Categories: OLD Media Moves

Apple tried to prevent hiring of tech writer by Newsweek

Newsweek tech writer Dan Lyons was on “Reliable Sources” on Sunday morning talking about the coverage of Apple’s new iPad and revealed that the company has not been happy with him for quite some time.

Here is an excerpt from the transcript:

KURTZ: Dan, you blog as fake Steve Jobs. How does the real Steve Jobs do it? For example, here, giving your competitor, ‘TIME,” an exclusive interview and he gets his face on the cover?

LYONS: Well, you know, Apple has been very, very good in terms of playing the media for a long, long time. For decades, right? And the game they always used to play was to play “TIME” off of “Newsweek,” for example, and to get them both to sort of compete to see who would get the access to Steve, who would get the exclusive interview.

“Newsweek” sort of opted out of that game when they hired me a couple years ago. Apple doesn’t like me at all because of the blog I write. And Apple actually made it clear to “Newsweek” before they hired me — or they got wind that I was going to get hired — that they didn’t want “Newsweek” to hire me, they weren’t going to like this.

And “Newsweek” hired me anyway, but sure enough, we didn’t get any access, we didn’t get — I don’t have an iPad. I didn’t get a device from Apple.

Read the rest of the transcript here.

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View Comments

RealityChannel says:
April 4, 2010 at 4:21 pm
Well Dan,
You "were" funny as FSJ prior to being outed. Since then, not at all. You originally savaged the iPad and then did a 180 flipflop when you understood how badly you got it wrong. This was quick enough for folks even with the shortest memories to notice. Which "expert" opinion are we supposed to believe? And how about some "hard facts" from your editors to back up this sensational assertion. "Newsweek" shouldn't be able claim journalistic privilege.