[OT] (Old) Deadspin is coming back
https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/28/business/media/deadspin-staffers-start-defector.html
Most of the old Deadspin gang is putting together (and co-owning) a new site, www.defector.com which will go live in September on a paid subscriber model. I for one have missed their humorous stories, whether it be about (any) sport, politics, or whatever comes to their mind. And hopefully this time there won't be any auto-start video ads.
I think some critics and PE overlords got caught up on the political side of things when it was really was about the writers' creative freedom to generate the content to keep audience engaged. If you're a good writer, why be forced to stick to one topic? Anyway, I'm looking forward to it.
Some girl: So, what is your main goal in life?
Me: To be told, 'Well done good and faithful servant'.
Not sure if the avant garde Andy Kaufman schtick is what you're going for, but you're not doing it well
Neither did Kaufman.
One question - what the bloody hell are you even talking about?
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We've all wondered this for a while now and just started downvoting without even reading the jibberish for risk of losing an IQ point or two.
Your my hero.
*You're
Take it easy, English is his second language
Hell yeah.
I think these are all currently unemployed / gig writers. As far as I can tell, the roster doesn't include people like Tim Marchman, Tom Scocca, Tommy Craggs -- people who I think of very Deadspin.
Best of luck to them and curious to see how it goes.
I already subscribed. Couldn’t be more excited
now if we can get spencer hall writing somewhere on the regular all would be right with the world
The business side of sports journalism is bad and getting worse. I will subscribe and hope they succeed.
Sports journalism is really just “free” advertising for sports. It really is at a weird intersection. Would anyone pay attention to sports if it were never mentioned on the news, in radio, or have its own devoted newspaper section? Of course, would those sources have fewer subscribers if nothing was devoted to sport...
Well, there is a base passionately devoted to sports as a deep cultural expression, if this website is any indication...
I’m happy it’s by subscription only so I don’t stumble across one of their articles.
Viva la Barstool
speaking of sites/blogs that went downhill...
Dave Portnoy is one of the few U-M alumni who's just really embarrassing
elaborate
I mean...this was only a couple weeks ago.
I'm not going to waste too much time trying to convince you; Barstool has its fans and sense of humor, and I understand its appeal to an extent. But Portnoy seems like just a miserable person to be around.
Dave Portnoy is the American Dream and a role model for our children.
Fair enough. Didn’t know much about him. I was going to make a Ted Kaczynski joke, but can see emotions are high.
Portnoy interviewed Trump, which went like this:
"I am not a political person, but watch how far up your ass I can stick my tongue for the next 20 minutes."
Then he FaceTimed his dad to show him that he was with Trump.
It was embarrassingly unprofessional for all involved.
Is that a complaint?
I so badly want to give you credit for maiking a "portnoys complaint" joke here but I dont think you have it in you
Yep. Portnoy is a piece of shit no matter how you slice it.
Counter-argument: Go fuck yourself.
I subscribed; sounds like they might also be pulling in some other figures (like some of the EDSBS crew) for spot articles as well. I didn't love everything Deadspin put out, but on balance it was a better level of general sports coverage than you got elsewhere, and I'm excited to see them back.
It'll probably suck and fail.
Old Deadspin worked, it was highly successful. But does that work on a subscription model? That's the key question. I do wish them well, but I lean toward "no" on that question.
If nothing else, the Outkick vs. Deadspin wars in future years will be interesting.
Why do you think it won't? 10,000 subscribers (which does not feel like a crazy number to me looking at their metrics before the PE takeover) is a cool million. Presuming they do some ad work as well, that's a nice pot for ~18-25 people. Expenses should be rock bottom unless they're renting an office, too.
I'm sure they've run the numbers. But "old Deadspin", IMO, got much of their numbers because they initially garnered a lot of clicks/impressions from organic positive word-of-mouth, and then things snowballed from there.
It's not impossible, but it's harder to garner organic positive word-of-mouth from behind a paywall.
Probably true, but as an earlier poster pointed out, with a subscription model they don't have to do huge numbers to be getting by. 18 writers who share editing duties, plus say 3 salaried administrative/support staff (accountant/benefits administrator, web developer, graphic designer/artist). If they average $75,000 in salary (the writers would get whatever their 5% share is worth and yes I pulled that number out of my ass but bear with me, it seems like a reasonable target for "doing well"), then you're looking at payroll of ~$1.6 million. Let's say they offer 30% on top of that in benefits, that's another ~$500k. Assuming there's no office space to pay for, they're off the hook for rent, utilities, maintenance, etc., although maybe they buy everyone a nice new computer setup for ~$50k total. Add (again, number straight from ass, continue bearing with) 50% to account for other costs incurred in reporting. That's a little over $3 million in costs.
If that's even in the ballpark, they need 30,000 subscribers at $99/year, leaving out any advertising or other revenue streams, or 45,000 at $69/year. That's doesn't seem unreasonable. Then again, I was a Deadspin fanboy so my sense of how popular it was is probably inflated. At any rate, I really hope the Defector works out.
ETA: They got 10,000+ subscriptions on the first day.
The plan is to have an email newsletter like everyone's doing nowadays like it's 1999 again, so there's like, one free thing a day as a front porch for the rest of the site. So if they do like, the 2021 equivalent of the Brett Favre's penis story or the Sinclair Media propaganda video that went super viral, they still can. Plus their main podcast will be free and i imagine they'll be starting more of them.
Three things caused the downfall of the Gawker Media sites:
1. Peter Thiel's funding of dozens of frivolous lawsuits until one of them got in front of a judge incompetent enough/partisan enough to kill the Denton ownership
2. Facebook devouring advertising money that's basically crushed the entire online publishing field.
3. The subsequent buyers since Denton being absolutely some of the stupidest people who've ever lived. The Gawker sites only ended up being a small part of the total disaster that was Fusion for Univision, and they actually were one of the only aspects of the Fusion project that wasn't a disaster. Then the PE guys who bought it from Univision are just the world's most incompetent businessmen.
We're never going to get the old internet back before Google and Facebook made advertising models impossible to sustain. You're either going to get legacy media outlets, outlets funded by billionaires who will tow whatever line they're asked or subscriber model.
Probably won't have the ability to subscribe, but it's nice to see these writers have consistent work for the time being.
It'll be an interesting experiment to see. Many of the writers involved with this new venture castigated their former employer for focusing on producing revenue. It'll be interesting to see how their writing changes once the shoe is on the other foot and they're paying the bills. I'll most likely never subscribe to their service as Deadspin was a little too whiny for my personal taste but more power to them. I hope they find success for themselves and their families.
They castigated their PE overlords for meddling in editorial decisions and favoring clickbait that devalued the brand and drove away their most loyal readers. PE and journalism don't mix. Google Alden Capital if you're curious. Here's just one story of many that layout the particulars:
They castigated their former employer because their former employer didn't understand the business they were in and their former employer was busy destroying any ability for their site to make money.
There is not a single person from Great Hill Partners I'd let manage a hot dog stand. They are incompetent businessmen.
This is excellent news. Old Deadspin could get very smarmy and up-its-own ass a little too much sometimes but overall it was pretty great. It sucks its been missing the last few years.
Good for these kids.
But as a very old person, I must say, Old Deadspin is Leitch/Chandler era. It's never been the same since then.