BuzzFeed hires WSJ data reporter Singer-Vine

Ricard Bilton of Digiday reports that BuzzFeed has hired  hired Wall Street Journal data reporter and programmer Jeremy Singer-Vine, who helped produce the Journal’s data-heavy ‘What They Know’ digital privacy series and its investigation into nuclear processing and storage facilities.

Bilton reports, “His role at BuzzFeed will be to dig into similarly dense data sets to find the kinds of stories that would otherwise go untold.

“The hire is a piece of a trend, putting BuzzFeed in lockstep with publications like Vocativ and Ezra Klein’s ‘Project X,’ both of which are also playing up the importance of data journalism in their editorial.

“Since hiring editor-in-chief Ben Smith from Politico in late 2011, BuzzFeed has expanded its politics, technology, and foreign affairs teams to become a serious news organization of over 130 people. It’s also hired six investigative reporters, including Aram Roston, who won two Emmys for his work at NBC News.

“‘Since [BuzzFeed’s] been around for seven years and doing journalism for two, people’s perceptions lag behind reality. There are still people not aware of the full depth of our journalistic enterprise,’ said Mark Schoofs, head of BuzzFeed’s investigative unit. ‘But their numbers are dwindling every day.'”

Read more here.