Twilio cofounder buys The Onion

The former CEO of web comms tools provider Twilio has bought The Onion, the US satirical magazine that saw its popularity boom in the early days of the web.

Jeff Lawson, who cofounded Twilio in 2008, declared on Twitter that he had bought the "national treasure" to save it from being "stifled" by poor commercial practices.

"Yes, I bought The Onion," he announced late last week. "The Onion is an institution, a national treasure, and we need it. But its success is based on something different than most media companies. The Onion has been stifled, along with most of the Internet, by byzantine cookie dialogs, paywalls, bizarro belly fat ads, and clickbait," he said.

He promised to introduce products and explore new media over time. In the meantime, he asked "everybody to pitch in $1," echoing an announcement made on The Onion site last week.

"If you care about The ...