Dan Kennedy

While we swelter, a look back at the heat wave of April 2002

A hot day on Boston Common. Photo (cc) 2013 via City of Boston archives.

There’s a lot of talk this week to the effect that the heat wave we’re experiencing is unprecedented — or at least unusual — for June. True enough. But I vividly remember a wild stretch of hot weather that hit the Northeast in April 2002. I was in New Jersey and New Haven to interview folks for my first book, “Little People,” and it was over 90 degrees for a day or two that week.

As I was driving through Connecticut, an anchor on NPR said that a new record of more than 90 degrees had been set in Central Park. That night, I met with Anthony Soares, a person with dwarfism who was president of the city council in Hoboken, New Jersey. We sat outside at a restaurant until 11 p.m. in stifling heat and humidity. Here’s how The New York Times put it on April 17, 2002:

After a stubbornly mild winter, a sudden heat wave settled over the New York region yesterday, with the temperature reaching 92 degrees in Central Park at 3:30 p.m. That shattered the previous high for the day of 88, which was reached in 1896.

Elsewhere in the region, records were similarly trounced. In Newark, a high of 90 beat the old record of 82, reached in 1976. And in Bridgeport, it was a full 10 degrees hotter (83 degrees) than on any previous April 16.

In Boston, the temperature on April 17 topped out at 93.2 degrees. Notably, the Boston Marathon had been held just two days earlier, although, fortunately, it didn’t make it out of the 50s that day. And on April 18, it was back in the 50s again.

Climate change is making all of this worse. It was a factor 22 years ago, and it’s even more of one now. I just thought you’d like a reminder that what we’re going through this week is nothing new, and that we’ve had even stranger weather off and on in the past.

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A dominant run, a rousing finish: The Celtics have made believers of us all

In the end, it wasn’t them. It was us. Since late April, we’ve been watching the Celtics with our eyes half-covered because we told ourselves we’d seen this team fall short so many times before. But that’s not really true. The first legitimate chance the current version of the Celtics had of winning it all was in 2022, and they were outclassed by a much better Golden State team. Last year, yes, they woke up too late and couldn’t overcome Jayson Tatum’s sprained ankle in Game 7 of the conference finals. But that’s the only time they should have gone farther but didn’t.

This year? A dominating regular season followed by a magnificent 16-3 playoff run. By far the best team they played was Indianapolis, and yet that was somehow their only sweep. The other series: 4-1, 4-1 and an emphatic 4-1 against Dallas, which proved to be an inconsistent Luka Doncic and a bunch of guys. As Bob Dylan once put it, “What looks large from a distance, Close up ain’t never that big.”

My favorite Celtics championship team is the 2008 squad, with the incomparable Kevin Garnett along with Paul Pierce and Ray Allen. Yes, I was a fan of the Larry Bird-led 1980s teams and the ’70s-era teams with Dave Cowens, John Havlicek and Paul Silas. But there was something special about 2008.

I may have to revise that. There were so many great story lines this year. Al Horford’s endless quest for a championship, finally fulfilled. Questions about whether Tatum and Jaylen Brown could play together — exaggerated by the media, but not completely without foundation. The emergence of Derek White. The addition of Jrue Holiday. (Admit it: We all feel a little guilty at being glad that fan favorite Marcus Smart isn’t around anymore.) The injuries to Kristaps Porzingis, who managed to play 16 minutes in the closer and actually made a few contributions after a rough start. Joe Mazzulla’s emergence as a decent coach.

I thought Tatum would get the Bill Russell MVP trophy after taking the team onto his shoulders Monday night and carrying them to victory. Brown got it instead, which is fine, because he was more consistent throughout the Finals. His improvement over the past year has been nothing short of remarkable. After utterly failing to step up after Tatum’s sprained ankle against Miami last year, he became the highest-paid player in the NBA over the summer, which had a few of us scratching our heads. And then he went out and earned it, at least to the extent that anyone can “earn” $286 million. How fitting is it that he’s now won playoff trophies named for Russell and Bird?

By adding Holiday and Porzingis last year, Brad Stevens turned an almost-good-enough team into the NBA’s best. If the Celtics are going to have a chance at repeating, though, Stevens may need to work some magic again. I’d be astonished if Horford doesn’t retire. Porzingis needs surgery on his ankle, and he may be better suited to a 20-minutes-a-game role as a bench player given his fragility. Can Stevens bring in a reliable big man? Other than that, though, the Celtics are well-positioned for another championship run.

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Subscription woes, public media challenges and the Post’s staff bites back

Here’s a round-up of media links for your Monday morning.

• With print dollars giving way to digital dimes and platform pennies, newspapers have been looking to online subscriptions for revenue and growth. Nationally, The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal and The Washington Post have all done well, though the Post, as we know, has hit some bumps. Regional papers like The Boston Globe and the Star Tribune of Minneapolis have succeeded, too. But Poynter business analyst Rick Edmonds has been reading the new Digital News Report from the Reuters Institute for the Study of Journalism and finds that, among digital subscribers, “at least 60% pay less than full price.” Full-price conversion at renewal time isn’t easy, either. Keep that in mind the next time you see an email from a newspaper offering six months for $1.

• Public broadcasting this year has been slammed with layoffs both nationally and in Boston, with both WBUR and GBH News suffering significant cuts. At Editor & Publisher, nonprofit consultant Tom Davidson writes that public media outlets face three challenges: audience fragmentation, a glut in podcasts and a decline in underwriting, as advertising is known in the nonprofit world. Davidson writes: “The good old days are not coming back. Drive-time audiences are never going to return to their late-2010 peak…. Engaging different audiences requires a deep, humble understanding of their wants, needs and desires.”

• I was heartened to see a four-byline story in The Washington Post, published Sunday night, about the latest scandal involving the paper’s new executive team. The story documents a close working relationship (free link) between John Ford, “a once-aspiring actor who has since admitted to an extensive career using deception and illegal means to obtain confidential information for Britain’s Sunday Times newspaper,” and Robert Winnett, who publisher Will Lewis, up to his neck in ethical challenges of his own, has named to become the Post’s executive editor later this year. The article, based on draft chapters of a book Ford wrote, includes this delicious package:

Winnett moved quickly to connect Ford with a lawyer, discussed obtaining an untraceable phone for future communications and reassured Ford that the “remarkable omerta” of British journalism would ensure his clandestine efforts would never come to light, according to draft chapters Ford wrote in 2017 and 2018 that were shared with The Post.

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The Sudbury leg of the Bruce Freeman Trail is open, sort of

The end of the line, just a few minutes north of Boston Post Road

The Bruce Freeman Trail, a bike path that currently runs from Lowell to Concord, is about to get a lot longer. On Saturday I rode from Acton south to Powder Mill Road in West Concord, where the trail was closed, as it was last year. This time, though, I could see that there were people on the other side using it, so I schlepped my bike over the road and back down to the trail. From there the trail continued another 5 miles into Sudbury, where it came to a dead stop just a short distance from Boston Post Road.

I can’t imagine why the opening at Powder Mill is still closed off. The Sudbury leg, which brings the total length of the trail to about 21 miles, is fully paved and fenced and looks like all it needs is a few finishing touches. There were as many people using it south of Powder Mill as north of it. In any case, I’m sure it will be officially open soon. Construction continues, and the next step will consist of building it out from Sudbury to Framingham.

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The Will Lewis scandal at The Washington Post is spinning out of control

Will Sally Buzbee return? Photo (cc) 2018 by Collision Conf.

Saturday was the first time I thought that Washington Post publisher Will Lewis might survive the scandal that had erupted over his role in the Murdoch phone-hacking schedule and his subsequent attempts at intimidating people into not reporting on it. By Saturday evening, though, it was clear that not only will he have to go but so will his hand-picked executive editor, Robert Winnett.

In case you missed it, here’s the lead of the latest New York Times report (free link), this one by Justin Scheck and Jo Becker:

The publisher and the incoming editor of The Washington Post, when they worked as journalists in London two decades ago, used fraudulently obtained phone and company records in newspaper articles, according to a former colleague, a published account of a private investigator and an analysis of newspaper archives.

Will Lewis, The Post’s publisher, assigned one of the articles in 2004 as business editor of The Sunday Times. Another was written by Robert Winnett, whom Mr. Lewis recently announced as The Post’s next executive editor.

What a disaster. And it gets worse, as Scheck and Becker recount the ways that Lewis has tried to play down his role in the scandal, including telling the BBC in 2020, “My role was to put things right, and that is what I did.” Now we know he was up to his neck in it. The Times story also reports that Lewis has been less than honest about how he handled a £110,000 payoff to a source.

Just a reminder: executive editor Sally Buzbee, who left the Post a week ago, was not fired; rather, she quit rather than accept a demotion to a new role overseeing social media and new editorial products. What are the odds of her returning triumphantly to the newsroom on Monday? No doubt that would require an apology by owner Jeff Bezos as well as some guaranteed job security. But that would seem to be Bezos’ best option at this point.

Earlier coverage.

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An insightful Times report on Jeff Bezos, Will Lewis and The Washington Post

Portrait of Jeff Bezos (cc) 2017 by thierry ehrmann

Some worthwhile insights in this New York Times story (free link) on Jeff Bezos and The Washington Post. According to Times reporters Benjamin Mullin and Katie Robertson, interim publisher Patty Stonesifer last fall did a thorough scrub of Will Lewis’ involvement in the Murdoch phone-hacking scandal and, according to an anonymous source, “came away satisfied with his explanation and confident that he was the right executive to run The Post.”

Lewis’ miserable attempts to manage the fallout from that scandal, which include reports that he tried to intimidate then-executive editor Sally Buzbee from reporting on it in the Post and that he told NPR media reporter David Folkenflik he could have an interview if he’d agree not to write about it, were apparently not enough to overcome Bezos’ belief that Lewis could be an effective publisher.

Bezos seems especially intrigued by Lewis’ proposal to create a “third newsroom” to include social media and new products, and the Times reports that Bezos pressed Buzbee to accept Lewis’ offer of running that shop. Buzbee declined and left the paper.

I’m intrigued by the third newsroom as well, since the Post desperately needs to find a strategy that involves more than being just like the Times only not as comprehensive. I still wonder if Lewis can overcome his self-inflicted wounds, but he has reportedly adopted a more contrite attitude in dealings with his employees. So we’ll see.

Earlier coverage.

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The Huntington News reports on the aftermath of April’s Northeastern encampment

Centennial Common at Northeastern University. Photo (cc) 2008 by Piotrus.

The pro-Palestinian encampment at Northeastern University’s Centennial Common may have been broken up nearly as soon as it appeared, but the events of those 48 hours in late April still reverberate. Now The Huntington News, our outstanding independent student newspaper, has published a massive overview that focuses on the police response.

Reported by Annika Sunkara, Eli Curwin and Emily Spatz, the story examines how protesters were treated by law enforcement officials who were called to the scene to take down the encampment and arrest those who refused to leave. Those officials included Boston, Northeastern and state police. As portrayed in the article, the response comes off as somewhat chaotic, with needlessly rough treatment of the some of the protesters as well as confusion over how those with a Northeastern affiliation should be treated.

The reporting speaks for itself, but I do want to highlight this:

Police ordered all individuals, including press, medics and legal observers, to leave Centennial.

Several Huntington News reporters were told to leave the barricaded area under threat of their “student status.”

Boston police ordered at least five legal observers, who had monitored the encampment since it was established, to move outside of the barricade.

How the press was treated when the encampment was broken up and arrests began on the morning of Saturday, April 27, has been a matter of controversy. Police officers have an obligation to move observers out of the way so that they’re not a hindrance and are not in danger of getting hurt. On the other hand, those observers should not be moved so far from the scene that they don’t have a clear view of how the police are doing their jobs. Journalism’s obligation is to bear witness at such moments.

Urszula Masny-Latos, executive director of the National Lawyers Guild of Massachusetts, told the News that the police moved observers “as far from the scene as possible so [the police] would not be easily visible.” She also said that Boston police overruled campus officers “and forced NLG legal observers off the grounds where the arrests happened.”

The Boston Police Department reportedly did not respond to the News about their actions.

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Reuters exposes NewsBreak’s Chinese ties and AI-based local news hallucinations

You would have thought that misusing artificial intelligence to make up a murder that never took place and to amplify a false story about yet another murder would have been enough to stop NewsBreak. But the media outlet, which has rushed in to fill the gap caused by the decline of legitimate local news, has continued along its hallucinatory way — until now.

Last week, Reuters published an investigative report into NewsBreak exposing the company’s Chinese ties and its use of AI to write fiction. Reporter James Pearson begins with the fake murder last Christmas Eve from Bridgeton, New Jersey, which I wrote about in January. Here’s Pearson’s lead:

Last Christmas Eve, NewsBreak, opens new tab, a free app with roots in China that is the most downloaded news app in the United States, published an alarming piece about a small town shooting. It was headlined “Christmas Day Tragedy Strikes Bridgeton, New Jersey Amid Rising Gun Violence in Small Towns.”

The problem was, no such shooting took place. The Bridgeton, New Jersey police department posted a statement on Facebook on December 27 dismissing the article — produced using AI technology — as “entirely false.”

“Nothing even similar to this story occurred on or around Christmas, or even in recent memory for the area they described,” the post said. “It seems this ‘news’ outlet’s AI writes fiction they have no problem publishing to readers.”

Pearson fails to mention that the fake story was first exposed by Eric Conklin of NJ.com. Nor does he report that, just a few weeks earlier, NewsBreak used AI to amplify yet another fake-murder story that was produced by actual humans at the Mid Hudson News in New York, a monumental error revealed by Lana Bellamy and Phillip Pantuso of the Times Union, based in Albany.

Despite the lack of credit to local news outlets, the Reuters investigation represents the deepest dive yet into NewsBreak, and could result in action. As Pearson notes, NewsBreak, despite its sleazy tactics, has content-sharing arrangements with news outlets such as The Associated Press, CNN, Fox and, well, Reuters. As far back as 2022, Norman Pearlstine, a longtime top news executive who was working as a consultant for NewsBreak, warned his client: “I cannot think of a faster way to destroy the NewsBreak brand.”

NewsBreak remains a popular destination for people looking for local news. According to SimilarWeb, it was visited nearly 57 million times between March 24 and May 24. But maybe NewsBreak’s reign of error is coming to an end. In a follow-up story, members of Congress voiced concern, with Sen. Mark Warner, chair of the Intelligence Committee, saying, “The only thing more terrifying than a company that deals in unchecked, artificially generated news, is one with deep ties to an adversarial foreign government.”

To be fair, the company says those ties were severed several years ago. Still, NewsBreak’s irresponsibly sloppy use of AI to generate fake local news needs to be called out and shamed.

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The Washington Post looks to local as a way of reviving its sagging fortunes

I was intrigued to learn that embattled Washington Post publisher Will Lewis is thinking about expanding the Post’s local coverage as he seeks a way to turn around the paper’s declining fortunes. It’s an idea I’ve suggested a couple of times (here and here), so I’m heartened to see that the Post might actually move in that direction.

In Axios D.C., Cuneyt Dil reports that the product would be known as Local Plus and would be aimed at readers who are willing to pay a premium for newsletters and “exclusive experiences,” whatever that’s supposed to mean. If Lewis decides to head down that route, he’d be embracing the Post’s roots, harking back to a time when it had the highest penetration rate in the country and had more in common with large regional papers like The Boston Globe and The Philadelphia Inquirer than with The New York Times.

Of course, Lewis doesn’t have to choose since digital distribution means that the Post can continue with the national and international mission that owner Jeff Bezos set for it a decade ago.

In my 2018 book “The Return of the Moguls,” I tracked the Bezos led-transformation. Under the Graham family, from whom Bezos bought the paper in 2013, the Post was barely profitable and was accomplishing that mainly through cuts. The Grahams’ final play was to double down on local, unveiling the slogan “Of Washington, For Washington.”

Even in the early Bezos years, Post executives understood the value of local. For several years they offered two different digital products — a colorful, low-cost magazine-like app that contained no local news and that was aimed at a national audience, and a more traditional app that cost more and included all of the Post’s journalism, including local and regional coverage.

The Post’s major Bezos-era challenge has come since Donald Trump left the White House and a post-Trump-bump malaise hit multiple news outlets. The New York Times has been a notable exception, zooming to more than 10 million paid subscribers on the strength of its lifestyle offerings, including recipes, consumer advice and games. The Post, meanwhile, slid from 3 million to 2.5 million paid subscribers as of a year ago, and may have slipped more since then.

If the Post is going to start growing again, it has to find areas where it’s not competing head-to-head with the Times. I assume that’s what Lewis’ “third newsroom” comprising social media and lifestyle journalism comes in, although he hasn’t even begun to define what that will look like.

Local news, too, would be a smart move, and charging a premium for it makes a lot of sense.

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Margaret Sullivan’s advice for The Washington Post

Former Washington Post media columnist Margaret Sullivan has written a sensible though surprisingly restrained column for The Guardian on how the Post can recover from its self-inflicted wounds: publisher Will Lewis promises to behave; owner Jeff Bezos makes it clear that he’s still committed to the Post and its mission of holding the powerful accountable; and a public editor is brought in “to provide transparency and accountability to readers.” Sullivan, who’s also a former public editor for The New York Times, says she’s not interested in the job herself.

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