I actually find it disheartening that The Atlantic gives BuzzFeed such uncritical praise. Native advertising is a form of deception; it's called 'native' as it is supposed to pass for non-advertising content. Buzzfeed can be forgiven for the transgression to the extent that they aren't practicing journalism. However, when you are being paid to craft content which you try to sell as a news item, you are not a journalist, you are a propagandist.

BuzzFeed has returned to the journalistic ideal that many—including myself–thought was lost with the demise of newspapers’ old geographic monopolies: true journalistic independence. Just as journalists of old didn’t need to worry about making money, just writing stories that they thought important, BuzzFeed’s writers simply need to write stories that people find important enough to share; the learning that results is how they make money ... The incentives are perfectly aligned.

TBH that last sentence almost sounds Orwellian to me. Buzzfeed's writers finding out how to write stories in a manner than will induce people to share them is akin to true journalistic independence?

There is no doubt that BuzzFeed excels at what they do. But it is just one type of media, and it can be differentiated by its approach.