• by Gavin O'Malley , Staff Writer @mp_gavin, May 19, 2014

Among other directives, The New York Times’ internal “innovation” memo (the one that leaked last week) suggested that the paper be more like Buzzfeed. A good place to start may be the paper’s homepage, according to Eric Harris, EVP of Business Operations at Buzzfeed. Do what exactly? As we say in New York, “Fogetaboutit!” Why? Homepages -- from design to story order -- are not nearly as important as they once were, Harris told attendees of the OMMA Native conference on Monday. Today’s socially-connected consumer gets most of his or her content through recommendations on Facebook, Twitter, and other popular platforms, he said. “Most of our traffic is through social discovery." To be clear, the homepage matters to Buzzfeed, but it shouldn't be taken too seriously, Harris added. There’s no reason, say, why serious news scoops can’t live next to “cat content” and light surveys. “If [readers] don’t care about something [whether it’s the serious news or cat videos], they’ll just ignore it,” he said.