LGBT publisher Gay Star News to close
LGBT publisher Gay Star News has closed citing financial difficulties. (Screenshot/GSN)
Online LGBT+ media group Gay Star News is reportedly going to cease trading tomorrow (July 30).
The company is entering insolvency after seven years’ trading, which will result in around 20 people losing their jobs, according to the BBC’s LGBT+ correspondent Ben Hunte.
BREAKING: LGBT media group Gay Star News (@gaystarnews) will cease trading tomorrow.
It is entering insolvency resulting in ~20 job losses. Staff were reportedly told 48hrs before pay day via meetings.
— Ben Hunte (@BenInLDN) July 29, 2019
Hunte also said that staff were informed of GSN’s closure via meetings before pay day.
The news was received with sadness on Twitter by others in the LGBT+ publishing industry.
Darren Styles, owner of gay magazine Attitude, tweeted, “That is a great shame, LGBTQ media is a small enough place as it is. Attitude has a couple of digital vacancies coming if anyone wants to reach out to me. Can save some jobs at least.”
PinkNews CEO Benjamin Cohen tweeted, “Sorry to read this – good luck to staff for the future.”
History of Gay Star News
GSN launched in January 2012, after raising money from angel investors.
On the site’s first day live, Stephen Fry tweeted a GSN article, which the founders credited with helping traffic.
By 2015, GSN reported that the site was seeing five million unique users per month, and was listed in the top five LGBT+ news sites worldwide.
Directors Tris Reid-Smith and Scott Nunn, each with a decade of experience in LGBT+ at that time, said when they launched that GSN was the first global 24/7 LGBT+ news website.
In a GSN article, they wrote, “The gap in the market was most glaring with global reporting, particularly online. Gay, bi and trans people worldwide are connecting more than ever, but there was no shared place they could go for quality news, information and entertainment.”
GSN, which has 140,000 followers on Twitter, has not publicly confirmed the news.
According to Companies House, Gay Star News Ltd is still an active company with the next accounts due to be filed at the end of September 2019.
