The job of the future is editor in chief
What’s new: When your smartphone can access any song, movie or book ever created, and you can use it to do anything from ordering food to finding dates to getting rides, companies are realizing they need a new weapon in the war for attention: an editor in chief, Axios editor in chief Nicholas Johnston writes.
- Why it matters:Because it’s never been harder to reach distracted consumers, more companies are hiring editors and content creators to build everything from podcasts to news websites to print magazines to grab your interest.
Driving the news:
- Airbnbthis year started a print magazine — free for hosts; $18/year for others.
- Bumble,a dating app, launched a lifestyle magazine.
- Netflixis publishing a free magazine “to promote its programs and stars ahead of this year’s Emmys,” Bloomberg reports.
- BlackRock, the giant money manager, recently hired a global head of content.
- Robinhood, a millennial-based financial services company, last month boughtMarketSnacks, a financial newsletter and podcast company.
- Stripe, a payments company, is publishing books.
- Goldman Sachshas a talk show.
- Blue Apron, Slack, Away, Shopifyand Casper created podcasts.
- Verizonis hiring an “Editor in Chief-Social” to oversee an editorial team tasked with “high frequency coverage” of Verizon activities.
By the numbers: The proportion of people on LinkedIn who report they work in content/editor roles at non-media companies (not typical news or journalism) has grown by 32% in the past decade, according to LinkedIn data.
- Our thought bubble, from Axios chief financial correspondent Felix Salmon: You know how every company is a technology company? Well maybe on some level every company is a media company, too. There’s no point felling trees in forests if nobody hears them.
Editor-in-chief’s note: The writer of this piece, about how editor in chief is the job of the future, is the editor in chief of Axios. He is aware of how preposterous this might look.
