Following up on this weekend’s flurry of Gawker re-org coverage, we’ve gotten our hands on Lockhart’s email Friday afternoon to the Gawk editors, wherein he notifies them of the comings and goings. Full text after the jump.
Treehugger steps into the world of the tangible (with more than a t-shirt).
Weblogs Inc. opens up shop in Ohio. Finally, some relatively accurate Akron coverage for the blogosphere .
Over at BoingBoing: People hate cilantro. But it’s most likely genetic, so cut them some slack.
And finally, don’t know how we missed this last week, but apparently the Banker from NBC’s Deal or No Deal is blogging. Howie Mandel was going to do it, but they couldn’t get him anywhere near a keyboard.
Being true humanitarians, we’re only going to subject you to one Oscarblogging moment — Tom Hanks swearing like crazy, reportedly b/c the orchestra played him out to the theme from Forrest Gump. (via Defamer’s Oscar coverage).
We’re assuming you caught Natalie Portman’s SNL rap performance (with Andy Samberg as a viking R&B singer) on YouTube NBC.com? WindowsMedia-disabled folks can check it out at DevilDucky, who I’m guessing will receive their C&D any minute now.
Instablogs has gone mobile, complete with action shots! Very Microsofty.
Speaking of Team Redmond, Scoble’s swearing off Memeorandum (at least for a week), b/c of all the snark, or as he calls it John Dvorakification. That’s right–Dvorakification. Watch for the Sci-Fi original movie this fall.
And finally….BarCamp rocked L.A. this weekend, and we were there. While a review & photos that do it justice are assembled by our Blogebrity interns, be sure to check out Mack Reed’s excellent liveblogging of the entire event (at LAVoice.org).
Now with 100% more Connery! Because Peter Gallagher’s eyebrows weren’t available.
I believe it was just 2 days ago when I decided to IM Nick Denton to ask him what was going on in his world. I was going to start putting out an article every Monday that featured A-listers and what they have been up to. I often wonder what some of them are up to from time to time. Nick basically told me that he was trying to keep a “low profile.” I agreed that keeping a low profile was a good thing.
After Nick told me something that pointed me in the direction of talking to Andrew Krucoff, (which I didn’t do) I left Nick alone and wished him a warm and good day, (because I am so nice and polite.)
Much to my surprise this morning, I was reading my daily cup of Page Six in the New York Post. Well if the Gossip fairy didn’t just slap me in the face, wouldn’t you know I see Nick Denton in there. Now, I’m not saying that Nick wasn’t honest with me when he told me he was trying to keep a ‘low profile’, but come on, Page Six? Nick, you live in New York, keeping a low profile does not include Page Six knowing your business.
So as I am reading I find out some very interesting news about what Mr. Denton has been up to! From the [source]:
JUST in time for the blogger backlash from articles in New York magazine and the Financial Times, the mastermind behind New York-based Gawker and L.A.-based Defamer is shopping proposals for two new guidebooks flaunting the Web sites’ names.
A reliable source says that Nick Denton, who owns all the Gawker-linked sites, is peddling a two-book proposal for “Gawker’s Guide to New York” and “Defamer’s Guide to Los Angeles,” and asking for an “astronomical sum.” True to form, Denton intends to contract out the writing to cheap freelancers instead of using his overworked editorial slaves
HA! That’s all I have to say about that…..
The Toronto Star calls blogging a reaction to “force-fed dumbed-down stories,” an alternative to “bad TV, greedy marketing, and more celebrity gossip.” Mm, Toronto Star, you almost had me there.
A poker blogger pulls a publicity stunt after watching Four Rooms once too often.
Good interview between Tony Pierce and antidisestablishmentarian, wherein Tony advances his favorite theory on the number of the Beast.
CNET bought ironicer-than-thou dating site Consumating.
Flickrd: Steve Rubel meets Peter Brady actor Chris Knight and his supermodel wife. Or as our friend DL Byron (who stumbled on this) says, “A-list glomming onto C-list.”
Jack of All Blogs nominates Blogebrity for “Best Designed Worst Content Blog” … in his own miniature award show. Our only opponent in the category is the thoroughly delightful Damn I’m Cute, so I guess Blogebrity wins one award this year.
Nick Denton is taking this “make Consumerist fugly” idea as far as he can.
Defamer punks an Aussie newspaper with news of a Mel Gibson Holocaust Jew-v-Nazi battle scene.
If Tony Pierce blogged for hits, he’d have used the photos that show those girls’ tits.
And now a gratuitous opinion from Nick.
Why do some of us (us being the privileged, educated upper class) have to take pranks and turn them into culture jamming? Can you just … just get a grip? You are not a revolution. You are not space monkeys bringing the world back to square one. You are just clever civilization-vandalists undermining a system you’d do better to co-opt. There is less honor and nobility in your fight than in one with pillows. And that one has better photos.
Gawker Media and the Huffington Post, thrilled by their New York affair, call up the kids and party again in Defamer-ruled Los Angeles. Gridskipper throws up low-res photos, including an Arianna grip-and-grin and Mark Lisanti looking undefinably non-bloggeresque. Defamer and HuffPo, all business, haven’t blogged the party yet. They’re probably waiting for a more photoshopped gallery to link to.
Update: Tony Pierce points us to better pics at Buzznet.
The buzz around the Internets this morning–if you can sidestep the Google Base chatter for a moment–is all about Nick Denton’s deal to bring Gawker, Defamer, Gizmodo, Lifehacker and Wonkette to Yahoo! News.
As of the deal’s announcement last night, the content sharing was, at least partially, already in place on Y! News — if you’re wondering what this new media mashup will look like, here’s Gizmodo on Yahoo! News right now.
The details (how much $$–if any–is changing hands, exactly where I find these Defamer stories on Y! News) are yet to be confirmed, but reactions are already pouring in:
Jeff Jarvis calls it “the Smarter Way”:
You can’t buy enough blogs. And you shouldn’t want to. Part of the value of blogs is their independence. And in a medium that is doubling every five months, owning 50 or 100 or even 1,000 blogs is nothing. Having a relationship with thousands more will be worth more.
Once again, Nick Denton zigs where Jason Calacanis zags. Instead of shopping Gawker Media, Denton is teaming up with Yahoo for the blog network’s first multi-blog major distribution deal.
The gap between big media and micro media is narrowing.
I’m of the mind that partnering is smarter than acquisition at this point in the blogosphere. Let’s see how this one plays out.
Oh, and here’s the official press release, if you’re looking to relive all the above information in juicy corporate P.R.-speak.
Trent Vanegas got interviewed by the New York Times and he did not even tell me. Flaunt this, dude!
Best known for the snappily catty and funny comments about paparazzi photos – Jake goes for coffee! Britney buys gas! – that open each day’s post, the site’s popularity has allowed Mr. Vanegas, 31, to quit his job as a Detroit-area schoolteacher.
Words from the Defamer and a god-like depiction of Trent follow the jump.
Read the rest of this entry »
Jesse Oxfeld, Andrew Krucoff, and Mark Lisanti show up at a Radar party.
More photos from the ANIMAL party. I want a Save Krucoff button. Seriously. Send me yours PLEASE.
Shelley Powers sees a male bias, buzz bias, and A-list bias in Tech Memeorandum.
A Quicktime video showing live-action Flickr sharing. From Sascha Pohflepp’s Flickr projects, which also include tag clouds projected onto t-shirts and a gallery of Fixr submissions. [via Kottke]
Brownpau writes a Flock parody. Refresh to remix. [via the peanut gallery]
The new Blogniscient looks slick.
When Jason Calacanis tries to coolhunt, it just hurts my eyes.
Tangible Brit used to look all slick. Now it’s just very sorry for what it’s done:
To Britney, Kevin, Sean, Jive Records, SONYBMG, and anyone else affected by this: I am deeply sorry for any pain I have caused you.
The images, as of now, have been destroyed. As soon as I learned of Britney’s not selling the images at all and after I was contacted by various media companies asking me for the images (which I did not comply to), I immediately removed the images from the internet.
Turns out, sez Stereogum, that photos of Britney Spears’ and Kevin Federline’s baby were loosed into the blogothing:
Looks like legitimate frameable photos of young Master Federline are in the wild, originally due to appear in People next week and subsequently pulled at her Fedliness’ request.
They link to UBritney, which took ‘em down too. Nothing at BritneySpy either. Defamer tells us that Britney’s not that innocent (Shut up, it’s the only Spears joke I have). They quote from Page Six:
BRITNEY Spears changed her mind about letting the world see her baby. The pop tart posed for studio shots with her new tot, Sean Preston Spears Federline, and hubby Kevin Federline last week in L.A. The pictures by Mark Liddel were supposed to go to People magazine for millions — but the next day, Spears “started freaking out,” our insider said. “She started crying that she was selling out her baby and couldn’t give up the pictures.” A People rep said, “We have not purchased nor paid for any photos of Britney this week.”
You can still see thumbnails at A Socialite’s Life. A shame we’ll never see the originals; the family almost doesn’t look ugly.
There’s a moral, children, and that moral is that Britney Spears is loathsome (and toxic. Okay, I’ll…I’ll just stop the title jokes). [Thanks, Steve]
Was it a harsh word from Scrivs? Omar Al-Hajjar drops the Webby Media network before launching a single member blog. Under two weeks have passed since WM’s first post. On the net, 90% of businesses fail before you’ve polished off the hors d’oeuvres from the launch party.
9rules posts an update, including the good news that blogger Richard got a column at ZDNet.
Mark Wade realizes he got into 9rules by the skin of his “LOL”ing teeth.
I Like Cameras is now in 9rules and Fine Fools.
b5media announces its new b5media forum, which joins the Fine Fools forum in offering conversation without immediate network profit.
A post on Denton’s blog is a fine celebration of Yahoo featuring Deadspin. And it’s quite tasteful to omit any announcement on Deadspin itself. But to link it from Gawker, Jalopnik, Screenhead, Kotaku, Defamer, Oddjack (that excludes Wonkette, Gridskipper, Sploid and Lifehacker. I didn’t check Fleshbot; there were people in the room), and forcing them to write words about it…that makes me feel less special in my pants.
Tags: blog+networks, Webby+Media, 9rules, Fine+Fools, b5media, Gawker+Media, Deadspin, I+Like+Cameras
Bucky Turco: Sex with Jessica Coen. Do it for the kids.
Some day, Neil Gaiman will stop blogging, and I will start crying into a torn copy of Anansi Boys.
VH1 pulls in Trent from Pink is the New Blog for their show “Best Week Ever.” Meanwhile, Jarvis is “with big guys from VH1 and you’re jealous.”
Aw dude, it’s Defamer, not Gawker, who calls Owen Wilson the butterscotch stallion.
Queerty interviews Apartment Therapy blog co-founder Maxwell Gillingham-Ryan.
Rocketboom thanks Jeff Jarvis for covering them in the Guardian.
Watch your gaze, Philip Torrone.
A history of medical blogs. [via Scripting News]
Krucoff cologne: Less sexy than Jeff Jarvis bodywash.
This Is What We Do Now lists the all-stars of snark. We’re not even alluded to. On the up side, we still have souls.
Gawker crashes its own party (the webcest we catalogued and huffed upon) and posts all the lovely photos Nick Denton flickr’d. Jess/Jesse’s captions are damn funny:
Arianna Huffington explains to Gawker co-editor Jessica Coen that Manolos really are worth the money. Shortly thereafter, Coen used her own $20 Payless heels to attack Huffington and steal her overpriced stilettos, which ended up being 4 sizes too big.
And now you can read all the pretty people talking about it.
Huffington wants to throw Defamer a party. Send a photographer! Maybe there will be CELebrities!
Jossip pretends the new Gawker comments are open only to influential bloggers. Hellz no; I got invited. I can’t influence my cat.
Romanesko highlights Nick’s reaming of an LA Weekly launch-day pan of HuffPo. Nick and the LAW writer poke each other gently in the aforementioned party photo comment thread.
Paul Scrivens congratulates GM on its comment threads in his 9rules blog Work Boxers, which, incidentally, is the beautiful thing of the day. Look at the snazzy front page.
