It’s no secret that AOL is aggressively building out its content strategy. Today at TechCrunch Disrupt, AOL CEO Tim Armstrong says that the company now employs 4,000 journalists, 3,500 of which are part-time or freelance. As of last October, the company employed roughly 3,000 journalists.
That’s pretty decent growth in a matter of six months. Of course, AOL has launched a number of content initiatives, including buying hyperlocal news site Patch and launching content machine Seed.com. Armstrong says that AOL is really “taking local to a local level.” Patch is now in 53 markets in 5 states, including Connecticut and California. And it’s been reported that AOL will pour $50 million into Patch this year and plans to roll out the model to “hundreds” of communities in the future.
We know that Armstrong is not only bullish on niche content but is also looking for AOL to become a content powerhouse. But Armstrong said today that he’s not interested on creating a “content farm.” He believes the future of AOL’s content strategy is in quality news. Hyper local is clearly a part of this strategy,