back to the 1800s, to shift their business models from advertising back to subscriptions.

For example, consider the New York Times.

In the late 1900s and early 2000s, the New York Times advertising revenue exceeded $1 billion every year.

That's advertising.

Today, its annual ad revenue is closer to 500 million.

On its own, that might seem like a calamity, a 50% decline, except today, subscription revenue has surpassed $2 billion.

20 years ago, the Times was two-thirds advertising.

Today, the Times is two-thirds subscriptions.

The business of newspapers underwent a total shift in the 1900s, and in the 2000s, it's changed again.

This is not just a statistical change, it's an identity shift.

Mid-century newspapers were as broad and unobjectable as the department stores that advertised in their pages.

But the most successful news organizations of the 21st century are very different.

Sharp-elbowed, cantankerous, ideological, personality-driven.

They have perspective.

They have an identity.

In many cases, they feel like individuals because, in the case of Joe Rogan, Bill Simmons, Tucker Carlson, they are individuals.