Two months after The New York Times‘ devastating takedown of Amazon’s culture, Amazon fired back. Where’s the whole truth here?
Where’s the whole truth here? There is none. Because by definition, stories always leave out more than they include.
As briefly as possible, here’s what happened. On August 15, the Times wrote about Amazon’s “bruising workplace.” Jeff Bezos emailed his employees a non-denial denial of the story. Two months passed. Amazon PR head (and former Obama press secretary) Jay Carney ripped the article in a post on Medium. The executive editor of the Times, Dean Baquet, responded. Carney rebutted. Finally — well, finally is a word I can’t really use here, but anyway, two other Times reporters published a story about the fight.
As I attempted to retrieve the truth from this food fight, this is what became clear. There is none. Because by definition, stories always leave out more than they include.
Josh Bernoff takes a thoughtful look at the high profile Amazon vs The New York Times dust up.