33 employees were let go by Citizen, the company reported. Since its release, Citizen has received over 14 million downloads and has generated around $30.3 million in consumer spending, according to data from the app analytics company SensorTower.
In addition to Nextdoor, Citizen has come under fire for fostering a culture of monitoring that makes it easy to harass and profile people based on their race. But the CEO of the business provided the most extreme illustration of these risks. While live-streaming on the Citizen app in 2021, Andrew Frame offered Citizen users $30,000 to find a suspected arsonist.
On a live feed, he posted a picture of the suspect that received 800,000 views, but it turned out that he had the wrong person. According to a report, Frame viewed this as a sophisticated marketing opportunity for the app’s streaming function.
Citizen’s app received an average monthly spend of $1.4 million in 2022, which is probably insufficient to generate a profit for the business. The citizen did not provide a rationale for the layoffs, although releasing 33 workers would give the business a little more breathing room.
