My office was the living room closet in a huge one-bedroom in a 1920s East Hollywood apartment court, across the street from the big blue Scientology headquarters in the old Cedars of Lebanon Hospital. There were built-in bookshelves and just enough space for a chair and a laptop and an ashtray. The neighbor lady's rescued pit bulls romped outside in the overgrown garden, and that electric L.A. sunlight came filtered through the grimy old French windows to the hardwood floors. It was a very pleasant place to work, my friends lived within walking distance in other cheap apartments in Los Feliz, and I had a bad case of being in [...]
The teaser for tonight's "Rock Center with Brian Williams" very special episode on Gawker Media is the most mindbogglingly dumb thing I've ever seen. It features reporter Jamie Gangel acting like a prosecutor, with all her notes bundled in her hand. She is also holding a pen? Just in case she wants to jot down some notes. After reading off a list of adjectives, to get "unapologetic" Gawker honcho Nick Denton to word-associate with them, or whatever, she then presents her case: "these blogs pay for salacious scoops, publish rumors, settle lawsuits when they have to, and if they get it wrong, they simply update."
To illustrate that when [...]
The latest traffic memo arrives from Gawker Media honcho Nick Denton: in it, Comscore shows that his network of sites is bigger than any newspaper online but the New York Times. That being said? "The newspapers are now the least of our competition. The inflated expectations of investors and executives may one day explode the Huffington Post. And Yahoo and AOL are in long-term decline. But they are all increasingly in our business."
Exciting news over at the world's last profitable (online) magazine company, Gawker Media! We're hearing that the company's widespread use of full-time yet non-employee contractors is finally being ended. Workers at the company's various blogs will have the choice between going full-time, as actual employees, or staying as contract workers, but only working four days a week. This is awesome news for those among us who were afraid that in the hideous future, no one would ever find employee status anywhere again. On a day-to-day level, this is less awesome for Gawker Media employees, who have to choose between being squeezed into the office (where, exactly?) for every workday [...]
Gawker Media Overlord Nick Denton [see, context!] reminisces about his early days in New York: I remember going to a party with a bunch of Broadway and film gays, and the one-liner one-upmanship felt like a scene from Will & Grace, which at the time was my lame yardstick for what passed for New York salon conversation. My HTML skills had improved in San Francisco, but I'd lost my edge. I thought I was being really witty, but at one point on a ski trip to Tahoe, it became clear that everyone thought I was just an asshole.
I can't believe I'm typing this, and may God have mercy [...]
