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I worked at HuffPo right after AOL was acquired by Verizon and before AOL/Yahoo became Oath. During this time Arianna left; rumor was she was forced out or at t

I worked at HuffPo right after AOL was acquired by Verizon and before AOL/Yahoo became Oath. During this time Arianna left; rumor was she was forced out or at the very least, her power was undermined/neutered by Verizon and she was unable to fulfill her vision. Shortly after was the 2016 election. It was very surreal to be working there, while everyone on the editorial staff was sure HRC was going to win and then Trump won, without the namesake leader at the helm. As time dragged on, it started to become obvious that Verizon was starting to extract as much value out of the acquired AOL web properties at the expense of quality/brand integrity. Then came subsequent layoffs and now HuffPo really is a shell of it's former self.

52-6F-62 6y ago
Similar things have happened elsewhere in the media world. I've seen some of them first-hand within the org. It was hard to watch a 100-year old magazine of note continuously stretched to its possible thinnest by the parent company because the returns were not what they blindly promised and seemingly wanted to reduce the price of the properties to make a sale cheaper. Thankfully in that case the company who purchased the properties is actively working to bring them back to their former selves.
skinnymuch 6y ago
I went to HuffPo just now. It appears to be same sort of stuff from years ago. HuffPo never had the rep of a shining beacon of journalism or even integrity. Didn it ever make a profit?
- oaththrowaway 6y ago
  No, it was bleeding money for a long time. They had to essentially pay Buzzfeed to take it off their hands.
  - skinnymuch 6y ago
    Very similar to the Tumblr situation.
Tempest1981 6y ago
> everyone on the editorial staff was sure HRC was going to win I will always remember the HuffPo homepage masthead, which showed HRC with a 98.5% chance of victory, right up until the end. Probably didn't help her situation.

52-6F-62 6y ago

Similar things have happened elsewhere in the media world. I've seen some of them first-hand within the org. It was hard to watch a 100-year old magazine of note continuously stretched to its possible thinnest by the parent company because the returns were not what they blindly promised and seemingly wanted to reduce the price of the properties to make a sale cheaper. Thankfully in that case the company who purchased the properties is actively working to bring them back to their former selves.

skinnymuch 6y ago

I went to HuffPo just now. It appears to be same sort of stuff from years ago. HuffPo never had the rep of a shining beacon of journalism or even integrity. Didn it ever make a profit?

oaththrowaway 6y ago
No, it was bleeding money for a long time. They had to essentially pay Buzzfeed to take it off their hands.
- skinnymuch 6y ago
  Very similar to the Tumblr situation.

Tempest1981 6y ago

> everyone on the editorial staff was sure HRC was going to win I will always remember the HuffPo homepage masthead, which showed HRC with a 98.5% chance of victory, right up until the end. Probably didn't help her situation.