Further to this post on the media and What Readers Want, it's always useful to have a gander at the New York Times's most emailed stories. For sure, this is no infallible guide but it is a useful snapshot of reader opinion in as much as it's a list of the stories readers most frequently recommend to their friends. Here's today's list.
- In Shift to Digital, More Repeat Mammograms
- Latest College Reading Lists: Menus With Pho and Lobster
- Equestrians’ Deaths Spread Unease in Sport
- Magazine Preview: The Aria of Chris Matthews
- Findings: And Behind Door No. 1, a Fatal Flaw
- Maureen Dowd: Toil and Trouble
- Well: Keeping Priorities Straight, Even at the End
- The Food Chain: As Prices Rise, Farmers Spurn Conservation Program
- Wine Bars Grow Up and Squeeze In
- A Disease That Allowed Torrents of Creativity
You'll notice what's missing: hard news stories. And this from the readers of America's best newspaper, the paper with more resources than any other and that prides itself (however dubiously) upon being a "paper of record".
Instead it's a list of lifestyle items with a couple of features and some opinion thrown in. Plus, of course, the mandatory story concerning animals. Editors should always remember that readers - especially, though far from exclusively, women readers - like animals more than they like people.