The second round of layoffs at The Walt Disney Company continues, with Nate Silver’s data-driven politics and journalism brand FiveThirtyEight being impacted, according to The Hollywood Reporter.
What’s Happening:
- FiveThirtyEight is a mainly political website which uses data and evidence to advance public knowledge, “adding certainty where we can and uncertainty where we must.”
- Nate Silver founded FiveThirtyEight in 2008, shortly thereafter becoming part of The New York Times. The site was then sold to ESPN, being moved to the ABC News division.
- Silver told FiveThirtyEight employees in a Slack message that he expects to leave Disney when his contract is up, which he added would be “soon.”
- His departure will be the first time that Silver has not been involved in the site since it launched 15 years ago.
- This comes as part of The Walt Disney Company’s plans to cut 7,000 jobs across TV, film, theme parks, and corporate teams, affecting every region where Disney operates.
- Moving forward, ABC News is expected to keep the FiveThirtyEight brand name, with plans to streamline the site and make it more efficient.
- A slew of senior ABC News executives were laid off last month as part of these job cutting efforts.
What They’re Saying:
- ABC News statement: “ABC News remains dedicated to data journalism with a core focus on politics, the economy and enterprise reporting — this streamlined structure will allow us to be more closely aligned with our priorities for the 2024 election and beyond. We are grateful for the invaluable contributions of the team members who will be departing the organization and know they will continue to make an important impact on the future of journalism.”
- Nate Silver said on his Twitter: “I had been worried about an outcome like this and so have had some great initial conversations about opportunities elsewhere. Don’t hesitate to get in touch. I am so proud of the work of FiveThirtyEight staff. It has never been easy. I’m so sorry to the people impacted by this.”