Deadspin is Burning
- Thread starter John Marzano Olympic Hero
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If you follow @Undeadspin on Twitter, they link to any pieces being written by the former staffers as they work elsewhere.
I can't imagine it would be all that hard to find a couple of guys who'd agree to anonymously upload a couple of stories a day for not much money, which makes letting the site lie dormant hard to understand.
Some of the Deadspin guys are landing new gigs.
View: https://twitter.com/domcosentino/status/1197591167434670081?s=20
View: https://twitter.com/domcosentino/status/1197591167434670081?s=20
I’m getting along ok without Deadspin’s take on regular sports stuff. But its stuff like this stupid Papa John interview that really makes me feel the loss. They should have done a bit on this. There should have been comments.
Toucher and Rich did a solid 20 min on this today as well. It should be on their site in podcast form.
That's no surprise. Toucher and Rich did a lot of stuff that was on Deadspin the day before*.
* I'm not saying that they copied Deadspin, but that similar stories passed both of their desks.
* I'm not saying that they copied Deadspin, but that similar stories passed both of their desks.
At least ten of those clicks is me typing “deadspin” into my browser, then realizing I don’t read Deadspin anymore, and clicking away to SoSH or The Ringer or something.
Leitch in his weekly newsletter states he was part of a group that tried to buy Deadspin back this fall.
“ I guess I can say this now, but I was initially part of a group of outside investors who tried to put together a bid to buy Deadspin back from Great Hill Partners after that whole shitshow. We had dedicated people who were willing to put down real money to make it happen. And then we talked to Great Hill Partners themselves. We were told, immediately, in zero uncertain terms, that Great Hill Partners was not interested in selling Deadspin, not at any price. Word-for-word: “Deadspin is not for sale. Ever.” Private equity ghouls would rather burn down the whole world than admit that it’s possible they were wrong about anything.”
Yeah PE bros are garbage.
Edit- linky: https://williamfleitch.substack.com/p/volume-2-issue-90-elt?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email&utm_source=copy
“ I guess I can say this now, but I was initially part of a group of outside investors who tried to put together a bid to buy Deadspin back from Great Hill Partners after that whole shitshow. We had dedicated people who were willing to put down real money to make it happen. And then we talked to Great Hill Partners themselves. We were told, immediately, in zero uncertain terms, that Great Hill Partners was not interested in selling Deadspin, not at any price. Word-for-word: “Deadspin is not for sale. Ever.” Private equity ghouls would rather burn down the whole world than admit that it’s possible they were wrong about anything.”
Yeah PE bros are garbage.
Edit- linky: https://williamfleitch.substack.com/p/volume-2-issue-90-elt?utm_campaign=post&utm_medium=email&utm_source=copy
Deadspin is mostly a brand name, right? Its assets are (or were) its writers, editors, sales staff and advertisers.
So why couldn’t Leitch (or anyone else) simply hire the exiting staff in its entirety and start Deadspin2 or Livespin or Undeadspin?
You cant hire advertisers, but the advertisers would follow the writers and clicks.
He mentions towards the end the Deadspin 2.0 rumors. Several of the key writers and Laura Wagner have taken new jobs so he doesn’t think that will come to be.
That’s what I thought at the time. The best writers split quickly and got new jobs, making a “let’s keep the gang together” under a new name and ownership play impossible.
I thought the same thing when Theil and Hulk Hogan took down Gawker. Media companies used to be capital heavy — printing presses, radio and TV transmitters — so most of the value was in physical assets (and in the case of broadcast, licenses,) not employees. Now a media company can be can be a brand name, an office and a web address.
you can't ignore the value of (A) the users' info and existing accounts, (B) the kinja network in enabling cross-discovery / time-on-site, and (C) users' habits of going to a site, which take a while to establish. It's surmountable, but the incumbent site property does have real, valuable assets that don't walk out the door at the end of the day (unlike, say, a consulting firm).
Speaking of Great Hill, yesterday I got this in a PE industry newsletter:
Speaking of Great Hill, yesterday I got this in a PE industry newsletter:
"you made a shitty, value-destroying move, that cost our LPs a lot of money! Here, take another industry role with some more carry."
Absolutely, but rebuilding user info databases and website metric analytical staff is a lot easier than building a printing plant, distribution system, or TV studio, let alone a network. I did not mean to say that Deadspin has zero intrinsic value apart from its employees, but that a website like Deadspin is much more easily replicable than, say, the Globe.
They are moving to Chicago and looking to restart but not Unionized.
https://deadline.com/2020/01/deadspin-owner-moving-dormant-site-to-chicago-breaks-off-talks-with-union-1202827055/
View: https://twitter.com/kgroetz/status/1215690455586869249
https://deadline.com/2020/01/deadspin-owner-moving-dormant-site-to-chicago-breaks-off-talks-with-union-1202827055/
In other words...
View: https://twitter.com/kgroetz/status/1215690455586869249
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Two writers leaving Kotaku, their video game website, posted a dialogue between the two of them, that ended like this:
I think they had physical offices in NYC, although many of their writers (Magary and Burneko for two) lived elsewhere.
View: https://twitter.com/KVanValkenburg/status/1217293078773583872
I am so, so skeptical that he actually believes any of this recovery stuff. It seems much more likely he's got no other choice because he made a shambles of his life, so he's using "recovery" as a way of excusing everything he did wrong in the past.
And WTF does this even mean?
I am so, so skeptical that he actually believes any of this recovery stuff. It seems much more likely he's got no other choice because he made a shambles of his life, so he's using "recovery" as a way of excusing everything he did wrong in the past.
And WTF does this even mean?
"Taken" from you? Guess not all of that recovery stuff has quite taken hold yet...
I used to visit Deadspin every day and was sad when it imploded.
But you know what? I don't miss it any more. I enjoyed a lot of the content, but the snark, the ever-relentless snark, the implication that everything sucked and nothing could be enjooyed because everything was run by awful people, it really got to me after a while. Going without that snark has made my life marginally better.
It's too bad.
But you know what? I don't miss it any more. I enjoyed a lot of the content, but the snark, the ever-relentless snark, the implication that everything sucked and nothing could be enjooyed because everything was run by awful people, it really got to me after a while. Going without that snark has made my life marginally better.
It's too bad.
Dauliero has half of this correct. He's such a piece of shit and is Portnoy v1.0, except he's dumber, more smug, less charismatic and an overall shittier person. I really like Will Leitch as a writer, but his blind spot for his friend is the one thing that bugs me about him. If you logically follow the path, Dauliero is the one who killed Deadspin. If he didn't completely fuck Gawker over, they would never have gone to bankruptcy, sold to Univision, who then sold to the VCs that stripped the site for parts. But everyone seems to be mad at the latter, rather than Dauliero.
And all for what? So he could show Hulk Hogan railing Bubba the Love Sponge's wife? That's his legacy: pervert and idiot.
That being said, I do miss Deadspin still. I liked going there and reading about the big news of the day. And you're right, there was a lot of snark and a lot of "everything sucked", but there was a lot of good there too. Magary is a decent writer who doesn't seem to have the same spark that he had at Deadspin. David Roth was really good too. And I miss the comments, I think that their's and the old AV Club commenters were some of the best in the business.
Yeah. I feel like Daulerio was an asshole before he was an addict. I feel like he'll be an asshole in recovery, too. Maybe that's unfair of me. I dunno.
I had this same realization about Twitter and culled a lot of folks from my feed. Having Roth, Hamilton Nolan, Magary and John Cook constantly telling me everything is awful and that I suck for liking some of the things I like turns out to be lousy for my mental health. If that means I've willingly put myself in a bubble, so be it.
That's one of the great consolations of studying history - the realization that while things are indeed awful, (1) they used to be WAY MORE AWFUL, and (2) you can understand how you got here and so deal with how they are a little more precisely, or avoid some of the same mistakes.
Anyway, reading that article I think Daulerio's as committed as anyone to AA, gets it and is trying to live it. I don't think we should expect perfection from him (or anyone), though neither is it necessary for us to read whatever crap he churns out today. I'm mostly just glad Sterger appears to have reached a point of closure and have her career moving upwards now... even if Daulerio does not appear to get that "it's not about himself, it's about her". He says as much in a preceding paragraph, and then goes on to talk about his own inner torment and career or whatever. You're a journalist, dude - in theory, anyway. Tell her story. Use whatever platform you've got to make her more interesting.
Anyway, reading that article I think Daulerio's as committed as anyone to AA, gets it and is trying to live it. I don't think we should expect perfection from him (or anyone), though neither is it necessary for us to read whatever crap he churns out today. I'm mostly just glad Sterger appears to have reached a point of closure and have her career moving upwards now... even if Daulerio does not appear to get that "it's not about himself, it's about her". He says as much in a preceding paragraph, and then goes on to talk about his own inner torment and career or whatever. You're a journalist, dude - in theory, anyway. Tell her story. Use whatever platform you've got to make her more interesting.
1000 times this. I was trying to figure out a way to block the site so I don't contributing to their ad buys by habitually typing in the URL
View: https://twitter.com/Decker6/status/1217340891414720512
Read the whole article and am stunned that Sterger even met with this scum. She's a much better person. And Cody Decker is a great follow!
Read the whole article and am stunned that Sterger even met with this scum. She's a much better person. And Cody Decker is a great follow!
A few of the unemployed writers are doing a temporary blog tomorrow to 2/2/20.
Good news, Magary will be there.
Bad news, apparently so will Ley
https://unnamedtemporarysportsblog.com/
Good news, Magary will be there.
Bad news, apparently so will Ley
https://unnamedtemporarysportsblog.com/
It's back, baby: https://unnamedtemporarysportsblog.com/you-shouldnt-get-the-monday-after-the-super-bowl-off/I guess no Jamberoo this week.
This is a great summary focusing on the last 3 months of big stories the website formerly named Deadpsin missed.
https://unnamedtemporarysportsblog.com/the-biggest-sports-stories-we-didnt-get-to-cover-over-the-last-three-months/
https://unnamedtemporarysportsblog.com/the-biggest-sports-stories-we-didnt-get-to-cover-over-the-last-three-months/
They're still fucking that Tom Brady chicken though. It's awfully stale.
Also, Marchman is on Twitter saying the Sox are trying to trade Mookie due to pressure from Boston's racist fans. Some things never change.
Also, Marchman is on Twitter saying the Sox are trying to trade Mookie due to pressure from Boston's racist fans. Some things never change.
That's exactly the kind of crap I don't need in my life. It's just look-at-me nonsense meant to get a reaction. RIP Deadspin - stay dead.
I've missed shit like this, though (even if Dave McKenna had already left years ago):
https://unnamedtemporarysportsblog.com/recovered-memory-that-time-sam-kinison-annihilated-me-and-my-mom/
https://unnamedtemporarysportsblog.com/recovered-memory-that-time-sam-kinison-annihilated-me-and-my-mom/
Look. Boston has an *ahem* checkered history when it comes to race. I know this. You know this.
But does he have ANY evidence whatsoever to back up his claim? Come the fuck on.
Yup, it's the worst, easiest and laziest troll in sports. It's not ratio'd enough, although I did do a reply guy to cast my vote.
That blog reminds me of former WWF wrestlers performing in a suburban high school. I guess it's cool for the 40 people who couldn't live without Ley's Bill Simmons takes.
I’ll bite. What makes Boston markedly worse that this keeps being brought up?