A Leaked Internal Report Reveals The Wall Street Journal Is Struggling With Aging Readers And Covering Race https://www.buzzfeednews.com/article/amberjamieson/internal-wall-street-journal-report via @ambiej | Having been at sister pub @MarketWatch in DC for nearly 5 years sharing office and some stories with @WSJ I have some thoughts. 1/x

"Traffic is a huge concern for the paper’s management, whether it be in terms of meeting internal goals or “winning” when it comes to drawing audiences to stories that are competitive with content on other outlets." There is a huge "scoop" culture at @wsj.

"Do you get "scoops" was a question I was asked when I expressed interest in roles on that side of the aisle. Given my often critical view of SEC, auditors , and many others, based on subject matter expertise and always evidence, I wasn't typically getting early access to info.

Not what I do.... I can do my work without their help or access. But this statement is an example of what the newsroom seemed to value: beating the competition, reveling in being "matched," rather than informing readers.

On the one hand the report recognizes much of @wsj coverage focuses on "heavy readers" who visit it at least 10X a month and lately lots of content catering to the wealthy, such as its Mansions coverage and CEO/CFO profiles. Forbes, almost all this now, also does "wealth porn."

On the other hand, the solution, the report says is to focus more on online readers and create beats that focus on diverse audiences interested in the environment, career, personal finance, addiction, racism, healthcare affordability, income inequality, and violent crime.

However what that can translate to if you're not careful are "stories" that are rewrites of other's work that capture FB and social traffic and have a half-life of about 5 minutes in this fast-paced firehose of news world.

An example is WSJ let go an excellent, veteran reporter on the accountancy beat in the middle of the biggest scandal in that industry in years, the KPMG/PCAOB data theft scandal. Leadership indicted! Not enough scoops? WSJ now chasing FT on Wirecard and new wave of frauds. 8/8

BTW, @FT has always had a dedicated accountancy reporter, in London. (Sadly not U.S.) Every few years they rotate but have been getting better and better every time in my 15 years of reporting. The investment in that sector paid off with deep coverage of actual accounting fraud.

One more thing. Imagine working for a while on a detailed 142-page report published in July 2020 and having @wsj leadership dismiss it when it's scooped three months later as "a months-old draft that contains outdated and inaccurate information..."