I had started to look at Gawker and their various sites much less favorably recently anyway since they've been moving even more toward click-bait than they already were and being really sketchy about things but this is even farther than I thought they'd go.
This is way over the line and is blowing up in their faces- rightly so. No doubt the Gawker of late has been resting on their laurels for awhile now- TMZ-lite, while taking gratuitous shots at Reddit and Buzzfeed and playing the sanctimonious holier-than -thou card. Worse yet, they've been shedding some of their best writers in pursuit of this tabloid crap- http://adamweinstein.tumblr.com/post/124342415120…
It'll be interesting to see if this gets covered on the front page- normally this would be bread and butter for wonket. But the old ties and loyalties might cause them to circle the wagons and pretend not to notice- hopefully I'm wrong about that. In the meantime, Huffpost, Salon, Greenwald and even the NYT have skewered Gawker for this- the non-apology apology and retraction a day later are not gonna make this go away. You can't unring a bell, I wouldn't be surprised if Geithner sues the shit out of them. All because Gawker has a hard on for Reddit and Conde Nast owns Reddit, so that made ruining some glorified accountants life OK somehow.
This has made the front page- good on wonket for not pulling the usual protect our own bullshit, like we saw when all the VSP all tut tutted Major Garrett, but then basically excused his disrespect for POTUS
I am somewhat obsessed with this story, for reasons I don't fully understand. I suspect there's a little bit of "white guy like me got into a kind of trouble I could imagine myself getting into so now I am Mad About A Thing." But it's really shitty, and I think the standards that are being proposed – "truth" is the main criterion for publication, being adjacent to power makes your private life "newsworthy" – are troubling. I also think Gawker actively participated in extortion/blackmail, probably because it would be embarrassing to a rival with whom they have an ax to grind.
But I'm mainly posting here because I had never until this morning clicked on the Wonkville tab.
What a shit show- I hope it was worth the clicks…
I had started to look at Gawker and their various sites much less favorably recently anyway since they've been moving even more toward click-bait than they already were and being really sketchy about things but this is even farther than I thought they'd go.
Yr Wonket.. those were the days.
This is way over the line and is blowing up in their faces- rightly so. No doubt the Gawker of late has been resting on their laurels for awhile now- TMZ-lite, while taking gratuitous shots at Reddit and Buzzfeed and playing the sanctimonious holier-than -thou card. Worse yet, they've been shedding some of their best writers in pursuit of this tabloid crap- http://adamweinstein.tumblr.com/post/124342415120…
It'll be interesting to see if this gets covered on the front page- normally this would be bread and butter for wonket. But the old ties and loyalties might cause them to circle the wagons and pretend not to notice- hopefully I'm wrong about that. In the meantime, Huffpost, Salon, Greenwald and even the NYT have skewered Gawker for this- the non-apology apology and retraction a day later are not gonna make this go away. You can't unring a bell, I wouldn't be surprised if Geithner sues the shit out of them. All because Gawker has a hard on for Reddit and Conde Nast owns Reddit, so that made ruining some glorified accountants life OK somehow.
This has made the front page- good on wonket for not pulling the usual protect our own bullshit, like we saw when all the VSP all tut tutted Major Garrett, but then basically excused his disrespect for POTUS
Just read the post and completely agree with it. It was basically just gay-shaming for clicks on Gawker's part.
I am somewhat obsessed with this story, for reasons I don't fully understand. I suspect there's a little bit of "white guy like me got into a kind of trouble I could imagine myself getting into so now I am Mad About A Thing." But it's really shitty, and I think the standards that are being proposed – "truth" is the main criterion for publication, being adjacent to power makes your private life "newsworthy" – are troubling. I also think Gawker actively participated in extortion/blackmail, probably because it would be embarrassing to a rival with whom they have an ax to grind.
But I'm mainly posting here because I had never until this morning clicked on the Wonkville tab.
Welcome to Hotel Wonkville.