The New York Times ‘will not be cowed’, with CEO Meredith Kopit Levien

Masters of Scale

WaitWhat

Entrepreneurship, Business, Management, Reid Hoffman, Mindset, Diversity & Inclusion, Jeff Berman, Bob Safian, Startups

4.6 • 4.4K Ratings

🗓️ 21 October 2025

⏱️ 30 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

From attacks by President Trump to active lawsuits against Microsoft and OpenAI, The New York Times is engaged in a fierce fight to preserve the future of independent journalism. It also keeps building a multi-faceted, excellence-obsessed brand with more users for games, recipes and podcasts than ever before. President and CEO Meredith Kopit Levien joins Bob Safian live on stage at the Masters of Scale Summit in San Francisco to explore The Times business model, how news coverage relates to the organization's fast-growing lifestyle products, and the impact of AI as a threat and a tool.

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Transcript

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0:51.0	The point of lawsuits or attempts to denigrate the independent press, that I believe is just an abject attempt to deter reporting.
1:02.6	And I want to be clear, the New York Times is not going to be cowed.
1:06.2	In a time where the big tech platforms that control a lot of the flow of information are sending
1:12.5	fewer and fewer people to publishers, to independent journalism outlets like the New York
1:18.4	Times, we have among the largest audiences we have ever had. I'm out all over the country.
1:25.5	I talk to liberals. I talk to conservatives. The universal thing,
1:28.9	I hear people believe there needs to be a shared fact base. Plenty of the country wants
1:35.5	independent fact-based journalism.
1:43.7	That's Meredith Koppett Levian, president and CEO of the New York Times, recorded live at the 2025 Masters of Scale Summit in San Francisco on October 9th.
1:54.6	I wanted to talk to Meredith about what it takes to sustain fact-based media in 2025, in the face of attacks from all corners,
2:03.5	including the White House. Meredith talks plainly about the future of the New York Times as a business,
2:09.4	how news coverage relates to the Times' fast-growing lifestyle products, plus the impact of AI as a revenue source,
2:16.2	and more. It's an inside look at operating a brand with no peers but plenty of challenges.
2:22.6	A brand that under her leadership has defied financial troubles plaguing other news outlets.
	...

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