The American digital media and news company Buzzfeed decided to close its newsroom that won the Pulitzer Prize. The decision comes amid the workforce reduction affecting more than 15 percent of its total employees. It was informed by Jonah Peretti, the CEO, and co-founder of the company.
Peretti released a memo that was shared over social media platforms. The memo reads that while the layoffs are happening in almost all divisions the company has realized that BuzzFeed News can no more continue operating as a stand-alone organization due to a scarcity of funds. He shared a photo of the memo on one of his social media accounts.
The memo also read that Peretti had made a decision to overinvest in BuzzFeed News because he loved the work of his employees and also the mission of the platform. His memo seemed that he really did not want to do what he has done tight ow but there was no other option other than it. The memo had contents that said the current decision has however been made because of the rough years that the company had to go through during the COVID-19 pandemic, the huge recession that is currently bringing the tech industry down.
Another reason was cited as the impactful deceleration that has been occurring in the entire market of digital advertising. Therefore it was mandatory for the company to shut down the news division because there was no practical way to find financial resources for it. Peretti further added that on its journey ahead the company will lay its concentration on its news attempts in the HuffPost.
This has been chosen as the way because the latter has the status of a profitable brand and has a highly engaged and loyal audience compared to other platforms. But what comes as a real bonus point is the fact the readers of the platform depend less on social media platforms.
It was the rise of social media that led to a gradual decline in the profit market of digital news companies. The proposed joint mission will see BuzzFeed Dot Com and HuffPost having a fixed number of roles opened considering the readers of BuzzFeed News. The experts in the field say that BuzzFeed had taken the wise decision because financing BuzzFeed News will result in the entire company going down and will impact the whole business.
It is not surprising that an online news company reducing its workforce. Other similar companies that laid off their employees are NPR News and The Washington Post. The former relieved more than 100 employees and has further plans to wrap up four of its podcasts.
Founder of the most popular e-commerce company in the world Jeff Bezos’s media company The Washington Post axed its Sunday magazine. It had also halted ist multiple other newsroom-related jobs. American online media company Insider had laid off around 10 percent of its total staff as its advertising revenue dwindled.
On another note, Jonah Peretti said that the company’s wealth was also decelerating at a quick pace as it used to have for building and now it only own one. He said that the company decided to let go of its property asset because the reports suggested that such an action will save millions of US dollars in prices as well as it will result in the present hybrid state of work. The previous year the company had a real estate presence in New York which has been reduced now. Some sources say that the company also has plans to eliminate its real estate dealings in Los Angeles too.
BuzzFeed was founded in 2006 as an Internet media company. Its division, which is entirely dedicated to news is BuzzFeed News which was launched later in 2011. The news division has stayed as an integral part of reporting and publishing stories on internationally controversial topics.
It started to garner global attention as the news divisions were ready to do news topics that many other leading companies sowed reluctance to do. BuzzFeed News has won a Pulitzer prize. Mark Schoofs was the chief editor of the news platform when the decision to shutter it down was made.
The other awards that it won are National Magazine Reward, George Polk Award, the National Press Foundation award, and The Sidney Award, all the top honors in the field. It was in 2021 that BuzzFeed News won its first-ever Pulitzer Prize. It was for international reporting. The news story was on the operations of the Chinese government that focused to eliminate the presence of Uyighur Muslims from the land of China and also the mass detention of the same community from China.
It was, in fact, a series of news stories handled and reported by three journalists Megha Rajagopalan, Christo Bucket, and Alison Killing.
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