A focus on higher profits next quarter. Lower costs for Outside Inc. Free money to place sponsored articles. Better SEO to drive more casual traffic. The ‘community’ at CT exists only to drive revenue for their parent company.
Well of course those are the ostensible reasons. But the “community” – and by that I mean what had been built between the website and all the contributors, comments on articles, forum, and slack – were what we were paying for. I’m pretty confident that at least at one time that business model was successful or it wouldn’t have ever been sold.
Given the costs they’ve incurred to shut down what existed and relaunch it, all the cancellations, and the refunds they’ve issued in acknowledgement that they were no longer delivering what we had paid for, I’m confident it will take a lot more than “next quarter” for CT to be profitable.
Perhaps Outside can eventually make the new CT profitable and the MBAs will justify their salaries. So be it. As for me, I’m taking my money and giving it to Escape Collective, not Outside.