BusinessWeek's changes under Bloomberg

Lucia Moses of MediaWeek takes a look at the changes at BusinessWeek under Bloomberg ownership, noting that new editor Josh Tyrangiel agrees with Bloomberg editor in chief Matt Winkler about tightening its sourcing.

Moses writes, “Josh Tyrangiel, who was appointed by Bloomberg as the magazine’s new editor, said the weekly would be more sensitive about sourcing in the future. ‘He’s right,’ he said. ‘Magazine standards for anonymous sourcing are too light, and he’s 100 percent right on calling us out on it.’

“As for bylines, Tyrangiel said there’s no mandate regarding the use of Bloomberg staffers, but that he would be ‘crazy’ not to take advantage of Bloomberg’s reporting resources. ‘My job is to put out the best magazine I can put out,’ he said. ‘I’ve been given no instructions from anyone. The only thing my bosses care about is, is it interesting?…I don’t have any recipe or ratio.’

“Tyrangiel declined to generalize about plans to change the magazine’s style, including moving it closer to that of Bloomberg, which prides itself on writing for the nonbusiness person although its primary audience is its terminal user. ‘I’m not a fan of the throat-clearing paragraph,’ he said, an approach he noted was rare in Bloomberg stories.

“He stressed that stories wouldn’t be ‘one size fits all,’though: ‘I think our audiences want information quickly. I think there are other times where they want to be told a long story.'”

Read more here.