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Medium Cuts Staff By One-Third, Shuts Down New York and DC Offices (arstechnica.com)

Posted by BeauHD on from the in-need-of-a-new-strategy dept.

An anonymous reader quotes a report from Ars Technica: Medium, the San Francisco-based online publishing platform founded in 2012, has laid off 50 employees, or roughly one-third of its staff. The company will also close offices in New York and Washington, DC. Ev Williams, Medium's CEO, wrote in a lengthy post on Wednesday that the company would be changing its business model despite ending 2016 as "our best year yet." He blamed the entire concept of "ad-driven media on the Internet" as the root of the company's shortcomings. As Williams, who is also a co-founder of Twitter, wrote: "It simply doesn't serve people. In fact, it's not designed to. The vast majority of articles, videos, and other "content" we all consume on a daily basis is paid for -- directly or indirectly -- by corporations who are funding it in order to advance their goals. And it is measured, amplified, and rewarded based on its ability to do that. Period. As a result, we getwell, what we get. And it's getting worse."

9 of 177 comments (clear)

  1. the start of .crash 2.0? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

    God I hope so. So fucking overdue.

    1. Re:the start of .crash 2.0? by Mashiki · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Why? That would put more people out of work, we will have less competition, less access to unique content and more reliance on just a few monopolies that simply copy one anothers content. Let me guess you work for Facebook, Microsoft or Google?

      Because the entire dotcom industry needs a massive correction again. Uber being valued at half the valuation of Intel? More then Ford, GM, or Chrysler? Not seeing a problem here. It's pets.com and their ilk all over again.

      --
      Om, nomnomnom...
  2. ServePeople by Luthair · · Score: 4, Insightful

    You know what else doesn't serve people? Firing fifty of them right after Christmas because you lost interest in your hobby.

    1. Re:ServePeople by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Insightful

      Medium, the San Francisco-based online publishing platform

      s/online publishing platform/blog/g

      Medium, Macy's.... What's the world coming to? Back in my day, people used to get fired right BEFORE Christmas.

  3. Who is medium? by Ash-Fox · · Score: 5, Insightful

    I've never even heard of them before? Are they important?

    --
    Change is certain; progress is not obligatory.
    1. Re:Who is medium? by Luthair · · Score: 5, Insightful

      They're a crappy centralized blog site that had a terrible layout with a huge font rendering it unreadable .

  4. bad business model by ooloorie · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Evan Williams blames a "broken system" of financing media through advertising.

    I think a more likely problem with Medium is entering the crowded commodity market of blogging platforms with a bad business model and a staff of 150 for something that should take no more than a handful of people.

    Of course, he is worth $1.7 billion, so what does he care.

  5. I care because? by Snotnose · · Score: 1, Insightful

    1) Never heard of the company
    2) Laid of 50 peeps, kinda insignificant
    3) Offices closed are 3k miles from me.


    Oh, it was some startup trying to feed me ads. So 4) fuck you.

  6. Re:So medium is now a small? by quenda · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Because readers paid the newspapers and that money was used by the newspapers to pay journalists

    No it was not. The cover price was not even enough for printing costs. What paid for those journalists was classified advertising, called "rivers of gold" by Rupert Murdoch.
    Of course the internet killed the classified ads, and online subscriptions can never replace that.