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LA Times Running Ads on Section Fronts

Following the lead of the New York Times, the Wall Street Journal and the Boston Globe, the Los Angeles Times will begin selling advertising on the front pages of some sections.

The move is designed to boost revenue at a time of steep losses: last month, parent Tribune Co. of Chicago reported a 62 percent drop in Q2 profits and accelerating circulation declines at its papers, writes the Los Angeles Times. The ads will run across the bottoms of the front pages of the Calendar, Sports, Business and Sunday Travel sections.

Times editor Dean Baquet expressed concern about the fact of ads running on the front of the Calendar section, pointing out that if a movie ad was run adjacent to a review of the film, it might give the appearance that the coverage had been compromised.

Newspapers used to run ads on the front pages of sections, but the practice was abandoned by the last half of the 20th century in this country (though it continues in Europe and elsewhere).

Baquet said he was reassured that there would be ways to set the ad apart from the editorial content, and added that the practice was more an issue of tradition than of ethics.