A eulogy for FiveThirtyEight 

I did something this week that I never thought I would do: I removed FiveThirtyEight.com as a bookmarked page on Chrome. This may seem like nothing, as people rearrange their bookmarks all the time. But this was no ordinary occasion. The website that inspired my love for politics was dead and nothing was going to bring it back to its former glory. 

Founded by Nate Silver in 2008, FiveThirtyEight wasn’t a typical news website. Silver placed a heavy emphasis on data-driven analysis, academic research and original reporting. He wanted to focus on the numbers of politics to break down the complexity of important issues and provide in-depth analysis of elections. For the past 15 years, he was able to successfully do so. FiveThirtyEight became known for its interactive, in-depth election predictions. The presidential election predictions got the most attention, and justifiably so for the analysis and wonderful graphics. But FiveThirtyEight went above and beyond by providing predictions for every congressional race and governorship as well. The site offered predictions for all 435 seats in the U.S. House, even uncontested races with only one major candidate. For each prediction, they simulated the race 40,000 times and would show a sample of 100 uniquely different outcomes for how the election could go. By pursuing this data-driven model instead of the usual generic ratings used by prominent pundits like Sabato’s Crystal Ball and The Cook Political Report, they accounted for multiple scenarios and established a unique approach that no other website even came close to in terms of vision and depth.  

In addition to its election predictions, FiveThirtyEight also featured political analysis by a team of writers and analysts who were able to explain data and current events without jargon so that the average reader could understand. The site also featured sports predictions for the NFL, NHL, NBA, MLB and the Premier League. Similar to their election predictions, their sports predictions also emphasized data in outcomes and used various statistical analysis. It made it easy to analyze who would be the serious title contenders in each league and how bad my beloved New York Mets performed this year. 

But as the great Robert Frost once wrote, nothing gold can stay. As a result of the mass layoffs by the Walt Disney Company in April, FiveThirtyEight became a target to cut costs by their parent company, ABC News. Soon after news of the layoffs broke, Silver announced that he would be leaving the company at the end of his contract. In spite of this, FiveThirtyEight continued operations as usual for the most part over the next five months. The only notable change was the elimination of their sports forecasts, which spared me from seeing the Atlanta Braves’ ever-increasing title odds. 

Everything changed on Sept. 18. ABC News officially rebranded the site as “538” and archived the old website. It’s not even its own website anymore: it’s a generic corporate page on ABC News’ website. While the page still has some interactives showing polls and new articles, the nerdy charisma of the old website is replaced by a shiny, cold and soulless page. The site says that they will be adding new interactive features soon, but I highly doubt that they will even come close to what Silver built for the old site. 

As a writer and political junkie, I’m deeply saddened by the corporatization of FiveThirtyEight. I can say without hyperbole that this website got me into politics. After my AP World History teacher showed me the site during a discussion about the Iowa caucuses in February 2020, I became infatuated with it. While I was stuck at home in 2020, I would begin every morning by going to FiveThirtyEight to look at new polling data for the presidential election and read analysis by the likes of Galen Druke, Geoffrey Skelley and the great Nathaniel Rakich. For someone who had little knowledge of politics, their data-driven explanations piqued my interest and kept me captivated. Looking back, the subtle wit and snark present in their articles may have been what has inspired the snark-laden style of this column. FiveThirtyEight quickly became my favorite news and analysis website and inspired me to start writing about politics myself. 

While there are plenty of other news and political analysis websites out there that I read, nothing comes close to my love of FiveThirtyEight. Now that the site that did so much for me is a corporate shell of itself, I will always be grateful for the incredible vision of Nate Silver and the wonderful writers at FiveThirtyEight who inspired my love of politics. Thank you for making me who I am today.