MSN is laying off digital journalists and replacing them with an algorithm to determine what news stories you can read on its site.

Vice Media is laying off more than 100 employees by making deep cuts to its digital group.

Layoffs of journalists are – sadly -- scarcely surprising in the COVID-19 era.

Yet, all three of these incidents continue a devastatingly stupid trend in which media organizations try to solve their immediate problems and existing infrastructure by destroying their best chance at a successful future in digital.

The world is no longer “going digital.” It has “gone digital.” In journalism, The New York Times and The Washington Post have been leading the way for several years now in showing digital subscriptions are the only way to make up for declining ad revenue that shows no sign of ever coming back.

In Canada, The Globe and Mail is emphasizing digital subscriptions as a way to counter falling ad revenue. But it hollowed out its digital operations several years ago. Where once there were dozens of journalists working only on digital products – video, social media, editorial enhancement of articles, writing, editing and posting breaking news and management of its Home Page – there are now less than a handful of staff on a daily basis. Instead, there is now a deeply entrenched algorithm which controls 95% of the content displayed. That algorithm places content based on what it believes will attract or retain subscribers – NOT based on the news value or timeliness of the articles, or even what is the most widely read content on the site.

AI and algorithms that control what we see are ubiquitous. Think of Facebook alone.

The theory behind it is simple as mc.ai described in a recent post titled “10 Artificial Intelligence Trends in 2020:”

Valuable customized content creates relevant and authentic user engagement at every level of the customer journey. This is where artificial intelligence provides all the much-needed help.

AI uses large amounts of data gathered by multiple sources to define patterns in customers' behavior. By using interaction history, it can even create a specific profile for every customer, essential for delivering a high level of personalization in user engagement.

While that may have uses for what we see on Facebook, it is the antithesis of what good journalism used to be – and should be still.

Journalism sites should be presenting the widest range of content, weighed by human beings in terms of news value and timeliness. AI reduces news sites to Facebook's level.

The argument most media owners make for cutting digital services is that they are not “core” to the company's journalism. You have to (a) be over the age of 50 and/or (b) have your head in the sand to fail to understand how stupid that is in the long term.

Their best hope of attracting and retaining new subscribers is in enhancing, not ending, digital services.

A note to staff at Global reads in part that the layoffs and the elimination of lifestyle, entertainment and social media teams “marks a strategic shift away from the non-news genre toward our core mission of providing breaking news and fact-based journalism. Our focus will emphasize video on our owned-and-operated platforms, rather than social media feeds that have lesser benefit to Global News.”

Meanwhile, as this article notes, Microsoft is laying off dozens of journalists and editorial workers, replacing them with artificial intelligence to pick news and content that's presented on MSN.com, inside Microsoft's Edge browser, and in the company's various Microsoft News apps. Many of the affected workers are part of Microsoft's SANE (search, ads, News, Edge) division, and are contracted as human editors to help pick stories.

Vice is laying off about 155 people worldwide, with its digital teams disproportionately affected by the layoffs.

As Vice Media Group CEO Mary Dubuc argued in a memo to staff: “Currently, the company's digital organization accounts for 50% of headcount costs, but only brings in about 21% of our revenue. Looking at our business holistically, this imbalance needed to be addressed for the long-term health of our company.”

Those same arguments were made years ago at The New York Times and The Washington Post. But they chose the opposite approach. Their investment in digital has put both of those media companies in a highly profitable situation.

The emphasis on digital, with constantly updated content — written, edited and evaluated for the most part by digital journalists — has led to vastly increased subscriptions.

It's mind-boggling, and a great pity, that so many other media owners believe only in cutting off their noses to spite their faces.

Jim Sheppard is the owner of Conquest Communications Canada. He is former senior manager at The Globe and Mail, The Washington Post and ABCNEWS.com. The earlier articles in this series on digital journalism can be read here.