Ben Smith quits Politico for BuzzFeed

“A move that is sure to surprise the political and journalistic classes.” — Brian Stelter, writing in the New York Times about Ben Smith quitting Politico for BuzzFeed. (“Mr. Smith will hire more than a dozen reporters right away,” reports Stelter.)

On his Politico blog, Smith writes that at BuzzFeed, “I’ll be trying to help build the first true social news organization.”

@gabrielsherman: Ben Smith is the most entrepreneurial reporter I know. When we worked together at the NY Observer in ’04, he recognized blogging was future