Their last peak of subscriptions was when Trump got elected in 2016. It was a good time for newspapers and TV. The NYT is having an even higher peak now[1]. Surely the Sulzbergers aren't the only family competent enough to run a newspaper. Lots of papers aren't owned by billionaires and manage to do ok. Wapo didn't have games in 2016 and people still subscribed. It just lost it's value to readers, so people unsubscribed. I certainly did.
Bezos is literally just showing his incompetence at this point in running a paper, and the NYT is probably loving it. Sure billionaires can buy social networks and papers, but people can also subscribe to and use things not owned by billionaires.
[1] https://www.natesilver.net/p/the-sad-and-self-inflicted-decl...