NYT employment columnist let go

Marci Alboher, the New York Times “Shifting Careers” column as a freelancer for the past 18 months, has lost that job, according to a report from Peter Kafka at All Things Digital.

Kafka writes, “The Times (NYT) had a round of layoffs/buyouts earlier in the year, but last month Executive Editor Bill Keller told his troops he would try very hard not to cut anyone else. It seems increasingly clear that Keller will struggle to make good on that pledge, given the Times’s deteriorating  financial picture. But since Alboher wasn’t an actual employee, her canning won’t technically count as a layoff –- it just feels like one to her.

“The Times has been ramping up its use of columnist/bloggers over the past year, and has brought most of them on as contract workers. I’ve asked the paper if it has made other columnist/blogger cuts recently; no response yet. But it hasn’t made cut any other of its columnist/bloggers, says the NYT’s Catherine Mathis.”

Read more here. Alboher wrote about being let go, stating, “The morning I got the call giving me the news, I was shocked. A mere few weeks before, I received a very favorable ‘review’ (inasmuch as a non-employee can be reviewed) and an increase in pay. Many of my articles had hit the most-e-mailed list and generated lively discussion in the comments. I was told my traffic was looking good (though I’d also been told not to be too concerned about my traffic). People at The Times seemed pleased that television and radio shows were calling regularly to book me for appearances.”

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