Forbes chides recent NY Times coverage

Forbes.com CEO Jim Spanfeller wrote a letter to New York Times business editor Larry Ingrassia and public editor Barney Calame that criticizes the Times’ recent story that called into question the traffic on the Forbes’ Web site, according to Advertising Age.

Ad Age’s Nat Ives wrote, “‘Shame on you!’ his letter continued. ‘Not for promoting the Times’ own log file numbers, but for suggesting we are somehow wrong in promoting our log file numbers while doing so yourself and failing to point it out specifically in the article. That smacks of competitive hypocrisy.’

“In a message sent to Mr. Spanfeller today and shared with Advertising Age, Mr. Ingrassia disputed Mr. Spanfeller’s assertions that the article omitted certain key points. Mr. Ingrassia agreed, however, that the article should have described how the Times describes its web traffic.

“‘You’re right,’ he wrote. ‘Precisely because of the competitive issue that you raise, we endeavor to say what the Times Co.’s practice is whenever writing about a media issue. We failed to do so in this case and should have, though after conferring with our standards editor, I don’t think that this warrants a correction.'”

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