Women’s Wear Daily
Bill Keller says it was his decision to end the magazine column, which started in March with editor Hugo Lindgren’s redesign of the magazine. “The magazine column has been fun – and I’ve loved being part of Hugo’s relaunch – but op-ed has greater license to have opinions, and a day-before deadline,” Keller tells John Koblin. Lindgren says Keller’s columns “were smart, well-written, fun to read.” What did he think of “>the criticism of Keller’s pieces?
“If you have a columnist that everyone loves — what is that? Is there one of those in the world? I enjoyed some of the controversy that he kicked up.”
Koblin points out that of the 12 magazine columns Keller wrote, five had corrections (including one column that had two) — a correction rate of 41.6 percent. (Jayson Blair’s annual correction rate at the Times ranged from 5 to 6.3 percent — high enough to bring warnings to improve. Keller tells Koblin: “Thanks for noticing the corrections. I don’t think any of them undermined the point of the column, but every one made me wince. And I’ve gotten better with practice, so there’s probably hope for me.”
