No Joke: The Onion Faces Layoffs by Univision, Says Report

I worked at The Onion a few years ago. The content teams there were some of the most dedicated and passionate professionals I’ve had the pleasure of working with in my career.

This is an upsetting story. Despite so much upheaval in print and publishing at large, and the unfortunate circumstance that reality has become as absurd as the headlines of The Onion a decade ago, everyone there comes in every day ready to give it all they’ve got. It honestly is a remarkable staff and sometimes I really miss it there.

Half a decade ago, The Onion reached the pinnacle of satire with their Onion News Network. What made it different was the presence of a really solid fourth wall. Not once is there a wink at the camera or any indication that the actors are "in on it".

All the satire I've seen in more recent years has had people talking in an exaggerated manner about absurd events. They don't talk like real people.

My Favorite ONN videos

https://youtu.be/D04wb7P_v-4

https://youtu.be/XUT8ec24anM

https://youtu.be/kOHABYhZ7a8

https://youtu.be/84phU8of02U

https://youtu.be/EDWo6m5hbG4

Two of my favourites:

Apple Introduces Revolutionary New Laptop With No Keyboard - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9BnLbv6QYcA

Anonymous Hero Donates Hospital 200 Human Kidneys - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=D_5nLxZVoPo

That's sad. Especially these days— seems like satire is as important as ever.

For fans of the Onion, there's a rising Canadian counterpart. They started off kind of slowly, but have started to come into their own— especially with Ontario's recent election. They sometimes cover American events as well.

https://www.thebeaverton.com

ex:

https://www.thebeaverton.com/2018/07/ford-vows-to-treat-asyl...

https://www.thebeaverton.com/2018/06/andrea-horwath-looking-...

Worth linking to the original report: https://www.thedailybeast.com/the-onion-clickhole-av-club-br...

If nothing else, for its closing anecdote:

> One former Univision executive joked to The Daily Beast that UCI seemingly does not differentiate between the Onion Inc. sites, and is “not even sure what Clickhole is.”

> When asked during an all-hands meeting with staffers from one site earlier this year what his favorite article was on an Onion Inc. site, Univision’s head of digital Sameer Deen would not answer.

It's been pretty obvious for a while that The Onion is struggling. I love a lot of their material, but lately a lot of their writing about others they see as threats to their ad-supported business model has been far less funny than mean spirited. Almost like an Onion headline.

"Humor site tries to save business by giving up on humor"

That's too bad, the onion is still very good with political satire, though it doesn't give you a good one daily unless Washington is particularly poor that week.

A recent good one: https://local.theonion.com/man-offended-by-rude-female-cowor...

For me comedy comes from good timing and the unexpected. I've tried to read the Onion but never found it funny because it's formula of satire is expected from the beginning. Sure, they have some witty observations and funny titles, but the articles read like an SNL skit that goes on too long.

The written word probably doesn't help too much either. Comedians frequently use pauses and pace to accentuate the humor and without it, in my mind reading the Onion sounds like poor comedic timing.

I think there was a reason political satire was traditionally effective in cartoon or stand up comedy format.

I love the onion. It's slowly become the only reason I use Facebook anymore.

I first found about The Onion in 1991 when I was a summer intern at Intel in Folsom, California. A fellow intern from UW Madison told me about it. I subscribed to the paper version: this was before it was on the internet. It was $28 a year.

Two years later, they went to a color version and raised the price to about $45 a year, if I recall correctly. I said "screw it" and didn't renew my subscription.

It was more of an "underground" thing at the time. I enjoyed it again a few years later when it became an internet site.

curious, does this affect AV Club, which I believe was a shoot-off from The Onion?

I really love AV Club's content, hope it doesn't go away.

Of course, I also love The Onion, it's an institution.

The Onion is long in the tooth, but Clickhole at times manages to pull off the perfect surrealist humor. Although at a glance, even they seem to have declined a bit.

I wish The Onion were still funny; can't really recall visiting them in the past 3 years because of some funny video they were famous for.

I really love the Onion, but I think I have laughed much more at The Hard Times these past two years. I’m not sure what that means, but I hope some of the Onion guys maybe make it over there.

Hard to stay relevant when half of their joke headlines could be real these days. (eg. "President Threatens Stock Market")

Herbert Kornfeld would have found the money to avoid this fate.

TBH, I think BabylonBee has been putting out better content for quite some time. Fewer sacred cows, harder punches thrown.