[2] The site, conceived as the Internet's "hometown newspaper",[3] focuses on topics such as streaming entertainment, geek culture, memes, gadgets and social issues, such as LGBT, gender and race.

[5] It raised a $10 million private investment to add staff, produce digital content and develop its internal creative agency in 2015, ramping up its output to 50–70 stories a day.

[7] In 2014, it purchased The Kernel, a competing website, and turned it into a weekly Sunday edition featuring long-form editorial built around a single theme.

[9] It also has collaborated on video projects with partners including HLN, on a co-branded series called Next Sex;[10] the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, for which it produced a public service announcement encouraging vaccination featuring Sesame Street character Elmo and former Surgeon General Vivek Murthy;[11] and television cooking personality Alton Brown, whose review of kitchen gadgets garnered many millions of views on YouTube.

[12][13] In January 2016, the site launched VIP Voices, a collection of op-eds from high-profile contributors on Internet issues in public discourse.

Contributors include Mayor Bill de Blasio, Representative Ted Lieu, and Senator Mike Lee.