Sulzberger: NYT’s Shift to Web Is Inevitable

Haaretz has a fascinating interview with Arthur Sulzberger in which the owner and publisher of The New York Times shares his vision of the news company's inevitable shift into the purely online future:

"I really don't know whether we'll be printing the Times in five years, and you know what? I don't care either," he says.

Sulzberger is focusing on how to best manage the transition from print to Internet.

"The Internet is a wonderful place to be, and we're leading there," he points out.

The Times, in fact, has doubled its online readership to 1.5 million a day to go along with its 1.1 million subscribers for the print edition.

The publishing magnate also riffs on the cheapness of web compared to print, the unwillingness of editorial staff to accept sudden change and the ways software will improve the reader experience.

He even manages to dis bloggers: "People don't click onto The New York Times to read blogs. They want reliable news that they can trust."

A major newspaper ditching print for the web? All I have to say is – we called it.

OK, maybe not this year, but in the very near future. That's news you can trust.