Jon Steinberg: Columbia University Keynote

In this video, former COO and President of Buzzfeed, Jon Steinberg, delivers a commencement speech for Columbia University in 2016. He shares how when he was in 3rd grade him and his family moved from New Jersey to New York and the transition was not easy. He was terrible at sports and kids picked on him. Steinberg quickly fell in love with tech and computers, and when his parents gifted him his first computer, it was truly a transformative moment in his life.

Jon Steinberg is the former COO and president of Buzzfeed, the former CEO of Daily Mail North America, and currently the founder and CEO of Cheddar, a video-based media company launched in 2016 that caters to millennials. Fast Company named Cheddar one of “The World’s Most Innovative Companies” in spring 2017, around the same time the booming video brand received a valuation of $85 million. Having led or worked with many of the major brands shaping millennial content consumption, Steinberg is the content and trends expert to turn to when it comes to understanding the next generation of consumers. Steinberg discusses the challenges facing modern businesses, what it takes to retain a competitive edge, how to spot trends before they happen, and how to grow exponentially by accessing the millennial consumer. Now in the early stages of developing Cheddar, Steinberg is able to relate to audiences that are both established in and new to the digital space.