Hey Mikey, he likes it

New York mayor Michael Bloomberg approves of the proposed acquisition of BusinessWeek by Bloomberg LP, the company he founded and still owns majority control, although he’s no longer involved in the decision-making, writes David Chen of the New York Times.

Chen writes, “‘They told me that they wanted to look at it,’ Mr. Bloomberg said during an appearance in Manhattan on an unrelated matter. ‘I certainly didn’t have any objections to it. I think it’s a great magazine.’

“Mr. Bloomberg went on to give his own take on the problems plaguing the publishing industry, suggesting that magazines and newspapers that were failing were simply not giving the people what they wanted.

“‘The magazine business — my personal opinion is — has fallen on hard times because of the economy, and the economy will come back,’ Mr. Bloomberg said. ‘I am very optimistic, as you know, about New York City’s economy, and one would hope that that magazine would benefit going forward.’

“He continued: ‘I’ve never believed that print is dead. I’ve always believed that there are two problems with print journalism today. One is lack of advertising, some parts of which will come back, and two, when nobody is buying your magazine or your newspaper, it’s because you’re not writing what people want to read.'”

Read more here.