BuzzFeed and the Death of the Internet as a Real Place

BuzzFeed News has learned that the truth may set you free, but it won't make you rich.

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The death of BuzzFeed News hit less like another chapter in the race-to-the-bottom economics of the digital media industry and more like the breakup of a favorite band. The website didn’t just define an internet era. It defined a definitive era of Millennial life. I once heard through the online journalist grapevine that, at its peak, half of all American Millennials were going to BuzzFeed News at least once a day. Its demise does not suggest great things about the state of digital journalism in 2023, and that’s not exactly news to anyone. But the downfall of BuzzFeed News also says something important about the state of epistemology in the world, and that’s a challenge all of us are going to have to figure out sooner or later.