New York Media Man Mortimer Zuckerman's $200 Million Gamble - 8th July 2009

Media companies such as Costigan Media's Gambling911 and Forbes are reporting the following:

The Daily News publisher is spending a mint to remake the paper. Wait till you hear his plan to save the rest of the industry.

Mortimer Zuckerman is chairman and co-founder of publicly traded Boston Properties, editor in chief of U.S. News and World Report and publisher of the Daily News. A Harvard Law grad, he's a fixture on Sunday talk shows like The McLaughlin Group. Off-air, he's often mid-air: Zuckerman traveled to Tangier in early August to attend events commemorating the 10-year rule of Morroco's King Mohammed VI. Zuckerman, with an estimated net worth of $2.8 billion, spoke to Forbes just after his return.

What kind of shape will newspapers be in when the recession ends, and what else can they do?

A lot of cities are going to exist without newspapers. There is something that can be done, and the federal government ought to do it: allow sports betting on newspaper Web sites. That would save every newspaper in America. The New York Times.com could do it. Plenty of British papers do this; for them it's a crucial part of their net revenue stream. I know a major newspaper in London that makes $15 million a year from sports betting alone.

What would it take for that to happen in the U.S.?

It would take congressional legislation and the willingness on the part of the government to confront gambling and casino interests that have blocked this. Newspaper owners have never gotten together to lobby for this because they have always been quite profitable. Those days are behind us.

Now that the price of newspapers have come down, are you considering acquisitions?

I'm going to focus on the new presses I'm buying.

The New York Times has raised newsstand and delivery prices. Is this something you're considering too?

I really haven't thought about it. It's true that there has traditionally been a price relationship between the Times and the Daily News, with the News costing about 50% of the Times. With what the Times charges now, the Daily News is more like 25% of that. But it's not something I'm considering.

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