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Dept. Of Tipping Your Hand: Stu Bykofsky Doesn’t Know What The Internet Is, Where He Is, Or What Any Of It Is Worth

bykoOn Thursday, veteran Daily News half-empty-bottle-of-Old-Spice Stu Bykofsky delivered a reply of sorts to Steve Volk‘s Philadelphia Magazine story about the awful fates of the DN and Inquirer. Which, on the face of it, is a welcome thing — but in the offing, Byko sadly revealed the insane disconnect between longtime PMH rank-and-file and reality. A close reading of the piece reveals the following:
Stu Bykofsky is not a very good reader, nor does he seem to watched Seinfeld much, and in fact, may not understand irony at all. In his opening grafs, Byko discusses the title of Volk’s piece — “1978 called. It wants its newspaper back.” — and asks, “What does that mean?” We could explain it to you, Byko, but we have zero confidence that your Prodigy service has the bandwidth necessary to load this site.
Stu Bykofsky has no fucking clue about the history of paid online content. Which is why he is floating the idea that readers should pay to read Philly.com. Are you kidding me? We should all get paid TO read Philly.com. Actually, we do, but that’s a whole other ball of wax. The point is, the model simply does not work; the genie is out of the bottle. And if suddenly one morning we logged on to Philly.com and found a screen there barring us from entry unless we paid, we’d be openly weeping with joy.
Stu Bykofsky, furthermore, seems wholly unaware of the content divide between the Inky, the Daily News, and, say, The New York Times. Because the latter actually has content that some people might — and we emphasize might — be willing to pay for. On a daily basis, half of what’s in the Inky and DN is AP junk that anyone can get anywhere and nobody wants in the first place. The other half is bullshit like Byko.
Stu Bykofsky seriously thinks that when Google links to one of his stories, they’re “stealing” it. Which is some seriously strange voodoo stuff. Byko is right when he talks about bloggers never replacing reporters unless they learn to verify, get shit right, stop listening to Tapes N Tapes, etc., but that small bit of “right” is so buried in a steaming cauldron of Wrong that it’s almost lost entirely. Which, as you know, seems to happen a lot at Broad & Whatever.
DN: Hey You Kids! Get Offa My Lawn (Remix Of The Remix Of The Remix)

This entry was posted on Monday, February 9th, 2009 at 12:01 pm.

  • http://thecitydesk.net thecitydesk

    It’s crazy how much of a difference there is between Bykofsky’s uninformed rant at these kids today and their crazy technology and Steven Brill’s attempts to actually come up with some sort of workable-seeming plan:
    http://www.poynter.org/column.asp?id=45&aid=158210

  • lutton

    Did Buzz Bissinger collobrate on that column?

  • lutton

    ps…what a surprise, commenting is gone from that column. And I was #2!

  • DJ DJCAPSLOCK

    Byko kind of invented blogging before the internet. His was the first column I read full of blabbering about pets and lame local celebrity sightings.

    He’s probably a little bitter since he gave away his “I wish there was another terrorist attack on America” column for free.

  • Robert Barr

    “Because the latter actually has content that some people might — and we emphasize might — be willing to pay for. On a daily basis, half of what’s in the Inky and DN is AP junk that anyone can get anywhere and nobody wants in the first place. The other half is bullshit like Byko.”

    Amazingly accurate. Really is a shame what the Inquirer has become. Business page in the 5th largest market is routinely 2 pages long…it’s a shame!

    “Stu Bykofsky seriously thinks that when Google links to one of his stories, they’re “stealing” it.”

    Laughed my ass off out loud. People beginning to look at me funny. Nailed the post with that line.