The snarky, anti-Trump Twitter feeds at The New York Times have finally been tamed.

The Times, conceding reality, decided to update its social media policy on Friday, and posted an explanation to readers.

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“The new guidelines underscore our newsroom’s appreciation for the important role social media now plays in our journalism, but also call for our journalists to take extra care to avoid expressing partisan opinions or editorializing on issues that The Times is covering. … [W]e also need to make sure that we are engaging responsibly on social media, in line with the values of our newsroom,” wrote Dean Baquet, the executive editor of The Times.

On Thursday, Baquet told an audience at George Washington University that reporters “should not be able to say anything on social media that they cannot say” in The Times.

In other words, The Times decided it was high time to act like straight-news journalists. Since before the 2016 election, The Times’ reporters have been involved in bashing of Republicans — particularly Republican presidential candidate Donald Trump, now President Trump.

Many observers, including presidential aide Kellyanne Conway, said the opinionated streams coming from New York Times reporters were out of line.

Conway told LifeZette last spring that she told newspaper editors — not just ones at The Times — that their reporters were obviously not objective. Their Twitter feeds, as Conway would like to say, were a “hot mess.”

On Sunday, Conway took a small victory lap.

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“Will other outlets follow? Score one for Kellyanne Conway. The New York Times plans to toughen its Twitter policy,” Conway tweeted.

In the new statement, The Times quoted some of its own reporters about how to handle the new direction.

Signs of a shake-up in policy began in mid-September, when mouthy Times reporter Glenn Thrush, long a critic of Trump, said he was going to shut down his Twitter feed. He kept the account but said it went dormant on September 19.

Baquet did not publicly divulge what made him seek the change. The management at The New York Times, it appears, decided they could no longer continue the kabuki dance of pretending to be the best newspaper in the world, while letting their reporters slam Republicans on Twitter.

While the new policy may seem a small change for The Times or any large mainstream newspaper, it’s not. The Times’ reporters have often mocked Trump on social media.

And it has not just been mainstream publishing companies like The Times.

After the Las Vegas massacre on October 1, CBS had to fire one of its attorneys, Hayley Geftman-Gold, who suggested she did not feel sorry for the 59 victims.

“I’m actually not even sympathetic bc country music fans often are Republican gun toters,” Geftman-Gold tweeted.

Conservatives and Republicans mocked The Times for not understanding social media sites, which are more than 10 years old.

“Twitter has been around for 10 years. NY Times just realized its staff say lots of stupid, left-wing things there?” pollster Scott Rasmussen tweeted.

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Left-wing voices decried the change.

Fast Company, a business magazine that has tacked increasingly left in the past several years, gave a thumbs-down.

“[P]eople turn to The Times because of its personalities,” Fast Company wrote, in a post that seemed to largely eschew the standard journalistic mission. “There are a number of journalists — Maggie Haberman, Mike Isaac, Farhad Manjoo — who have acquired dedicated audiences because of their frequent and unorthodox social media practices. Platforms like Twitter have made it possible for writers to become personal brands, and if Haberman left The Times today, readers would sure as hell read her stuff at wherever she goes next. Baquet’s new plan would basically throttle these personalities for doing what they’re paid to do.”

(photo credit, homepage image: The New York Times Building, colored,  CC BY-SA 3.0, by JavierDo; photo credit, article image: The New York Times Building…, rotated and darkened, CC BY-SA 2.0, by Adam Jones)