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Quartz (publication)

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Quartz
Available inEnglish
OwnerG/O Media
Key people
  • Jay Lauf
  • Zach Seward
  • Kate Weber
RevenueDecrease $26.9 million (2019)[1]
Net income-$18.4 million (2019)[1]
URLqz.com Edit this at Wikidata
CommercialYes
LaunchedSeptember 24, 2012; 12 years ago (2012-09-24)

Quartz[2] is an American English language news website owned by G/O Media. Focused on international business news, it was founded in 2012 by Atlantic Media in New York City as a "digitally native news outlet for business people in the new global economy".[3] The publication implemented a paywall from 2019 to 2022.[4][5]

History

[edit]

On September 24, 2012, Quartz launched its website,[2] designed to deliver content primarily to mobile and tablet users. Its founding team members were from news organizations including Bloomberg, The Economist, The New York Times, and The Wall Street Journal.[6][7] According to its website, Quartz's team reports in 115 countries and speaks 19 languages.[8] The publication was initially led by Kevin Delaney, a former managing director of WSJ.com, Zach Seward, a former WSJ social media editor, and Gideon Lichfield, a global news editor from The Economist, among other editors.[3]

Quartz's main office is located in New York. It also has correspondents and staff reporters based in Hong Kong, India, London, Los Angeles, Thailand, Washington DC, and elsewhere.[8]

In 2014, Quartz expanded into India, launching Quartz India. In 2015, it launched the Africa-focused Quartz Africa.[9][10]

In 2015, it launched Atlas, a chart-building platform.[11]

In 2015, it had meanwhile specific publications for Hong Kong, Japan, and the United Arab Emirates, adding to Africa and India.[9]

According to Ad Age, Quartz made around $30 million in revenue in 2016, and employed 175 people.[12]

In 2017, revenue decreased to $27.6 million as advertising shrank.[13] In August 2017, Quartz's website saw about 22 million unique visitors. Approximately 700,000 people subscribe to its roster of email newsletters, which includes its flagship Daily Brief.[14]

In July 2018, Japanese company Uzabase (Japanese: ユーザ��ース) acquired Quartz from Atlantic Media for $86 million.[15][4][1]

In October 2019 co-founder/co-CEO/editor in chief Kevin Delaney stepped down from his position. Zach Seward, the company's second employee, became the company's new chief executive officer.[16][17]

That same month Apple removed the Quartz app from its Chinese App Store, as part of the Great Firewall, for reporting on the 2019–20 Hong Kong protests.[18][19][20]

Revenue fell from $11.6 million in the first half of 2019 to $5 million in the first half of 2020. In November 2020, Uzabase sold Quartz to the publication's staff.[21][22]

In April 2022, the site was sold to G/O Media.[23][24]

As of 2024, Quartz India has been shut down.[25]

Content

[edit]

Quartz is structured around a collection of phenomena or what it calls "obsessions"[26][27] instead of "beats", preferring news stories or reports to be either short or long rather than middle of the road or average.

Quartz often uses charts, created through its Chartbuilder tool, which forms the basis of its Atlas platform. Chartbuilder has been used by other media organizations, including CNBC, FiveThirtyEight, NBC News, New Hampshire Public Radio, NPR, The New Yorker, The Press-Enterprise, CEOWORLD magazine, and The Wall Street Journal.[28][29]

In December 2024, a ChatGPT tool used to write hundreds of daily articles on securities and exchange filings for the past year was shut down because it would sometimes publish incorrect names and figures that actually belonged to other companies.[30]

See also

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References

[edit]
  1. ^ a b c Perlberg, Steven (June 15, 2020). "Caught in the mushy middle: How Quartz fell to earth". Digiday. Archived from the original on September 18, 2020. Retrieved September 22, 2020.
  2. ^ a b Benjamin Mullin; Katie Robertson (April 28, 2022). "G/O Media Buys Business Site Quartz". The New York Times. Archived from the original on January 20, 2023. Retrieved January 20, 2023. because of its high-quality global business journalism.
  3. ^ a b Sonderman, Jeff (September 17, 2012). "5 things journalists should know about Quartz, Atlantic Media's business news startup". Poynter. Archived from the original on August 11, 2017. Retrieved August 11, 2017.
  4. ^ a b Schmidt, Christine (May 13, 2019). "Quartz, built on free distribution, has put its articles behind a paywall". Nieman Lab. Archived from the original on October 1, 2020. Retrieved September 22, 2020.
  5. ^ Katie Robertson (April 14, 2022). "Quartz, the Business News Site, Drops Its Paywall". The New York Times. Archived from the original on January 20, 2023. Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  6. ^ "The Atlantic Launches Mobile-First Business Publication". Mashable. September 24, 2012. Archived from the original on May 29, 2018. Retrieved May 28, 2018.
  7. ^ "Atlantic Media business website, Quartz, staffs up and strategizes". Politico. May 28, 2012. Archived from the original on May 29, 2018. Retrieved May 28, 2018.
  8. ^ a b "Welcome to Quartz". Quartz. Archived from the original on November 2, 2015. Retrieved November 4, 2015.
  9. ^ a b Jackson, Jasper (November 3, 2015). "Quartz Africa site to launch in June". The Guardian. ISSN 0261-3077. Archived from the original on October 26, 2017. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  10. ^ "Africa rising: Why and how Quartz, GE (Media) want in". fipp.com. March 13, 2015. Archived from the original on July 18, 2015. Retrieved November 4, 2015.
  11. ^ "Quartz's Atlas becomes open platform for building charts, data visualizations". ijnet.org. Archived from the original on October 26, 2017. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  12. ^ Barr, Jeremy. "Quartz said to near $30 million in revenue, without clickbait or standard ad units". Advertising Age. Archived from the original on May 29, 2018. Retrieved May 28, 2018.
  13. ^ Mozur, Paul (July 2, 2018). "Quartz, Atlantic Media's Business News Start-Up, Is Sold to Japanese Firm". The New York Times. Archived from the original on September 4, 2019. Retrieved July 2, 2018.
  14. ^ "Why Quartz has gone niche with newsletter topics". Digiday. January 31, 2018. Archived from the original on May 29, 2018. Retrieved May 28, 2018.
  15. ^ "Japan's Uzabase to acquire online news platform Quartz". The Associated Press. July 3, 2018. Archived from the original on July 17, 2018. Retrieved July 17, 2018.
  16. ^ Jerde, Sara (October 7, 2019). "Quartz Searches for New Editor in Chief After Co-Founder Departs". Adweek. Archived from the original on October 7, 2019. Retrieved October 8, 2019.
  17. ^ Tracy, Marc; Lee, Edmund (October 7, 2019). "Quartz Editor in Chief Steps Down in Shake-Up". The New York Times. Archived from the original on January 20, 2023. Retrieved January 20, 2023.
  18. ^ Miller, Chance (October 9, 2019). "Apple removes 'Quartz' news app from Chinese App Store". 9to5Mac. Archived from the original on October 10, 2019. Retrieved October 10, 2019.
  19. ^ Statt, Nick (October 9, 2019). "Apple removes Quartz news app from the Chinese App Store over Hong Kong coverage". The Verge. Archived from the original on October 10, 2019. Retrieved October 10, 2019.
  20. ^ Leskin, Paige (October 10, 2019). "Here are all the major US tech companies blocked behind China's 'Great Firewall'". Business Insider. Archived from the original on May 2, 2020. Retrieved May 17, 2020.
  21. ^ "Japan's Uzabase sells Quartz news site to co-founder, editor-in-chief". Reuters. November 9, 2020. Archived from the original on November 19, 2020. Retrieved March 1, 2021.
  22. ^ Pompeo, Joe (October 8, 2020). ""Journalism Needs Help to Survive This": Despite a Crushing Spring, the Media's Pandemic Reckoning Is Far From Over". Vanity Fair. Archived from the original on January 18, 2021. Retrieved March 1, 2021.
  23. ^ Abdel-Baqui, Omar; Bruell, Alexandra (April 28, 2022). "Gizmodo Owner G/O Media Buys Business News Site Quartz". The Wall Street Journal. Archived from the original on May 2, 2022. Retrieved May 2, 2022.
  24. ^ Owen, Laura Hazard (April 29, 2022). ""An audible gasp": Quartz, once a high-flying startup, has sold to G/O Media". Nieman Journalism Lab. Archived from the original on May 11, 2022. Retrieved May 12, 2022.
  25. ^ "Last Post on Quartz India Twitter is in 2023, qz.com/india is defunct".
  26. ^ "The newsonomics of Quartz, 19 months in". Nieman Lab. May 2015. Archived from the original on December 1, 2017. Retrieved October 25, 2017.
  27. ^ David Carr (September 23, 2012). "Covering the World of Business, Digital Only". The New York Times. Archived from the original on January 22, 2023. Retrieved January 22, 2023.
  28. ^ "The most important things we learned in our first two years of chartbuildering". quartzthings.tumblr.com. Archived from the original on October 29, 2015. Retrieved November 4, 2015.
  29. ^ "Quartz maps a future for its interactive charts with Atla". Nieman Lab. June 2015. Archived from the original on July 3, 2018. Retrieved May 28, 2018.
  30. ^ Smith, Ben (December 9, 2024). "Panic in public radio". Semafor. Retrieved December 13, 2024.
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