BuzzFeed Just Can't Get It Right

The New York Times, The Washington Post, Politico and other news organizations all knew about the now-infamous document for months, but chose not to publish it. The reason? They couldn’t verify any of the details. Yet BuzzFeed went ahead and posted the dossier anyway.

BuzzFeed’s decision to post the document—while simultaneously acknowledging it couldn’t prove anything in it—is highly questionable and yet another hit on the company’s longing to be seen as a serious news outlet.

BuzzFeed editor in chief Ben Smith seemed to know publishing the dossier was a bad idea, so he tweeted his “internal” note to staffers explaining the move.