I'm sure someone at the NYT gets it. I just don't know why that isn't being communicated outside the organization.

Their product is their content. Their news reporting and other journalism-derrived content such as columns, etc.

Their product is not paper. Their product is not trucking. Their product is not advertising. Their product is also not a database of subscriber data.

In this respect it's about recognition and realization rather than changing what the product itself is. What needs to change is the process. The productization. How they package, distribute and of course sell their product.

They also need to really understand who their core customers are and figure out the above by catering to them. Are their core customers their readership or advertisers? They must believe it's the readership judging by the way they're pricing their content today, so they're not completely lost.

To me, it seems like they have some idea of what to do, but they left the starting gate with their shoelaces tied together. It really seems like they didn't perform due-dilligence by looking at what other publications were doing, how people consume news/content online and lastly, they didn't run the numbers by anyone with basic math skills.