The Business Insider Bloodletting

In internal Slack messages and emails obtained by Status, staffers vented their fury not just at the layoffs, but at the manner in which they were handled. In a lengthy reply-all email chain, editors and reporters pleaded with management not to lock affected employees out of Business Insider’s systems at 4pm, calling the move both disrespectful and counterproductive. (Impacted staffers, I’m told, will get to keep their laptops.) “Treat them like professionals,” one reporter wrote. “Give them more time to reach out to sources, make sure that they have the records they need, and everything else.”

In a separate message, another staffer noted the irony: Business Insider has reported extensively on the recent spate of harsh "firings in the federal workforce,” particularly when employees are cut off from accounts with little warning. “Please extend more grace to our colleagues,” the staffer urged.

Meanwhile, over in POLITICO’s newsroom—Business Insider’s sister publication—top boss Goli Sheikholeslami attempted to reassure her own staff. “Our thoughts are with our friends and colleagues there,” she wrote in a memo obtained by Status. But she also sought to quash speculation about any contagion in the Axel family: “Our business remains strong,” she said, with growth plans still on track.

That was not the impression at Business Insider. During an 11:30am all-hands meeting, Peng and Editor-in-Chief Jamie Heller spoke for four or five minutes, reading from what appeared to be a prepared HR-style script, according to multiple people familiar with the matter. They took no questions from the staff—a glaring omission that only deepened the frustration. Then, in the 5pm hour, Heller held another all-hands meeting. In an audio recording obtained by Status, it was clear she was reading from a prepared script. And again, no questions were taken—a remarkable act of cowardice from management to dodge inquiries from a (rightfully) anxious workforce.

The deep cuts Thursday were hardly the first sign of trouble at Business Insider in recent memory. There was an 8% staff reduction last year. And a 10% cut the year before. But Thursday’s 21% layoff is by far the most significant. What was once a newsroom largely immune from these kinds of mass reductions has now been roiled by them in rapid succession.

To be fair to management, Business Insider is very much reckoning with forces far outside its control, namely a structural collapse in the very distribution model it was built upon: SEO. For years, the outlet drew large volumes of traffic from Google search. Its e-commerce operation, in particular, was engineered for such traffic, surfacing affiliate-driven shopping guides and “best of” lists that was algorithmically served up to the masses. But that golden pipeline is now drying up.

Google has recently rolled out major changes to its search engine—including the AI Overviews feature—that deprioritize traditional news links in favor of machine-generated summaries. Though Peng didn’t explicitly name the Sundar Pichai-led search giant in her memo, the subtext was clear: “We must be structured to endure extreme traffic drops outside of our control,” she wrote, citing the decision to gut most of the commerce team and shrink the company to a size that can "absorb that volatility."

The impacts rippling through Business Insider are surely just the early tremors of what's to come as A.I. overtakes traditional search. In the months and years ahead, other publishers are sure to also be walloped by Google’s firehose shutting off. Just last month, we reported The Daily Dot was forced to layoff the bulk of its staff after the outlet’s traffic fell off a cliff in the wake of an algorithm tweak. These painful events are unfortunately set to become more common as the internet undergoes a systemic revolution. The era of the distribution internet—when publishers could build empires off the backs of Google, Facebook, and Twitter referrals—is coming to a rapid close.

“Business Insider was built for an internet that doesn’t exist anymore,” a former senior employee at the publication told me Thursday. “No question.” But that person added that the pain could have been less severe had Business Insider’s C-suite worked harder to see around the corner.

"Everything that’s happened regarding traffic was predictable. They could have been much more decisive much sooner," the person said.

Of course, Peng & Co. would argue that the company is rushing to reposition itself—it's just anything but easy to transform a digital behemoth in an orderly, painless fashion. According to Peng, Business Insider will go “all-in on A.I.,” accelerate its live events business, and double down on “business, tech, and innovation” coverage—internally abbreviated as “BTI.” That editorial narrowing began months ago under Heller, the former Wall Street Journal editor brought in to polish the newsroom's editorial output. Heller’s arrival signaled a shift away from the freewheeling culture of the Henry Blodget era and toward a more corporate, standards-driven operation. The goal: trade viral traffic hits for subscriber conversions.

But Thursday’s bloodletting did not instill confidence in staffers, especially since some blame the new Peng-Heller vision as part of the reason traffic to the website has dried up. Whether fair or not, it is true that the original iteration of Business Insider was presented as a fun, millennial-oriented alternative to the Bloombergs of the world. The revamped outlet, offering a more buttoned up experience, seems to be undergoing something of a midlife identity crisis, desperately wanting to be cool, but also very serious.

In Slack messages Thursday, journalists shouted out laid-off colleagues, eulogizing their contributions in the company’s #bi-props channel. “A newsroom cannot be its best without a team of incisive, thoughtful, and dogged copy editors,” one editor wrote. Another added, “Please do the right thing and make this an easy transition.”

Whether Business Insider can reinvent itself before the ground beneath it shifts again is an open question. What’s clear is that the old model is gone. And the human cost of transition to the new one—whatever it ultimately looks like—is beginning to mount.

The Delicate Donald: Donald Trump’s lawyers said this week that he was emotionally rattled by CBS News’ editing of its “60 Minutes” interview with Kamala Harris. In a filing made public Thursday, they claimed he suffered “mental anguish” after the network edited the interview in a manner he has falsely said was malicious and aimed at tilting the scales of the 2024 election. “This led to widespread confusion and mental anguish of consumers, including Plaintiffs,” the filing stated, suggesting CBS News “deceptively distort[ed] its broadcasts” and then refused to correct the record. Talk about a real ❄️!

► In the filing, which you can view here, Trump's lawyers also described the president as a "prolific content creator,” perhaps one of the truer things they have told the court!

• An appeals court allowed an injunction to remain in place in the Radio Free Asia and Middle East Broadcasting Networks cases against the Trump administration. [Democracy Forward]

• As it remains locked in a lawsuit with OpenAI, The NYT announced it will partner with Amazon in its first A.I. licensing deal. [CNBC]

• Lester Holt will anchor his final edition of “Nightly News” before passing the baton to Tom Llamas. Ahead of his last time in the anchor chair, Holt will join “TODAY” in the morning for a tribute.

  • Meghan Rafferty, executive producer of "Nightly News," posted her own tribute to Holt: "Lester and I go back to my first job in television news." [LinkedIn]

• Pivot to podcasting? MSNBC announced it is launching an audio show with Nicolle Wallace that will be interview focused and feature Hollywood and sports guests. [THR]

• The News & Documentary Emmy Awards said Al Roker will receive a lifetime achievement honor at this year's ceremony. [Deadline]

Dan (Bongino) in Distress: Dan Bongino, the former podcaster who screamed about the "Deep State" for years before joining it, is having a rough go as the FBI’s new deputy director. On "Fox & Friends" Thursday morning, Bongino delivered a whiny monologue about how hard his job is—apparently forgetting that no one forced him to trade his podcast mic for a badge. “I gave up everything for this,” he said, before launching into a teary-eyed tale about long hours, lonely walls, and how Kash Patel’s faucet disrupts his solitude. (Yes, really.)

Of course, the timing of Bongino’s pity party is rich. He’s facing significant heat from MAGA diehards for saying Jeffrey Epstein killed himself, despite spending years egging on conspiracy theories that suggested otherwise. Now that he’s wearing a government badge, he’s suddenly the voice of reason trying to mop up the mess he helped create. To that end, Bongino told Fox News that the FBI will release video tape from inside the prison proving he's telling the truth about Epstein. Good luck to Dan in his impossible task of quelling the conspiracies! But hey, if the job gets too much to bear, there’s always a return to Rumble. Or maybe just another trip to the "Fox & Friends" set to bask in some affirmative commentary. Either way: cry us a river, Dan.

• Awkward! News outlets spent Thursday exposing fake citations in Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s “MAHA” report. First NOTUS identified seven sources that do not appear to exist, then The NYT found two more. [NOTUS/NYT]

• What’s going on at The Free Press? Lachlan Cartwright reported on some high-profile departures at the anti-woke, Bari Weiss-led outlet. [Breaker]

• Charlie Kirk said he was with Donald Trump this week and urged him to "crush Harvard in its current form." [MMFA]

• Rupert Murdoch’s WSJ editorial board is once again laying into Trump, this time over his assault on big law firms, warning, “he would be wise to cut his losses before he goes zero for nine at the Supreme Court.” [WSJ]

• The Federalist’s Mollie Hemingway used her time in the White House briefing room’s “new media” seat to rail against the press for its past coverage of the “Russia collusion hoax.” Of course, there was no hoax. But plenty of dishonest coverage of the Russia probe, led by people like Hemingway. [Mediaite]

• Sean Hannity, who used to assure his audience he received the flu shot, is now casting doubt on it, calling the vaccine “stupid.” [MMFA]

• Matt Gertz chronicled how Fox News has been attacking Scott Pelley "for accurately describing Trump’s war on the press." [MMFA]

• Status Scoop | The Nation will publish an endorsement Friday morning urging New Yorkers to rank Zohran Mamdani as their first choice for the Democratic nomination for mayor. It’s the first major publication to announce an endorsement in the race.

• In conversation with Tina Brown, Barry Diller said Elon Musk “is definitely in certain ways a glorious monster.” [Fresh Hell]

• Bluesky has gained significant traction with news influencers, with 43% having accounts on the Jay Graber-led platform, per new data from Pew Research. But Elon Musk's toxic swamp—also known as X—remains far ahead, with 85% still on the site. [Pew]

• 🪖 Meta and ex-virtual reality chief Palmer Luckey partnered to develop military mixed reality headsets allowing soldiers to control A.I.-powered weapons. [WSJ]

• OpenAI chief operating officer Brad Lightcap said it has not struck deals with movie studios yet because it still has to establish a “level of trust” with Hollywood. [The Wrap]

• Instagram boss Adam Mosseri announced the platform will now support photos with a 3:4 aspect ratio, the typical phone camera default. [The Verge]

• It’s official: The 2024-2025 Broadway season is the highest grossing on record, powered by hits like “Good Night, and Good Luck” and “Othello,” among others. [THR]

• Starz said it ended the latest quarter with 12.3 million U.S. subscribers, up a little more than half a million from its previous earnings. The company also said it took a $177.4 million restructuring charge as part of a "reassessment" of its content offerings. [Deadline]

• Lionsgate shakeup: Nathan Kahane will step down as president; Erin Westerman is expected to take over studio production. [Deadline]

• A former aide to Sean "Diddy" Combs identified as “Mia” testified that the music mogul repeatedly raped her: "It’s the most traumatizing, the worst thing that’s ever happened to me." [Deadline]

• Harvey Weinstein's legal team said the disgraced movie mogul is "seriously contemplating" testifying at his sexual assault retrial. [AP]

• George R.R. Martin pushed back on frustrated fans waiting for his long anticipated “Winds of Winter” novel: "I know you've given up on me.” [THR]

• The Tony Awards said the original cast of "Hamilton" will reunite at the 78th annual awards show. [Variety]

• Lionsgate unveiled the teaser for "Good Fortune," the Aziz Ansari comedy that also features Seth Rogen, Keke Palmer, and Keanu Reeves. [YouTube]

• RoadsideFlix dropped the trailer for the horror thriller "THE HOME," starring Pete Davidson. [YouTube]

• Netflix recruited Julia Garner and Anthony Boyle for a series about Sam Bankman-Fried. [Deadline]

• "Only Murders in the Building" teased the return of Meryl Streep for season five. [The Wrap]

• Showtime renewed “The Chi” for an eighth season. [Deadline]

• Apple TV+ ordered up a serial killer drama. [THR]