NYC Times Best book of the Past 125 years

[Parson]

The New York Times has had a couple of month process to determine the best book of the last 125 years. They had readers nominate their own choices 1300 books were nominated (60% of the books nominated were nominated once!). In November they compiled a list of 25 books from that group, and then 200,000 people voted. The Number one choice by a slim margin was To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkein was #2, and 1984 by George Orwell was #3.

For the story: What’s the Best Book of the Past 125 Years? We Asked Readers to Decide.

For the twenty Five which made the list:
Vote For the Best Book

 

[hitmouse]

It is interesting to compare with the Guardian's 100 best novels written in English.

These sorts of lists are always open to ridicule, of course, but the discussion can be interesting.

 

[Judderman]

The first list seems to be US focused while the second is from one man in England. But there are several in common.
The first list perhaps has more that have been adapted for films..
Can’t take the lists too seriously, but some potential reading material there. Not much SFF.

 

[Parson]

The first list seems to be US focused

I would doubt that the New York Times, although it is an international paper, has more than 5 percent or so of its subscribers outside the US, and of those in the US, I would be surprised if more than 20% of them resided outside New York State.

Not much SFF.

I was actually surprised the other way that there were so many books which could be listed as part of the genres of SF and F.

 

[Judderman]

I quite often google a topic/news item and find a link that looks interesting only to then find it is in the subscriber only (after a couple of articles) NYT. Maybe they are just good at headlines, but must have a large readership. Or paying a lot to google.

But there were so many books nominated the list is more down to whoever is actually working for the NYT that made the final choices for 125.

Ah maybe I was wrong on the lack of sff. I noticed the big ones like Harry Potter, and Fellowship of the Ring.

 

[Parson]

The NYT has a readership of 5.09 Million.
25 New York Times Readership Statistics [The 2021 Edition]

A little more research left me with the opinion that it is among the mostly widely read papers in the world. Digital is where the fuzzy area lies. A couple of Japanese and one Indian newspaper have larger circulations and possibly, but not certainly more readers.

 

[dask]

The New York Times has had a couple of month process to determine the best book of the last 125 years. They had readers nominate their own choices 1300 books were nominated (60% of the books nominated were nominated once!). In November they compiled a list of 25 books from that group, and then 200,000 people voted. The Number one choice by a slim margin was To Kill a Mockingbird by Harper Lee. The Fellowship of the Ring by J.R.R. Tolkein was #2, and 1984 by George Orwell was #3.

For the story: What’s the Best Book of the Past 125 Years? We Asked Readers to Decide.

For the twenty Five which made the list:
Vote For the Best Book

Well, good or bad, I’ll just have to take the Chrons for it:

 

[hitmouse]

The NYT has a readership of 5.09 Million.
25 New York Times Readership Statistics [The 2021 Edition]

A little more research left me with the opinion that it is among the mostly widely read papers in the world. Digital is where the fuzzy area lies. A couple of Japanese and one Indian newspaper have larger circulations and possibly, but not certainly more readers.

I ( in the UK) would read NYT much more if it werent for the paywall that limits the number of free articles.

 

[mosaix]

I have to agree with the choice of To Kill A Mocking Bird. Our reading group read it about ten years ago. I remember distinctly thinking that every single word was in just the right place.

 

[Parson]

I ( in the UK) would read NYT much more if it weren't for the paywall that limits the number of free articles.

Here's the discouraging thing. Paywalls work. I now subscribe to the Minneapolis Star Tribune, because I was continually frustrated at not being able to read the articles they printed about the Twins, and Vikings. Giving me a taste whetted my appetite and sadly I could not control myself and took the bite.

Perhaps related; you might be interested to know that 10 years ago the Times received around 80% of it's revenue from advertising. Today that figure is about 25%. We live in a digital world as far as advertisers are concerned and they love to target their ads through Facebook etc. so you make your money by charging for content rather than advertisers paying.

 

[viraltwit]

Here's the discouraging thing. Paywalls work. I now subscribe to the Minneapolis Star Tribune, because I was continually frustrated at not being able to read the articles they printed about the Twins, and Vikings. Giving me a taste whetted my appetite and sadly I could not control myself and took the bite.

Perhaps related; you might be interested to know that 10 years ago the Times received around 80% of it's revenue from advertising. Today that figure is about 25%. We live in a digital world as far as advertisers are concerned and they love to target their ads through Facebook etc. so you make your money by charging for content rather than advertisers paying.

Agreed. Once they hit a price point that was palatable, I went the same way. I currently pay for the WSJ, NYT, and the Globe and Mail. Though I read the NYT less and less.