Content Consumed: BuzzFeed News, Class of 07, and AI music

Hey! I am tired. Very tired. But! This weekend will surely be rejuvenating and I will wake up on Monday with a pep in my step.

In today’s edition of Content Consumed, we’re chitchatting about…
🪦 Thoughts on the fall of BuzzFeed News
🇦🇺 Review: Season 1 of Class of ‘07
🧨 What to do about AI music

Farewell to BuzzFeed News

It’s over: BuzzFeed News is shutting down after over a decade of prominence as a fantastic, Pulitzer Prize-winning news organization with a talented team of reporters. It’s a huge loss for investigative reporting.

Please note: this is not me praising BuzzFeed as a whole, but specifically their reporting and journalism branch. It was, and could’ve continued to be, an actual challenger to longtime media outlets. But it wasn’t making money. If you want to read CEO Jonah Peretti’s entire memo, here it is.

Some of the most important stories from BuzzFeed News over the years include:

• Their Pulitzer-winning report on the infrastructure built by the Chinese government for the mass detention of Muslims
• An exposé on Trump’s order to Michael Cohen to lie about the Moscow Trump Tower
• Breaking the first Kevin Spacey allegation
• Investigating the Breitbart-Milo Yiannopoulos-white supremacy connection in the wake of Charlottesville

One person who I’ve been following closely in the aftermath of BuzzFeed News’ failure is Scaachi Koul. She’s had controversy in the past but has been a prominent part of the BuzzFeed team for nearly a decade. (Also, I liked her book.) It feels like she’s not going to hold back. Here’s her full Twitter feed if you’re interested in some insider info.

Review: Class of ‘07

I started Class of ’07 last week and finished it this week! And I loved it.

Warning: it gets dark. What else do you expect from a bunch of depressed 28-year-old girls stuck on an island with plenty of high school trauma to contend with?

I almost don’t want to say too much, because the best part of this show is that you have no idea what’s going to happen next or what anyone is going to do. The second best part is the dialogue: witty, meaningful, and explorative. How would you handle being stuck on a tiny island in an apocalyptic situation with your best frenemy from 9th grade? You’d probably be a little snarky.

I wanted to see if people online loved it as much as I did, and I liked this one bit from The Guardian, about one main character named Saskia:

[She plays] the role of school-bully-turned-tyrannical-leader who demands everyone use electricity generators to straighten their hair each morning; the apocalypse version of making your bed when working from home (“It sets a standard.”)

It’s that kind of thing that makes this show so hilarious and bewildering: doing your hair in the apocalypse?! Might as well. The Aussie humor cracks me up too. Just a great show all around, from the potential cannibalism to the girlie heart-to-hearts.

What do we do about AI music?

Yesterday, I listened to Kanye West singing “Boy’s a liar Pt. 2”.

Or did I?

I didn’t, but it sure sounded like him. Because someone—sorry, someTHING—created it. They (an AI system)created audio and matching video that made it seem like Kanye performed the Ice Spice / PinkPantheress hit at a concert.

What do we do about AI music, like a fake Drake-the Weeknd collab called “Heart On My Sleeve” that went viral this week?

The New York Times reports that Universal Music Group, the largest of the major labels and home to both Drake and the Weeknd, had already flagged such content to its streaming partners this month, citing intellectual property concerns.

I don’t have the answers and neither do groups like Universal—yet. Dive into the debate with this Vice article or this Verge article if you want. It’s interesting.

And that’s it for today! See you Monday for a Succession recap.

Love ya,
Casey

👉🏼 Check out this week’s Succession recap and review over here.

👉🏼 Read the most recent Content Consumed over here.

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👉🏼 Find out what I’m reading at my Goodreads profile.