Bustle Digital Group Shutters ‘The Outline’, Lays Off Culture And Tech Site’s Staff

Digital media outfit Bustle Digital Group (BDG) has shuttered one its properties, The Outline — a news website dedicated to covering power, culture, and the technology, which was founded by veteran tech journalist Joshua Topolsky in 2015. BDG acquired The Outline last March for an undisclosed sum.

Variety reports that BDG also laid off the entire Outline staff amid corporate complications stemming from the coronavirus pandemic, with executive editor Leah Finnegan sharing the news on Twitter. “I am tremendously proud of all the weird, funny, interesting, and brilliant stuff we put into the universe, and all the talented writers we were able to publish,” she wrote. “Thank you for reading, and I hope you will remember what we did fondly.”

BDG, led by founder and CEO Bryan Goldberg, is the parent of several digital media brands, including its flagship women’s interest outlet Bustle, as well as Elite Daily, Mic, Nylon, The Zoe Report, and more. And BDG isn’t the only digital firm tendering cuts in the midst of the pandemic; BuzzFeed reduced pay for most staffers, freelancers, and executives last week in an attempt to prevent layoffs.

Prior to establishing The Outline, Topolsky was a co-founder of Vox-owned tech website The Verge, and also previously served as editor-in-chief of Engadget, as well as an editor at Bloomberg. Prior to its acquisition, The Outline had raised $10.2 million in venture funding from the likes of RRE Ventures, Boat Rocker Ventures, NextView Ventures, and Advancit Capital. That said, The Outline had laid off staff writers prior to the acquisition in 2018, Variety notes, spawning a boycott campaign by freelancers.

Bustle, for its part, laid off 10 employees and contributors in November , attributing the cuts to a website relaunch.