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"BuzzFeed's chief operating officer and president Jon Steinberg has stepped down from his role at the viral content site.\nHe will remain with BuzzFeed as an adviser for the next six months. Steinberg will join investment group Lerer Ventures also in the role of adviser, according to a memo from a spokesperson at BuzzFeed. The full memo is below.\nSee also: Disney Wanted to Buy BuzzFeed, Report Says\nKen Lerer, the managing director of Lerer Ventures, is chairman of BuzzFeed and the cofounder of The Huffington Post.\nSteinberg joined BuzzFeed as the company's 15th employee and spent four years helping to build out the site's social advertising offerings.\n\"We're so thankful for Jon's leadership that helped get us here. He will always be family to us. We are growing and continuing our mission of building a media company that is anchored around social, and a business that is transforming the advertising industry,\" Steinberg and BuzzFeed CEO Jonah Peretti wrote in the memo.\nBuzzFeed traffic has risen sharply during Steinberg's time at the company. The site claimed in December to have reached 130 million monthly unique visitors.\n\nImage:  QuantcastThe growth of BuzzFeed has attracted the interest of major investors including Hearst Ventures. The site had recently been in talks for a sale to Disney with an asking price of $1 billion.\nThe memo:\n\nTeam,\nJon and I want to share some important news with you. Jon has decided after four years of being President and COO of BuzzFeed, it's time for him to move on to new ventures and challenges and will be moving into an advisor role at BuzzFeed. As you know, Jon was instrumental in building BuzzFeed into the great company we are today; joining as the 15th employee in a tiny SoHo office, defining and growing our innovative social content advertising products, helping grow the company to 500 employees all over the world and building a strong, profitable operation. After four spectacular years at BuzzFeed, Jon has decided it's time to move on but we will miss him a huge amount. I thought you would be interested to know that Jon will joining Lerer Ventures as an advisor so he will very much remain part of the family. He will also be pursuing new challenges in the web and media space.\nWe will miss having him in the office every day, though we're delighted he will be an advisor to BuzzFeed transitioning his work with all of you.\nBoth of us believe we have all built something special here, and the company is in spectacular shape and primed for even greater things in the future. \nWe're so thankful for Jon's leadership that helped get us here. He will always be family to us. We are growing and continuing our mission of building a media company that is anchored around social, and a business that is transforming the advertising industry.\nWe think the best days are ahead for BuzzFeed. Thank you all for your hard work and we're excited about pressing forward to continue to do huge things! Jon will say his own good-byes to you over the next few weeks but even after that he will be available to us.\nOnward,Jonah and Jon\n\nHave something to add to this story? Share it in the comments."^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://mashable.com/2014/05/12/buzzfeed-coo-steps-down/>