Gawker
-
Stephen Colvin
Gamespot editor's nemesis on way out of CNET
At CNET, the heads keep rolling, nearly a year after Gamespot editorial director Jeff Gerstmann was sacked. Stephen Colvin, an executive who oversaw Gamespot, is out of the company, a tipster tells us. Gerstmann's firing came after a negative review of an advertiser's game, which made him a cause célèbre among gamers. What Gerstmann's fans will say: That Colvin and other suits are getting what they deserved for ruining the CNET-owned gaming site's editorial credibility. Josh Larson left CNET, now owned by CBS, in April. Colvin, a former magazine executive who was Larson's boss, joined CNET a year ago, shortly before the Gerstmann incident. His exit comes as CBS rejiggers CNET's generous benefits, our tipster says: More »
7,185
17
By Owen ThomasComment by Llost: Can anyone tell me the webiste Gertsmann made himself after leaving? 3 Responses | Other threads
-
jeff gerstmann
Ousted CNET editor and CEO return for vengeance
GiantBomb is a new gamer blog edited by Jeff Gerstmann, the CNET GameSpot editor fired last November over his negative — or "unprofessional," if you want the official version — reviews of an advertiser's game. GiantBomb is part of WhiskyMedia, a small startup run by Shelby Bonnie, who himself was forced out as CNET's CEO two years ago, after an investigation fingered him in a stock-options backdating scandal. Bonnie told Bits that he's not out to build another CNET: “Our goal is we want to remain less than 10 people." Valleywag's publisher used to talk like that, too. -
exits
Jeff Gerstman's executioner at CNET replaced by ex-Yahoo Shawn Rose
Who'll be the new man atop CNET's GameSpot come April 10, replacing newly fired Josh Larson? According to a tipster, it's Shawn Rose, currently at CNET's TV.com. And the description of Rose's leadership abilities don't exactly inspire confidence.the terrible irony, shawn rose should never have been hired to run tv in the first place, as he talks and talks his way into all kinds of crazy shit. now another suit replaces the suit they booted, and this one's wearing purple. he literally got nothing done at Y, and to date, has done nothing at CNET
Ineffectual managers from Yahoo? I've never heard the like! Anyone who's worked with Rose, let us know how accurate the description is. There's much more after the jump. More »
6,474
By Jackson WestComment by oymyhead: I like Shawn. But it's basically all true. Lots of words, very little focus, even fewer results. more » | Other threads
-
media
Gasp! CNET values sales over editorial
News flash: CNET's "ad sales team carries more weight than the editorial team," writes Alex Petraglia, editor of Primotech, a videogames-news site. In the wake of Gamespot editorial director Jeff Gerstmann's firing, should anyone find this shocking? No. But in an attempt to jump on the Gerstmann story, Petraglia has posted a long-winded rant about a new ad campaign plastered all over the Gamespot website. More »
1,161
Comment by Christopher Batty: @cheradenine: I *loved* my time and the relationships I formed at Cnet and being let go probably lit a fire... more » | Other threads
-
rumormonger
CNET sells editorial placement, needs to raise rates
Buried news in a long post by Amadeo Plaza at Gamer 2.0: CNET allegedly sells placement of articles, not ads, on the front door of its GameSpot site for about $3,500 per week. He's not saying advertisers can buy an article — rather, they can pay to have an article placed prominently on the front door. Imagine the makers of Cloverfield paying The New York Times to move its review of the movie to page A1 and you get the idea. I'm supposed to opine here about the evil advent of adverjournalism and its corrupting influence on my so-called career. But at $500 a day to override CNET's editorial judgement, my overwhelming reaction is that GameSpot is selling itself too cheap.
694
By Paul BoutinComment by Owen Thomas: @GameSpotter: Your own management, two years ago, admitted to the practice of paying for editorial placement. more » | Other threads
-
rumormonger
Fired GameSpot editor to start new site
Jeff Gerstmann, the ten-year CNET GameSpot veteran believed to have been fired for negative reviews of advertisers' games, is now rumored to be starting another site with GameSpot founder Vince Broady. 1UP editor Sam Kennedy buried the news in an endless thumbsucker about the influence of advertisers on game reviews. No word on how the new site's ad-dollars-versus-reviews-quality policies will be any different from the rest. Jeff? -
jeff gerstmann
Newsweek on Gerstmanngate — the 100-word version
Mom, make him stop! As hopefully the last 3,500 words on Gerstmanngate, Newsweek's N'Gai Croal ponders What It All Means. Look, if you want to spend a half hour revisiting The Godfather, Almost Famous, Wu-Tang Clan and George Bernard friggin Shaw in the post-Metacritic era all applied to some game reviewer getting fired, knock yourself out with Croal's meandering rumination on why GameSpot editorial director Jeff Gerstmann was fired shortly after publishing a negative review of an advertiser's game. For the rest of us, I've trimmed the references to Faust. More »
1,196
By Paul BoutinComment by Pherdnut: Ad space is only worth something if you have a large and consistently devoted audience that wants to put their... more » | Other threads
-
jeff gerstmann
Game reviewer affirms advertisers run the show
Was CNET's firing of GameSpot editor Jeff Gerstmann a bizarre special case? Isn't it hard to believe Gerstmann was axed to appease an advertiser? Not at all, says a game reviewer who claims he's been pushed out by advertisers twice. More »
2,315
By Paul BoutinComment by Scott_Wolf: How utterly unsurprising that this comment refers to the Insider's Mutual Masturbation Society that is quartertothree.com. Talk about sad, those... more » | Other threads
-
-
jeff gerstmann
CNET tells all, reveals nothing on GameSpot firing
GameSpot, the CNET-owned videogame-reviews site, has officially acknowledged the canning of 11-year site veteran Jeff Gerstmann in a sappy farewell posted early this morning. The site begs off confirming whether Gerstmann's departure had anything to do with his critical review of an advertiser's game, repeating the party line that "his exit was not a result of pressure from an advertiser." CNET vice president Greg Brannan treads the same tone as CNET's official release: "Neither CNET Networks nor GameSpot has ever allowed its advertising business to affect its editorial content. The accusations in the media that it has done so are unsubstantiated and untrue. Jeff's departure stemmed from internal reasons unrelated to any buyer of advertising on GameSpot." There's a simple way to prove that, Greg: State those reasons.
1,086
Comment by andyfox1979: @magnusdopus or Greg Brannan (or his lackey), video games are expensive and the market is flooded with new games all... more » | Other threads
-
harvey smith
Honesty will get you nowhere
If there's one lesson to be drawn from the CNET fiasco known as Gerstmangate, it's that honesty isn't always the best policy. Jeff Gerstmann's controversial departure from CNET's GameSpot, allegedly for his critical take on an advertiser's product, overshadowed another videogame industry exit. Game developer Harvey Smith, known for his role in the critically acclaimed Eidos Interactive franchise Deus Ex, has left Midway after giving what one executive referred to as his "public resignation" at the Montreal International Games Summit. Smith referred to his latest project, Blacksite: Area 51, as "fucked up" when explaining its poor reception. He said he wasn't excited about Area 51 and "with a year to go, the game was disastrously off rails." Far too honest an assessment for an industry which makes its living off fantasies.
682
Comment by mandarin: Wow he pretty much sabotaged the released. I doubt anyone would hire him after pulling a stunt like this. more » | Other threads
-
gamespot
Jeff Gerstmann isn't giving up on videogames
GameSpot editorial director Jeff Gerstmann, if rumors are to be believed, may have been fired for expressing his opinion about a game heavily advertised on the CNET site. Although he's unable to comment his termination, this didn't prohibit Gerstmann from relaying his future plans to Joystiq. The top question for fans of his videogame reviews: Does Gerstmann plan to stay in the business? Here's what he said. More »
1,842
Comment by Blackjack: What he knows for sure is that he doesn't know anything for sure. Glad he cleared everything up. Come on... more » | Other threads
-
jeff gerstmann
Eidos acknowledges game "caused pain"
The chummy relationship between game-review sites and videogame publishers, the sites' primary advertisers, is drawing fresh scrutiny after the firing of GameSpot editorial director Jeff Gerstmann. Eidos, the publisher of Kane & Lynch, a videogame Gerstmann savaged in a review, is being singled out by the Internet lynch mob. Eidos had dropped a hefty sum — reportedly hundreds of thousands of dollars — to "skin," or redesign, the GameSpot site with promos for the title. Eidos has yet to make a public statement about the incident. But perhaps its marketers knew what was coming. At a preview event for the game, Eidos handed out Kane & Lynch T-shirts emblazoned with the words "I've seen the pain you've caused." After the jump, closeups of the shirt, soon to be a collector's item among Gerstmann supporters. More »
1,692
Comment by Mary Jane Irwin: @sample032: Eidos (or perhaps CNET) quickly pulled all Kane & Lynch advertisement off GameSpot the night the story broke. more » | Other threads
-
jeff gerstmann
GameSpot staff schadenfreude roundup
Commenter Bobby Bokista has pulled together a handy collection of posts by CNET GameSpot staffers upset over this week's controversial firing of 11-year reviewer Jeff Gerstmann. Executive summary: Blame the suits but don't get us fired, OK? -
jeff gerstmann
GameSpot editor says CNET firing a "disaster"
Remember SimCity? Remember what a joy it was to build up a fully functioning, living, breathing city, full of life and wonderment? Then, at some point down the road, after you've built up your city to the peak of its productiveness, you'd start mashing the disaster button and a wide variety of tornadoes, earthquakes, and fake Godzillas would come tromping through, laying fiery waste to every bit of what you'd worked so painstakingly to create? Yeah. It's a little bit like that. Except someone hit the disaster button for me.
— GameSpot editor Alex Navarro on the state of CNET after the tech publisher fired his colleague Jeff Gerstmann, editorial director of the videogame-reviews site, on still-unexplained grounds.
49,547
Comment by einnocent: Everyone should start reading 1UP for bold, unbiased game reviews presented on a site maintained by brilliant, handsome developers. [Full... more » | Other threads
-
13,727
Comment by Willbur: "GameSpot takes its editorial integrity extremely seriously", but keeping our advertisers happy so we can make a profit we take... more » | Other threads
-
recap
This week was a wash
Ahh, that feels good right there. I don't think we'll be talking about this week next week. The Facebook pile-on continued. Amazon's Kindle reader suffered a surprise media backlash. I'd hoped for another bank-employee-in-tutu photo to liven things up. Instead we got Gerstmanngate. At least we still have jobs — oh wait, Valleywag party girl Megan "Leggy" McCarthy is heading to Wired. I think I'll go curl up in the tub with my INVISIBLE PUPPY. (Photo by Jason Calacanis) -
jeff gerstmann
GameSpot editor (?) on fired reviewer
We never know for sure if the commentards are who they claim to be. But one prodigious poster with the new account "gamespot" is telling what reads like a credible insider story — it's written in editor-speak — of what happened to ex-CNET GameSpot reviewer Jeff Gerstmann, supposedly fired for low-scoring an advertiser's new game. "Gamespot"'s posts are in need of a 100-word-versioning, but it's Friday so forgettabout it here's the whole thing pasted in. I've bolded the newsy parts. More »
103,403
By Paul BoutinComment by ceokhan: playing too many games impairs your spelling lol... no but really I agree with @ironblob: the article is indeed filled... more » | Other threads
-
great moments in pr
"Freaked-out" Eidos ducks CNET firing rumor
Videogamers have been accusing CNET of shredding its editorial credibility by firing GameSpot editorial director Jeff Gerstmann after Eidos allegedly threatened to pull "hundreds of thousands of dollars in future advertising." That, of course, is conspiracy theory entirely typical of the blogosphere. Has anyone thought that Eidos has as much to lose as CNET here, with customers turning against the games studio over claims it muscled out a popular reviewer? We hear Eidos is "freaking out" over l'affaire Gerstmann; top management there, an insider says, sincerely believes they didn't prompt CNET to fire Gerstmann, but fears they'll get the blame anyway. Michelle Curran, Eidos's director of public relations, says, "Yeah, we're not commenting on that right now." That's all right, Michelle. If we were you, we wouldn't comment, either.
7,538
Comment by bjornmmcc: So Eidos says they have nothing to do with Jeff's firing, but why would anyone believe Eidos when they lie... more » | Other threads
-
jeff gerstmann
Fired CNET editor speaks
Jeff Gerstmann, the former CNET GameSpot reviewer whom the rumor mill claims was fired by CNET for angering an advertiser with a negative writeup about one of their games, responded to my Facebook poke. Besides being a journalistic first for me, Jeff's message made me laugh.
16,299
By Paul BoutinComment by Paul Boutin: Aw how cute. Someone called me and left a message, "Hey I was just wondering if this was really... more » | Other threads
-
rumormonger
CNET editor fired for "unprofessional" reviews, not "Kane & Lynch"
Here's a new wrinkle on the controversial firing of CNET editor Jeff Gerstmann, which came shortly after he posted a negative review of CNET advertiser Eidos's Kane & Lynch. An individual claiming to work in CNET ad sales — specifically on the Eidos ad campaign — claims that while Eidos was upset over the review, that conflict was settled over two weeks ago. He says, "I'd heard a few people tell that [Gerstmann had] already been skating on thin ice for 'unprofessional reviews and review practices.'"
4,230
Comment by gamespot: Also, despite the fact that this occured two weeks ago, there was no way they were going to fire him... more » | Other threads
-
clips
CNET editor's farewell video
Whether you believe CNET editor Jeff Gerstmann was canned for a critical review of an advertiser's product or other causes, this much is clear: Someone took offense at his video review of Kane & Lynch, a release by CNET advertiser Eidos, and the clip was yanked offline. One insider alleges that the review was deemed "unprofessional." We've watched it and just don't see it, but the clip is above and you can judge for yourself. More »
1,273
Comment by Adam Rock: Nevermind, you guys already posted ( [valleywag.com] ) the comic. My bad. more » | Other threads
-
mysteries
CNET fires editor to please advertiser? Three reasons I don't believe it
CNET GameSpot editorial director Jeff Gerstmann was supposedly fired for giving an advertiser's game a low score. I don't buy it. Here's why. More »
9,230
By Paul BoutinComment by tomJ5566: Follow the money. Ok, lets follow the money. Gamespot was paid over $100,000 for advertising by Eidos. ... more » | Other threads
-
exits
CNET editor fired, negative game review suspected
Rumors are flooding the online videogame forums that Jeff Gerstmann, editorial director of CNET's Gamespot, was canned for criticizing an advertiser's product. A tipster informed us that Gerstmann, who had worked at the company for more than a decade, was greeted with a locked office yesterday morning. While there's no official explanation (apparently, it's being kept very hush hush even inside the company) as to why Gerstmann was escorted off the premises, the evidence gathered so far is pretty damning. More »
4,162
Comment by rspress: Duh! C|Net has been the sweetheart of major advertisers for a long time. It has published glowing reviews of Vista... more » | Other threads
- 1
1-23 of 23 for "Valleywag, Jeff Gerstmann"
