The New Statesman
•68% Informative
Ben Smith, 46, was the founding editor of BuzzFeed News, the site which helped reinvent the way news was covered in the 2010s.
In 2020, as BuzzFeed struggled, he joined the New York Times as its media columnist.
Smith soon left the Times, setting up Semafor, a new digital media play.
In doing so he has sought to ride the latest shift in journalism: the proliferation of private media.
Semafor, Smith’s new site, is trying to offer that, albeit with no more sophistication than any other digital media site.
The site attracts 1.5 million monthly visitors, equivalent to the readership of a print magazine.
It is a pat solution to the problem it is supposed to address: the erosion of trust in journalism.
But as he noted, trust has fallen in “every social institution” and there is “obviously no magic wand” that will restore it.
VR Score
69
Informative language
65
Neutral language
29
Article tone
informal
Language
English
Language complexity
40
Offensive language
possibly offensive
Hate speech
not hateful
Attention-grabbing headline
not detected
Known propaganda techniques
not detected
Time-value
short-lived
External references
4
Source diversity
3
Affiliate links
no affiliate links