This is odd. In an online discussion today, Washington Post managing editors Liz Spayd and Raju Narisetti indicate that the Post outsourced “an important reader service” to a paid advertiser:

Alexandria, Va.: I recognize its economics in a web-world, but I'm mightily angry at AMC for dropping their Style section daily advertising. Is it unsportsmanlike for The Post to tell me how to complain?

Liz Spayd and Raju Narisetti: We believe that those paid ads by AMC giving timings for movies locally was indeed an important reader service and were disappointed that they pulled all such advertising. We have been passing on reader feedback to them so will be happy to pass on your comments as well.

If those movie showtimes are an “important reader service,” there's no reason why the Post can't provide them. They needn't rely on AMC doing so via paid advertisements. It's one thing to say that paid advertising subsidizes the Post's ability to provide “important reader services,” but there's something a bit off-putting about the Post's managing editors saying they rely on the content of the ads to provide such a service.

UPDATE: Later in the same chat, the topic came up again:

Washington, DC: Why are AMC theaters no longer included in the movie listings in Style? Given their large share of the market, dropping them seems to severely limit the usefulness of the movie listings.

Liz Spayd and Raju Narisetti: Those listings were actually paid advertising by AMC. The movie chain decided to pull all such advertising from the paper, something that we thought was a disservice to movie goers in our region.

Ok, that goes beyond “a bit off-putting.” The top journalists at the Washington Post are attacking a private company for doing “a disservice to movie goers in our region” ... because the company decided to stop paying the Washington Post to run its ads. If the Washington Post thinks those listings are so vital, they should provide them. Attacking a company for deciding that advertising in the Washington Post no longer makes economic sense looks heavy-handed and desperate.