Re: [Fwd: WQEW make your move])

["A. Joseph Ross" <lawyer@world.std.com>]

Brian Vita wrote:
 
> You are missing the point.  The management of the NYT has a fiduciary
> responsibility to its shareholders to achieve the best return on their
> investment.  If other stations in the market are easily obtaining a better
> return, then they would be remiss in not attempting to do the same.  They
> *have* to follow the dollar or they are not serving their stockholders.
 
Well, yes, but there's still room, within those parameters, for a
corporation to decide that a certain nitch is appropriate for it and for
what is currently referred to as "corporate culture."  The New York Times
might be able to make more money by pushing sensationalism and screaming
headlines, but they have an image, they've done well with it, and it
works.  

Another good example is the way William Paley occasionally used to get
behind a show that had poor ratings and keep it on for awhile despite its
ratings because he liked the show.  He couldn't do it often, and he
couldn't stay behind a poor-performing show forever, but he could do it,
even though it reduced the bottom line.

The stockholders may be presumed to approve of these things if they keep in
place the officers and board that are pursuing that policy.  And the agenda
at a corporate Annual Meeting usually includes a stockholders' resolution
to the effect that all the acts and doings of the Board of Directors since
the last Annual Meeting are hereby ratified and confirmed.

I don't know what the makeup of the New York Times ownership is, but with
most of these corporations, even publicly-traded ones, the few people
running the corporation, and their friends and allies, have a pretty strong
controlling marjority among the shareholders.  And the more secure their
control, the less vulnerable they are to hostile takeovers.

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 A. Joseph Ross, J.D.                                     617.367.0468
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