Amazon CEO Buys The Washington Post in the "Dying" Age of Newspapers

Before doing some research on the Amazon CEO, Jeff Bezos, I knew little about his "empire" of companies he owns and just how impressive of a man he is. If you look on the right at the picture I posted of 'The Bezos Empire' you can see the incredible amount of companies that Bezos has purchased or invested in. In what some refer to as the 'dying' age of newspapers, Bezos decided to buy The Washington Post for $230 million with no prior experience  in the news paper business or journalism less than three years ago. Although he had with no prior experience Bezos has still somehow turned the company around after they were facing years of decline by revamping the newspaper to be more apart of the digital age.

In an article I found online it explains, "Bezos isn't involved in setting the Post's editorial direction at all. But he's taken a more hands-on approach on the business and technology sides to reinvent the paper as a 'media and technology company'" (Kim 2016). One way he has done this is by revitalizing the newspapers website and mobile apps. Bezos also has employed web strategies and software programs to track readership of stories and ways in which ways readership if affected by different options. Furthermore, during a time where most newspapers are making staff cuts Bezos has significantly increase The Post's hiring. The companies engineering team has almost tripled in the past few years and it has also hired new editors and reporters to increase the content that is published. Bezos also uses social media platforms, such as Twitter and Facebook, to help distribute the new content that is published and offers discounts to Amazon members to help even further push 
viewership. 

It is amazing to see the growth of The Washington Post that has come from the focus on it being more a media and technology company. I have attached a photo of a growth chart of to this blog that shows the significant increase in the news of viewers of the website since Bezos bought the company. It seems as if though newspapers are dying, we just need to make them a part of the digital age instead of trying to resit the digital age and Bezos understood that.


*News Article: http://www.businessinsider.com/how-the-washington-post-changed-after-jeff-bezos-acquisition-2016-5/#its-also-hired-a-bunch-of-new-editors-and-reporters-lately-it-now-publishes-1200-articles-a-day-its-content-varies-from-breaking-news-and-long-features-to-fun-photo-slideshows-like-this-one-8