NY Times changes biz story headline three times, and cuts 350 words

The New York Times business section has changed three times the headline of its story Wednesday about bubble tea and cut about 350 words from the original version, reports Stefanie Tuder of Eater New York.

Tuder reports, “The business section has discovered bubble tea, or as they are trying to call the boba at the bottom, ‘blobs.’ In a story originally titled, ‘The Blobs in Your Tea? They’re Supposed to Be There,’ the newspaper of record tries to build a case for boba finally hitting it big in the United States.

“The title has since been changed to ‘Bubble Tea, Long a Niche Favorite, Goes Mainstream in the U.S.,’ but that premise is not quite accurate, either: As many are pointing out on Twitter, the Taiwanese drink long ago hit remote corners of this country.

“Update: For the third time today, editors have changed the headline, this time to ‘Bubble Tea Purveyors Continue to Grow Along With Drink’s Popularity,’ along with a separate editor’s noteadmitting the original story’s failure.

“‘In retrospect, we wish we had approached the topic differently (if at all). There may be a story in the expansion of bubble tea businesses in the United States, but there is no denying the drink has been around for quite a while. And we regret the impression left by some of the original language in the article, which we have revised in light of the concerns,’ business section editor Ellen Pollock wrote.”