Video: WTF is TLDR?

For the past six weeks, Digiday has experimented with a new way for people to get our content.

There’s the regular version of stories, typically clocking in at 500-800 words, and then there’s the 70-to 80-word TLDR version.

The idea is that in a media world rapidly shifting to mobile devices, news content hasn’t done enough to change to fit new behavior patterns. This was a topic that came up in a recent podcast we recorded with Kevin Delaney, president and editor-in-chief of Quartz, who decried the tyranny of the 800-word article, a relic from newspapers.

In order to demystify TLDR — it stands for “too long; didn’t read” — we asked Hannah Yi, our new video producer, to find out if the denizens of New York knew what TLDR stands for. Here’s what we learned.

WTF is TLDR? from Digiday on Vimeo.

More in Media

How Shira Lazar grew social account ‘What’s Trending’ to seven figures in revenue

Shira Lazar saw that creator-led media brands were the future 15 years ago, and now the entire industry has caught on.

Condé Nast, Hearst among 300 media execs to push federal ‘bad bots’ bill on AI scraping

More than 300 publishing execs are heading to Washington, D.C to push Congress to crack down on AI bots that scrape their content without permission.

Digiday Publishing Summit September 2026 Recap: How publishers are rebuilding for the post-search era

Execs at DPS described how they’re preparing for a post-search era by prioritizing direct audiences, diversified revenue and AI strategies.