Controversial Washington Post technology columnist Taylor Lorenz quit the left-leaning paper on Tuesday, weeks after causing an uproar by calling President Biden a “war criminal” on her Instagram account.
Lorenz, who had not posted anything on the Jeff Bezos-owned broadsheet since August 7, said he was leaving to launch his own newsletter on the Substack platform. According to The Hollywood Reporter.
Her newsletter, titled “User Magazine,” “covers technology from the user side,” she told the media.
“What matters is who has power on the internet and how that power is exercised,” she says.
“I just wanted to get out of legacy media,” said Lorenz, who has been at the center of controversy during a checkered career that included stints at the New York Times and the Daily Beast.
“I'm finding it really, really difficult to do the kind of reporting that I want to do on the internet as a primary job within such an old institution,” she told THR.
The Washington Post has revealed that New York Post reporter John Levin published on his X account an eyebrow-raising Instagram photo that he uploaded while attending a White House event featuring Biden. In response, the company announced that it had begun an investigation into Mr. Lorenz.
Lorenz took a selfie with Biden in the background and wrote the caption “war criminal” under the photo.
She shares photos with selected friends on Instagram, where she has a total of 143,000 followers.
Lorenz claimed that the photo was not intended for public viewing and had been digitally altered, writing: “You will be fooled by someone's stupid editing.” Ta.
She told the Washington Post editor that the photo was a fabrication.
but Confirmed by National Public Radio The authenticity of the photo supports Levine's X post.
She deleted the post an hour after it was shared by friends on Instagram.
The Washington Post did not reveal the results of its investigation.
On Tuesday, a spokesperson said: “We are grateful for the work Taylor has produced at The Washington Post. We wish her all the best as she leaves to pursue a career in independent journalism.” Masu.”
Lorenz, who joined the paper in 2022, said he is looking forward to building “a truly interactive relationship with our readers.”
“Of course, I like to be very vocal online, and I think it's really hard to do all of this in the roles that I'm given in these traditional institutions,” she said. .
“Traditional institutions…were really struggling to cover the Internet in a meaningful way,” Lorenz said.
“I write about the attention economy, I write about the content creator industry, and I just want to have complete autonomy to write and do and say what I want and engage with readers and the public. I want to be a little bit more involved. People come to my job,” she said.
In 2022, Lorenz was widely criticized for unmasking her social media persona “Libs of TikTok.”
A few weeks earlier, Lorenz appeared on MSNBC and broke down in tears as she recalled how she faced “harassment” from critics online.
While working as a technology reporter for the Times, she was sued by a businessman who claimed he had defamed her for leaking nude images of one of her clients.
Lorenz also came under fire after accusing tech mogul Marc Andreessen of using derogatory language during a private conversation on the Clubhouse app. The accusation turned out to be false.
