Games Journalism General

[Tanner Glass]

I was kind of amazed the general Gawker "shit on the entire world" mentality somehow survived the obliteration of the Gawker corporate umbrella and none of these clowns figured out the reality distortion field wasn't protecting them any more, but apparently reality finally caught up with them.

Their new corporate purchasers apparently hadn't brought the axe down at first because they were trying to figure out what to do with these subpar assets they bought at fire sale prices. So what did these morons do? They established they are, in fact, as utterly worthless as they looked.

Why would they stop with the attitude? Even as Gawker died, Kotaku (and Deadspin) lived on - so clearly this meant that they were better than the wreckage they left behind. If anything it made them even bolder.

Also, with regards to not having the axe brought down, Univision bought them and never figured out what to do and then someone else bought those assets from Univision in 2019 - Kotaku/Deadspin/everyone had gotten another second chance for free, because the new company was a fresh break away from the old one and they still blew it.

Univision selling the Gawker assets should have been a huge warning for everyone who worked there, though. They bought the Gawker assets in liquidation/a fire sale for ~$135,000,000 only to sell them years later for ~$50,000,000 (allegedly) - essentially meaning that Univision essentially paid $85,000,000 to get Kotaku off of their hands. If your former owner is willing to take a $85,000,000 hit to get rid of you - chances are you aren't making money and the new company doesn't think very highly of you.

 

[Water-T]

That shit was just amazing. It's not like even the boomeriest of boomer management don't know that these obnoxious, shitty autoplay ads piss people off, so what does it mean if they take such ads anyway? It means your shithole outlet isn't producing income and management is desperately trying to squeeze some income out of you useless fuckers.

So what do they do? They throw a tantrum and start flinging shit, and the shit starts hitting the entire corporate structure. The result is obvious to anyone who isn't a moron, but these insulated little crybabies have lived in their own shitty little world for so long they couldn't see it coming. They're used to acting like spoiled brats, screeching about gamergate and other shit nobody cares about, and getting away with it all.

I was kind of amazed the general Gawker "shit on the entire world" mentality somehow survived the obliteration of the Gawker corporate umbrella and none of these clowns figured out the reality distortion field wasn't protecting them any more, but apparently reality finally caught up with them.

Their new corporate purchasers apparently hadn't brought the axe down at first because they were trying to figure out what to do with these subpar assets they bought at fire sale prices. So what did these morons do? They established they are, in fact, as utterly worthless as they looked.

CHOP CHOP.

It's so fucking delicious. It couldn't have happened to nicer people.

The tards working at Kotaku/Deadspin/etc basically were given free rein by Denton to spew whatever hot garbage they felt like, just as long as it brought attention and clicks. Any EIC with half a brain would have said, "Hold up - how about we NOT publish a sex tape of Hulk Hogan that was filmed without his consent? Or maybe it would be a bad idea to post images of hentai featuring 10 year Pokemon characters? While we are at it, listing the location of celebrities in real time might open us to huge liability suits?

I mean, what is the point of positioning yourself as a sports site when you talk about EVERYTHING ELSE BUT SPORTS? It would be like opening an issue of Architectural Digest and seeing articles about "Top Ten Death Cab For Cutie songs", "Hot sex tips to keep your man satisfied", and "Which show was better: Scandal or Gray's Anatomy?".

Kotaku was the worst offender of this "write whatever" attitude - especially when they had Patricia Hernandez on staff - because almost all her articles read like they were written by a horny 12 year old boy and often featured games made by close friends or fuckbuddies.

I'm immensely enjoying seeing all the salt and butthurt by Deadspin and their supporters. "When writing about sports, you're not just writing about sports!". No, dummies - you're writing about some guy who hit a ball with a stick and ran around some dirt. You're not exposing some vast conspiracy by a right-wing militia to overthrow America and turn it into Gilead, OK?. Funny how Sports Illustrated managed to write about sports for DECADES without making every article some deep-thunk piece about civil unrest in the Philippines or war crimes in the Middle East. Want to read about that shit? Go look at an issue of TIME, Newsweek, or USA Today.

All these hipster babies had free reign of the asylum and are now flinging their diapers because the new management said "Readership and revenue is so low that we have to plaster the site with ads just to make enough money to pay you clowns, and get back to focusing on sports/video games so we can gain back the audience you dickshits drove away".

After seeing how fast G/O Media got those "PLEASE HARASS OUR OWNERS BECAUSE OF THESE ADS" posts taken down, and how swiftly one of Deadspin's editors got booted for posting non-sports articles like a dumbass, you would think that these galaxy brains would realize that they are not valuable nor are they irreplaceable.

As @AnOminous pointed out, these shit-for-brains have been living under Denton's reality distortion field for so long, that they are SHOCKED that real, credible journalists can't behave like spoiled mongoloids and walk away unscathed. Oh, well. I'm sure they'll have plenty of time to reflect on that while waiting in the unemployment office.

 

[Duncan Hills Coffee]

Upper Echelon Gamers made a video nicely summarizing the shitshow.

 

[Keystone]

However, as we know, Kotaku staff is retarted and didn't take any of this into account and in the last month has tried very hard to make sure to get themselves some very bad publicity - primarily.

- Writing an article about Anime Porn (on a video game site) and having actual, porn pictures of anime characters who are aged 10 years old, uncensored and not behind any kind of age verification. The new owners probably didn't love the advertiser push back/bad press from this one.
- Complaining public about "behind the scenes" issues with advertisers (primiarly, the type of ads run). Instead of discussing this with management directly, or handling it in a smart way, having your staff direct the users to harass advertisers who almost certainly, instantly, complained to management and likely threatened to pull ads not just from Kotaku, but all Gawker/Univision sites.

It's one thing to not be profitable, it's another to fuck up revenue for the entire company. This likely made them priority #1 for Univision's leadership team and they clearly did not like what they say (reasonably so). I'd be curious if they junk the entire thing or if they try and find someone not retarted to run the site and bring the focus back to Video Games.

And wouldn't you know it, this was the exact reason they got the hammer of God brought down on their dumb heads. These faggy Bay Area hipsters cost their former employer one million dollars with their idiocy:

--Article Start--​

Farmers Insurance Pulls Million-Dollar Ad Campaign With G/O Media After Editorial Staff Raises Hell
The ads were axed after G/O Media staffers at Deadspin and other sites spoke out against irritating autoplay ads—yet another battle in the ongoing feud between execs and editorial.

Farmers Insurance Group pulled a seven-figure advertising deal with G/O Media this week amid increasingly public turmoil between the digital-media company’s management and editorial staff.

Earlier this week, several websites at G/O Media—which oversees former Gizmodo Media sites including Deadspin, Jezebel, and Lifehacker, among others—published a blog post criticizing the company’s new autoplay videos, which in some instances featured a Farmers Insurance ad.
“We, the writers, editors, and video producers of Deadspin, are as upset with the current state of our site’s user experience as you are,” the post read. The editorial team made clear they do not control “the ad experience,” and acknowledged that many readers had been critical of the way the ads appeared on the site.

When asked for comment by The Daily Beast, a G/O Media spokesperson said the company does not comment on advertising partnerships. According to the Wall Street Journal, the company’s ad-operations team did not believe the sites could deliver on the impressions promised to Farmers, and decided to autoplay the ads before videos after failing to hit the ad goals.

Multiple sources confirmed to The Daily Beast that following the editorial team’s public criticism of the ads, Farmers informed G/O that it would not continue with the campaign which, according to the Journal, was worth $1 million and required the media company to deliver nearly 43.5 million ad impressions through next year.
Management eventually decided to remove the critical posts, causing an even greater uproar among staff and readers.
“The GMG Union has been informed that posts across our websites asking for reader feedback on an autoplay ad campaign were taken down by management. We condemn this action in the strongest possible terms,” the company’s editorial union wrote Monday in a tweet.

Farmers’ advertising removal comes amid increasing friction between G/O staff—particularly at Deadspin—and their new executive managers.
G/O Media was formed earlier this year when private equity firm Great Hill Partners bought Gizmodo Media, the collection of former Gawker Media websites, from Univision.
In the months since the acquisition, new management has clashed with many editorial staffers over some of the sites’ editorial direction. Earlier this year, Deadspin’s former editor in chief left the site after G/O brass ordered her to halt publishing stories that did not have a sports angle.
And this week, the company’s CEO fired Deadspin’s deputy editor after the site refused to hew to the new “stick to sports” mandate.

--Article End--​

Farmers Insurance Pulls Million-Dollar Ad Campaign With G/O Media Aft…

archived 30 Oct 2019 19:01:17 UTC

archive.md

How precious

 

[Krokodil Overdose]

In the months since the acquisition, new management has clashed with many editorial staffers over some of the sites’ editorial direction. Earlier this year, Deadspin’s former editor in chief left the site after G/O brass ordered her to halt publishing stories that did not have a sports angle.
And this week, the company’s CEO fired Deadspin’s deputy editor after the site refused to hew to the new “stick to sports” mandate.

--Article End--​

Farmers Insurance Pulls Million-Dollar Ad Campaign With G/O Media Aft…

archived 30 Oct 2019 19:01:17 UTC

archive.md

How precious

This is insane. They could hire literally any half-dozen randos who vote for the All-Star Game lineup and get a reasonably competent sports site. How the hell do they keep getting sports editors who don't give a shit about sports?

 

[Francis York Morgan]

This is insane. They could hire literally any half-dozen randos who vote for the All-Star Game lineup and get a reasonably competent sports site. How the hell do they keep getting sports editors who don't give a shit about sports?

Probably because whoever is in charge of hiring these people isn't looking at sports writers. No one in the business world buys more into this virtue-signaling horseshit than HR. If G/O Media still wants to try and make any of these sites work then they have to clean house at the source for all these bad hires.

 

[huckbeine]

This is insane. They could hire literally any half-dozen randos who vote for the All-Star Game lineup and get a reasonably competent sports site. How the hell do they keep getting sports editors who don't give a shit about sports?

Because real sports beat reporters will be extremely expensive to hire.

 

[Ruin]

Petty much exactly as I predicted. As soon as wokeshit stops being profitable capitalists will drop it

Who would have thought?

 

[Water-T]

LOLOLOLOL. The soyboys and dangerhairs sitting in the ruins of Gawker just shot themselves in the foot. Those "intrusive ads" were there to generate ad revenue in order to pay their salaries, and instead of just handling it professionally like adults, they go into a tard rage and direct the public to harass their bosses about them.

As a result, one of those advertisers pulls out and takes a $1 million contract with them. GORD JERB, Gawkerites! A WINNAR IS YOU!

Even worse, instead of learning anything from this, the mongoloids at Deadspin start openly defying the mandate to "stick to sports" and change their front page to display non-sports related content, resulting in one of the editors geting shittcanned. So what do these water-heads do? CONTINUE TO BE DUMBASSES and post shit shit like "Three Good Dogs I Met". Because this will totally show those mean old bosses who write the checks!

Meanwhile, back at the Kuntaku ranch, Schrier is doing his best "THIS IS FINE" routine while the rest of writers are crying on Twitter about the house being on fire. You'd think that Univision selling them off to GO Media for pennies on dollar would have been a clear enough warning sign that the House Of Tards was falling, but they also can't seem to understand that these "intrusive ads" are a major red flag that says WE ARE DESPERATE FOR REVENUE.

The schadenfreude I get from watching these mental midgets continue to dig their holes past China and into the ionosphere is delicious. They thought the pre-Hulkamania salad days would last forever, but now the lettuce has wilted, the ranch dressing has curdled, and the croutons are stale.

EDIT: Actually, I think the best thing about all this all the Kotaku/Deadspin stans that are uber-butthurt over the inevitable crash of the only thing that give their sad lives meaning. They're screeching about how the new owners are assholes, as well as screaming "bootlickers!" at anyone who points out that bosses tend to fire employees who don't do what they are fucking told to do. Gee golly gosh guys, this will surely save your favorite websites from going the way fo Gawker and Splinter!

 

[AnOminous]

Probably because whoever is in charge of hiring these people isn't looking at sports writers. No one in the business world buys more into this virtue-signaling horseshit than HR. If G/O Media still wants to try and make any of these sites work then they have to clean house at the source for all these bad hires.

They need to cut the cancer out at the root and axe HR then hire some exec with a penchant for dropping the axe, and mercilessly go through every property, going full exterminatus on every one. Not a single non-naturally occurring color should be atop the head of any employee when they're done.

 

[Water-T]

They need to cut the cancer out at the root and axe HR then hire some exec with a penchant for dropping the axe, and mercilessly go through every property, going full exterminatus on every one. Not a single non-naturally occurring color should be atop the head of any employee when they're done.

THIS. Univision ended up selling Denton's dried up turds at a huge loss because they barely did any 'tard wrangling.

The only way to salvage what little of worth there is is to start cleaning house.

You want to write about ORANGE MAN BAD instead of the latest NFL draft picks? BYE BITCH.

When told to write a review about the newest Switch game and you give some headcanon on why "Link is trans and in a poly-relationship with Zelda and Ganon" instead? CLEAN OFF YOUR DESK NOW.

Any reporters that got outraged about the "Fappening" but defended Hogan's sex tape being posted? GTFO YOU HYPOCRITES.

There are a ton of people out there who can write much better and are more than willing to fill those positions without being massive entitled dicks to their bosses. Get to hiring them, GO Media.

 

[Suck the Cock]

So I guess we're gonna have to make sure all of Kotaku's stuff is archived before it's too late. I know all the greatest hits are already archived, but I think it's time to trawl the depths for anything we missed. I don't want the site to crash and take all that quality journalism with it.

 

[Megaroad 2012]

So how else am I supposed to find out the new Persona game has ablist slurs if click bait blogs aren't around anymore?

I need to be outrage to validate my moral superiority and without Kotaku I'm going to have to learn to think for myself.

 

[Water-T]

So how else am I supposed to find out the new Persona game has ablist slurs if click bait blogs aren't around anymore?

I need to be outrage to validate my moral superiority and without Kotaku I'm going to have to learn to think for myself.

Also, how will I know which games with lady tits I need to be personally offended by and which games with gay dudes in speedos I should be buying 100 copies of? I NEED SOMEONE TO TELL ME!

 

[Where Do You Find Them?]

I love the argument they always trot out when told to stop talking about politics.
"But X and politics are intertwined. It's impossible to talk about one without the other"
"But every other site has apolitical coverage."
"Yeah but that isn't really apolitical, even choosing not to have political commentary is a political statement in itself."
"Just do what they do or you're fired."
"I suppose I'll try to fuck with your revenue instead."
"You're fired."
"This is so unfair. What could we possibly have done differently?"

 

[AnOminous]

I love the argument they always trot out when told to stop talking about politics.
"But X and politics are intertwined. It's impossible to talk about one without the other"
"But every other site has apolitical coverage."
"Yeah but that isn't really apolitical, even choosing not to have political commentary is a political statement in itself."
"Just do what they do or you're fired."
"I suppose I'll try to fuck with your revenue instead."
"You're fired."
"This is so unfair. What could we possibly have done differently?"

I love the result when these insufferable fucks pull out those arguments and the response from someone they can't just click block on is "fuck you clean out your desk and this guard will help you leave." "It's not my JAAAAAAHB to edumacate you, EEEEEEVEERYTHING is political you shitlord," no it isn't, fuck you. Out of here.

 

[Water-T]

I love the argument they always trot out when told to stop talking about politics.
"But X and politics are intertwined. It's impossible to talk about one without the other"
"But every other site has apolitical coverage."
"Yeah but that isn't really apolitical, even choosing not to have political commentary is a political statement in itself."
"Just do what they do or you're fired."
"I suppose I'll try to fuck with your revenue instead."
"You're fired."
"This is so unfair. What could we possibly have done differently?"

And it's not like they didn't have plenty of opportunities to write about sports with a political slant - Colin Kaepernick's kneeling was about sports and politics, as well as Trump getting booed at the World series. So it's not like they will never be able to EVER write about politics - it's just that the honchos only wanted articles about sports and any articles about politics ALSO had to be sports related. The water-brains at Deadspin would rather continue to piss out articles about ORANGE MAN BAD and WHITE MEN, AMIRITE? than collect a paycheck,

 

[AnOminous]

The water-brains at Deadspin would rather continue to piss out articles about ORANGE MAN BAD and WHITE MEN, AMIRITE? than collect a paycheck,

One of the articles they reposted during their tard tantrum about being told to do their job was literally a 2014 article about Gamergate.

 

[Belligerent Monk]

A little disappointed to see that, of all people, Nathan "of Five Guys" Grayson wasn't among the first to get the axe.
I'm legit shocked he held onto that position for as long as he has.

I, like many of you, have been entirely unable to keep my popcorn bucket refilled while watching this saga play out though,
10/10 lulz here

 

[Keystone]

So I guess we're gonna have to make sure all of Kotaku's stuff is archived before it's too late. I know all the greatest hits are already archived, but I think it's time to trawl the depths for anything we missed. I don't want the site to crash and take all that quality journalism with it.

If anyone does go trawling, look for a Kotaku article where they had their readers ask a porn star a bunch of questions, one of which being what she thought the "right amount" of pubes present for a blowjob should be. I vividly remember that article and I wanna say it was around 2010 or up to 2013. The comments are probably long gone but I do remember people back then going "wtf does this have to do with games?" and "why should we listen to or take seriously the opinions of someone who literally gargles cock for a living?"