Businessweek editor loves long-form journalism

Joe Pompeo of Capital New York writes Tuesday about Bloomberg Businessweek editor Josh Tyrangiel, who answered questions Monday night at Housing Works Bookstore.

Pompeo writes, “‘If you look at magazines, oh, eight years ago, they demanded much longer stories because they were making more editorial pages,’ said editor-in-chief Josh Tyrangiel, by way of reply. ‘Most weeklies these days have gone down in pages.’

“But not Businessweek, whose deep-pocketed parent company didn’t flinch when Tyrangiel asked, after landing the editor gig in 2009, that the magazine be increased from 58 total pages to 66 pages of editorial alone.

“‘We just have that luxury of being able to do long stories,’ he said. ‘And as it happens, while other magazines are doing shorter stuff, The New Yorker and Businessweek and The Atlantic and others are really thriving as a place where if you’re a reader, you can go.’

“The fact that Tyrangiel works for a company whose reporters are required to fly business class on any flight longer than four hours was not lost on the guy who’d asked for Tyrangiel’s thoughts on the future of their trade.”

Read more here. Tyrangiel declined to answer as to whether Bloomberg Businessweek was profitable.