‘Entertainment Tonight’ to Lay Off 17 Online Staffers as Website Switches to Video-Heavy Focus (EXCLUSIVE)

“Entertainment Tonight” is letting go of a substantial portion of its online editorial team, Variety has learned. As part of a shift to a mostly video, around 17 staffers are expected to be impacted by the layoffs, which will take effect in September as the long-running syndicated entertainment news strip starts its new season.

“’ET’ has long been a video first business, and we are doubling down on that success as we enter our 44^th season this fall,” a spokesperson told Variety in a statement. “We are transforming ETonline.com to deliver more breaking news video and original interviews and streamlining our news gathering process to better reach our audiences across ET’s multiple platforms.”

Insiders stressed that this isn’t a sign that ETonline.com is shutting down, and no existing content will be removed from the website. But the news does come soon after parent Paramount Global shut down active posting and eliminated archives on its MTV and Comedy Central websites (among others).

The layoffs, which mostly impact digital and not the linear “Entertainment Tonight” TV show, won’t take effect until September 7, which means current Season 43 staffing remains unchanged. For next season, new roles are expected to be added, and employees who have been let go by this wave of layoffs will be eligible to apply for any new roles.

The layoffs come a year after “Entertainment Tonight” also cut less than 10% staff in 2023 layoffs. In those cuts, which also impacted a dozen or so employees, “Entertainment Tonight” made those changes in light of its downsizing of digital programming.

On its boilerplate, “ET” touts itself as “the #1 for entertainment news video on Facebook and YouTube” and says that ETonline.com averages 26 million monthly unique visits.

“Entertainment Tonight,” which is produced and distributed by CBS Media Ventures, is exec produced by Erin Johnson, with Whitney Wallace and Leslie Kawaguchi as co-executive producers.