Why I left BuzzFeed: Former employees speak out against media company and fake news outlet
by: Frances Bloomfield
NaturalNews.com
Saturday, May 06, 2017
Over the course of several months, a spate of “Why I Left BuzzFeed” YouTube videos have hit the internet. Former employees of the million-dollar Internet media company have cited a number of reasons for their departures in prerecorded confessionals that have since received millions of views. As reported by Variety.com, an assortment of recurring themes can be spotted while watching the videos.
According to ex-staffers, the BuzzFeed higher-ups imposed policies that they didn’t agree with, such as the guidelines that prohibited them from working on outside projects. These included channels outside of work and the ex-staffers’ personal video projects. Others, like comedy-duo Allison Raskin and Gaby Dunn, have cited their lack of ownership and creative control over their work for BuzzFeed as a determining factor for their resignation. The pressures put upon their shoulders to churn out videos that focused on quantity over quality didn’t help either, claimed ex-producer Kenny Moffitt. Additionally, the content creators were not allowed to engage directly and formally engage with fans, such as by replying to comments, which former video producer Safiya Nygaard spoke out against.
There were also those who didn’t leave of their own volition. In June of last year, BuzzFeed let go of video content creators Jenny Lorenzo and Brittany Ashley for allegedly breaching their exclusive contracts with the company. The actor-writer-producer pair had small roles on “Gente-Fied”, a web series produced by America Ferrera. This led to their termination and to BuzzFeed Motion Pictures president Ze Frank issuing a company-wide memo emphasizing the company’s expectations of its creators and their BuzzFeed-only content.
BuzzFeed: Strict content curators and unapologetic fabricators
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