BuzzFeed's 2014 tweet on learning to code hasn't aged well

As Twitchy reported earlier Thursday, BuzzFeed News is shutting down, beginning with layoffs of about 15 percent of the staff. Under Twitter 1.0, you could be suspended for telling one of the laid-off journalists to learn to code — journalists are a protected class, after all. We’ve since moved on to telling them to learn to build solar panels — lots of good-paying jobs have been promised — but this 2014 tweet by BuzzFeed has come back to haunt them.

Should You Learn To Code? http://t.co/IMzUAr3v7s

— BuzzFeed (@BuzzFeed) February 10, 2014

What makes this classic is it’s not even a news article, but a quiz: You pick the boxes that best describe you, and BuzzFeed looks up to see if there’s been an article written telling you to learn to code. There are 24 options, ranging from “a cat” to “homeless,” but strangely no option for “coal miner.” Or “journalist.”

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— Mostly Peaceful Memes (@MostlyPeacefull) April 20, 2023

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— Jackie (@jackie1321_67) April 20, 2023

Seems like a good time to learn to code.

— Beat Rev (@Beat_Rev) April 20, 2023

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— Curtis Houck (@CurtisHouck) April 20, 2023

Congratulations, you just played yourself.

— Gen-X Wolf™ (@GenXWolf) April 20, 2023

This aged like milk on the porch in July in Atlanta.

— Reborkulous Flufferdoodle (@reborkulous) April 20, 2023

Have you thought about a career doing factory work?

— PumpkinPie3 (@pie3_pumpkin) April 20, 2023

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— Mark (@Funkatr0n) April 20, 2023

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— Will Austin (@_Sir_Willie) April 20, 2023

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— DJ Bryce 🇺🇸🐶🐶🐱🐱 (@DJBryce3) April 20, 2023

Options…

– Code
– Solar panels
– Coal

— ♠️ “Ummm…Phrasing!” ♠️ (@count_mockula) April 20, 2023

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— Ricky Spanish (@_Ricky_Spanishh) April 20, 2023

😂😂 pic.twitter.com/WV8kmvLmvJ

— Marie  (@MrsBisMe) April 20, 2023

We’re honestly not sure if BuzzFeed is doing away with the stupid quizzes … they say they’re shutting down BuzzFeed News. Are the listicles going to continue? We’re not sure what we’d do without those.

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Related:

Here is the 'cruel and psychotic and ridiculous' way BuzzFeed let HuffPost staffers know if they were laid off https://t.co/46yumuOeOF

— Twitchy Team (@TwitchyTeam) March 9, 2021