Internet gossip pioneer Gawker.com is moving in a new editorial direction, as part of a massive shakeup at parent company Gawker Media Group that includes staff layoffs and the closure of several of its longstanding sites.
In that memo, Cook clarified the company’s vision in transitioning Gawker to a forum focused on political coverage, stating that the revamped site will "take a ‘Daily Show’ approach to covering the ever-intensifying culture wars, documenting, satirizing and reporting on the ways that political disputes are refracted in every aspect of our popular culture."
In a separate 1,000-word staff memo, Gawker Media Group founder and owner Nick Denton claimed the site, were political stories are already common, is well-prepped to successfully “ride the circus of the 2016 campaign cycle, seizing the opportunity to re-orient its editorial scope on political news, commentary and satire.”
“Politics, writ large, has provided the scene for some of Gawker’s most recognized editorial scoops,” Denton’s memo continued. “More than any other facet of the American system, the politico-media blob begs puncturing by some sharp Gawker wit and probing by Gawker’s inquisitive journalists.”
As part of the transition, about a half-dozen staffers have been let go. New editorial staff will be brought into the fold, including at least one new political columnist, according to a report by the New York Times.
The company is also shuttering numerous Gawker sub-sites, including long-standing site Defamer (which covers Hollywood), Morning After (which focuses on television), Valleywag (which follows Silicon Valley) and The Vane (which reports on weather). Jezebel sub-sites Millihelen and Kitchenette, Lifehacker’s Workshop and AfterHours, and Gizmodo’s Indefinitely Wild are also on the chopping block.
Meanwhile, Gawker Media Group's popular technology site Gizmodo will see content tweaks, to be overseen by new editor-in-chief Katie Drummond, formerly deputy editor at Bloomberg Business, who assumed her new role Nov 1. Sports site Deadspin will also get new writers, and Jezebel will now host a new sub-site focusing on beauty and health.
Gawker’s massive rehaul comes after the company was embroiled in controversy when it published in July an article detailing Condé Nast CFO David Geithner's alleged attempts to solicit a male escort in Chicago, thereby outing Geithner — a married father of three — as gay. Criticism surrounding that story continued, albeit in different form, when Gawker Media executives decided to pull it from the site. That decision led to the resignations of several of Gawker's top editors.
Following the controversy, Denton warned staff in a memo that changes were coming to the site that would make it "nicer."
Gawker Media Group properties reach a total of 104 million people each month, according to Quantcast.
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