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AdAge Interviews Our Publisher, Nick Denton []

Erin Pettigrew — Wed, 20 May 2009 16:24:20 -0400

No one can better capture the origins, influence, and trajectory of the Gawker Media network than our founder and publisher, Nick Denton:

People — particularly if they're under 40 — have news priorities other than those of the editors of The New York Times or producers of the "NBC Nightly News." A new tablet from Apple — or last night's episode of "Gossip Girl" or the adventures of the hipster grifter — is a bigger deal than the latest petty scandal in Albany. You think that's a damning indictment of modern society and a recipe for idiocracy? Fine. Start a nonprofit to cover all the local-government news you think a healthy society needs. But don't expect advertisers — or commercially-minded publishers or readers, for that matter — to share your interests.

Economic climate and old media traditions be damned. Read more from AdAge.

Kotaku Editor In GamePro's 20 Most Influential []

Erin Pettigrew — Wed, 06 May 2009 12:14:09 -0400

GamePro rounded up its 20 Most Influential People in Gaming and Brian Crecente, Managing Editor of Kotaku, anchors the list. With "investigative grit and a healthy disregard for the rules," Crecente has built Kotaku into a "powerhouse" of video gaming news and culture. Congrats to Crecente and Kotaku for the recognition!

And for anyone doubting the relevancy of gaming to real life, Crecente sets us straight in his interview:

Video games as a subject is an endlessly fascinating topic, not just because it's about how people play, but because it touches on just about everything. As gaming writers we can delve into business reporting, look at education, the medical field, sociology, crime, art, the list goes on and on. As long as we remember to explore things beyond the realm of the creation and consumption of video games there will always be an opportunity to reach a broader, more mainstream audience.

Read the full profile at GamePro.

Establishing Cultural Cred []

Erin Pettigrew — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 11:07:23 -0400

"The family of Gawker sites has become at once a publishing success and part of the contemporary New York bohemian scene, like Andy Warhol's factory in the 1960s."

— Financial Times

T-Mobile, Sprint Ads Quote Gizmodo As Wireless Authority []

Erin Pettigrew — Thu, 12 Mar 2009 11:14:35 -0400

Further cementing Gizmodo as a wireless industry expert, both Sprint and T-Mobile recently sourced our wireless reviews in national ad campaigns. Photos and video of both below!

Check out Sprint's flashy promotion for the new Samsung Instinct. The campaign ran both on the web and in large out-of-home billboard installations in Times Square, JFK, and other highly trafficked public spaces. Sprint drew on Gizmodo's technical expertise, quoting a wireless connectivity and speed test that we conducted in NYC.

And just a few days later we were flipping through channels and caught this T-Mobile ad! It clipped Gizmodo's ogling of the G1's screen for its 'Glowing Reviews' TV campaign. T-Mobile's reference is less technical than Sprint's, which shows the industry is catching on to Gizmodo's influence on both pure techies and lifestyle consumers. Watch:

Commenter Activity Growing 120% Annually []

Erin Pettigrew — Tue, 10 Mar 2009 20:19:36 -0400

A quick glimpse at the astounding increase in comment volume over the past few years.

In 2008, registered Gawker Media commenters posted 5.9 million missives in response to our editors' posts. That number was 120% greater than comment volume in 2007.

2009 is off to an equally impressive start. We're averaging 600,000 comments per month already (last year's monthly average hovered at 500k).

Gawker's Hollywood Column: Defamer []

Erin Pettigrew — Tue, 24 Feb 2009 12:10:44 -0500

Media, culture, celebrity, and the markets they inhabit are converging. So too is our coverage: We're reining in Hollywood title Defamer as a column on Gawker. We will continue to report the movie industry beat under the larger Gawker brand as the property evolves into a more national gossip site. More coverage here: NYT, LA Times.

3 Gawker Media Writers in Forbes Web Celeb 25 [Awards]

Erin Pettigrew — Tue, 03 Feb 2009 18:18:16 -0500

Every year, Forbes ranks the 25 most influential and recognizable digital celebrities, calling them "the biggest and brightest stars on the web." We're not sure what makes Forbes qualified to do this, but the money mag's accolades have not gone unnoticed. This year, three of our writers claimed spots on the critically eyed list - the Forbes Web Celeb 25:

Will Leitch - "rose to fame as the editor of Deadspin, the world's biggest independent sports blog"

Owen Thomas - "best known as the editor of Valleywag...infamous [!]"

Brian Lam - "man behind the curtain at one of the biggest blogs in the world—gadget site Gizmodo"

Our writers appear with other Internet notables and fameseekers: Matt Drudge, Seth Godin, Perez Hilton, Kevin Rose, etc.

Guinness World Records Hails Kotaku as "Best Gaming News" [Kotaku]

Erin Pettigrew — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 20:07:15 -0500

It's not quite an entry in the famed book itself, but a blog post on Guinness World Records names Kotaku as the best site for gaming news. Being in the (near) company of the world's most-Amazon-like woman and dwarfest man brings inexplicable joy to us. What other digital media group can say the same? None.

Gawker Media Drives "Engagement" [Comments]

Erin Pettigrew — Mon, 02 Feb 2009 19:41:17 -0500

Providing perhaps the worst interactive marketing pun opportunity ever, two of our readers have met via our sites and are getting engaged! They flirted — below-the-fold — in the comment sections of Deadspin and Gawker before meeting up and calling it bliss. Full story on Gawker, which was picked up by the Examiner.

Consumerist Gets a New Home [Consumerist]

Erin Pettigrew — Wed, 31 Dec 2008 18:07:41 -0500

In probably the most fitting match in publishing history, our advocacy blog Consumerist is transitioning to new ownership under Consumers Union, the non-profit publisher of Consumer Reports.

While Consumerist has always attracted an enviably marketable audience, selling to brands within the consumer advocacy context has proved challenging.

Consumerist's new home with Consumers Union repositions the site as a news and discussion property that will not rely on advertiser support. The original editors will stay on and continue to break and report news on relationships between companies and consumers.

From its launch in 2005 to its last days with Gawker Media in 2008, Consumerist has been wildly popular, disarmingly influential, and a top notch example of the way that web publishing is powering information dissemination and change.

With this departure, Gawker Media continues to streamline our stable of properties, steering toward news and entertainment sites that attract a top tier readership and innovative brand marketers.

See news coverage from CNET, AdWeek, The New York Times, MediaPost

CNN Gets Up Close and Personal with Gizmodo [Video]

Erin Pettigrew — Wed, 17 Dec 2008 15:01:47 -0500

We're ready for our close up! Check out this clip where Giz gets a lengthy once-over from CNN anchor Veronica De La Cruz as she covers the day's tech news.

Then read the featured story here:

Blackberry: $20, McCain-Palin's Contacts: Priceless

Gawker Media Network Captures Record 297 Million Views [Traffic]

Erin Pettigrew — Mon, 24 Nov 2008 22:20:18 -0500

Traffic activity for the month of October hit a record high. Gawker Media's network of 12 properties attracted 297 million pageviews over the 31 days of newsmaking.

The more important numbers to our marketers, however, are audience figures! Gawker, Gizmodo, Kotaku, Jezebel, et al now reach a total of

13 million US uniques
22 million global uniques

For more detailed stats information, check out Gawker Media on Quantcast.

Gawker Hosts Toby Young's Film Launch at SoHo House [Parties]

Erin Pettigrew — Thu, 02 Oct 2008 16:15:06 -0400

Last night, literati and glitterati gathered at SoHo House to celebrate the launch of Toby Young's book-turned-film — How to Lose Friends and Alienate People. The venture tracks the British writer's rise and fall in the New York publishing scene as an editor at Vanity Fair.

The film's stars Simon Pegg and Kirsten Dunst were joined by Tom Arnold, Malcolm Gladwell, Gawker's own Nick Denton, David Carr, Julia Allison, and others in throwing back glasses to celebrate. Gawker Media sponsored the soiree.

See party coverage and nightlife slideshow on Gawker

Traffic and Commenting at Highest Levels Ever [Traffic]

Erin Pettigrew — Wed, 01 Oct 2008 16:49:53 -0400

With politics, tech, and entertainment in a frenzy, Gawker Media continues to set internal and competitive web traffic records as it covers the news. Both traffic and commenting set all-time records in September 2008.

Traffic Is Booming
The network of 12 titles received an astounding 274 million pageviews, a 69% jump over one year ago to our highest level yet. An approximate 22 million global unique visitors (13 million US) contributed to this total, making the Gawker Media network a definitive and influential reporting source for a myriad of news followers.

How does our audience benchmark against those of other publishers? Comparisons are difficult across the chaotic landscape of audience measurement, but here's a glance at where we stand amongst other news properties that enroll in Quantcast's Quantified Publisher Program (a pioneer in direct traffic measurement):

Quantified Publishers, ranked by US Unique Visitors, past 30 days
13.2 million - Gawker Media
11.5 million - Digg
10.7 million - Newsweek.com
9.5 million - Huffington Post

Commenting Activity is Unrivaled
Readers added over half a million comments to editor posts in September and just over 1.58 million comments across the network in the third quarter of 2008.

Commenting frequency is at an all-time high with an average 17,639 comments posted each day. The 17k figure is a result of steady, upward growth, to the tune of 130% in the past year.

Overall, the economy may be spiraling downward, but Gawker Media's news and entertainment coverage continues to attract a sizable, responsive — and therefore highly marketable — digital audience.

Art@Gawker Opens with the Work of Ken Parris [Artists]

Erin Pettigrew — Tue, 02 Sep 2008 14:59:35 -0400

Until recently, Gawker Artists featured artists and their works in purely digital format via the web. We're now venturing into the physical space with Art@Gawker, a quarterly exhibition of selected artists' works in the Gawker Media headquarters in SoHo. Programming and installations are directed by Liz Dimmitt, Curator of Gawker Artists.

Art@Gawker opened this summer with selected works by Ken Parris, a Brooklyn-based mixed media and collage artist and member of Gawker Artists since 2006. His paintings, collages, and dimensional works were displayed throughout the loft space on Elizabeth Street. The exhibition culminated in a gathering of art-lovers, culture-hounds, and city-dwellers for a viewing of Parris' exhibition and wine-tasting!

Congrats and thanks to Ken and Liz for bringing this program to fruition! Photos of the event are below —

Gawker Media Sets All Time Traffic Record in July [Traffic]

Erin Pettigrew — Mon, 04 Aug 2008 16:55:31 -0400

With a subtle peak, July 2008 surpassed the previous all-time traffic record (January's MacWorld spike) to set a brand new record of 254 million monthly pageviews! For benchmarking against other publishers, that's twice what the Los Angeles Times' site LATimes.com received in July (source: Editor & Publisher). With growth over May and June at just over 6% each month, Gawker Media has resumed an aggressive but normalized upward trend.

Also important is the year-over-year growth that continues with this new high. Gawker Media's network traffic level is 70% higher than last year, 330% greater than in July 2006, and a whopping 700% higher than three years ago in 2005.

Our stable of titles has both grown and contracted, but individual properties continue to impress. Several sites set records this month with exclusives, features, and organic growth in readership.

July 2008 traffic by title:

Gizmodo 73.5m
Kotaku 44.3m*
Lifehacker 25.6m*
Gawker 18.9m*
Fleshbot 17.4m
Jezebel 15.5m
Consumerist 13.7m*
Jalopnik 13.4m
Deadspin 12.6m*
io9 8.8m*
Defamer 6.4m
Valleywag 3.3m

*These sites set new traffic records this month.

Overall, an impressive month.

Gawker Artists Relaunches [Artists]

Erin Pettigrew — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 17:47:45 -0400

Breaking! The attractive younger sibling of our content titles, Gawker Artists, has officially relaunched with a flashy redesign, new branding, improved browsing, and interactivity. It's a fitting new showcase — with lots more depth and utility — for our growing exhibition of emerging and noted artists from around the country.

WHAT'S NEW

In addition to the splashy new layout, we've dug in to add some new features to the site. Art connoisseurs can now

Sort artists by medium

Search the entire collection

Make comments

Add artists to "Favorites"

View artists by recency and popularity

Email and post artist profiles to the web

ABOUT GAWKER ARTISTS

In late 2005, we began rotating provocative artwork from a half dozen artists alongside irreverent content from Gawker Media titles as an alternative to advertising. Now in mid-2008, Gawker Artists is an ongoing web exhibition that promotes 560 artists through both Gawker Media sites and over 130 Exhibitor sites.

As the program strengthens, we continue to invite submissions for both Artists and Exhibitors. Participation is free and submissions are accepted on a rolling basis. Gawker Artists is curated by Liz Dimmitt. For more information, send notes to artists@gawker.com.

IN BRIEF

560 Artists
130 Exhibitors (sites displaying Gawker Artists' works)

"Gawker Artists is a collection of Gawker-published artists who benefit from the wide reach of Gawker Media blogs, gaining awareness they'd otherwise have to pay for." — AdRants

Stalker Catches Creatives in Action at PSFK Conference SF [Stalker]

Erin Pettigrew — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 11:04:02 -0400

Ad people get ribbed for being drunks, but we have evidence that creatives have fun, too! We recently sent our intrepid Gawker Stalker: Ad Edition photographer cross-country to document trendsetter hijinks for one of the best creative congresses around — PSFK Conference SF. The event attracted creative thinkers and experts from the most forward-thinking brands and agencies today.

When was the last time you had that much fun at work? Also, be sure to check out the coverage on PSFK.

Gawker Stalker: Ad Edition @ PSFK Conference SF

June Traffic Roundup: 239 Million Pageviews [Traffic]

Erin Pettigrew — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 16:36:48 -0400

Although a carefree summer month, June brought healthy traffic for Gawker Media — 239 million views across all properties.

Gizmodo's coverage of the Steve Jobs keynote on June 9 and a record-breaking streak for Lifehacker helped propel the network to this near quarter billion number.

June's tally is 100 million more views than the network saw one year ago and a significant step up from just one month ago.

Gizmodo Is A Top 5 Destination for iPhone News [Gizmodo]

Erin Pettigrew — Fri, 27 Jun 2008 11:26:52 -0400

Gizmodo's prominence in technology news continues to skyrocket! comScore released figures today reporting that Gawker Media (powered strongly by Gizmodo) welcomed the 5th largest share of all iPhone related search activity in April.

We're in the Top 5 with tech empires Apple and Google and have actually beaten out other notable tech properties CNET, Yahoo!, and AT&T (the official iPhone carrier).

Americans conducted 7 million searches for the Apple iPhone in April and 5.1% of that activity directed visitors to Gawker Media pages like Gizmodo's extensive coverage of the new iPhone 3G. Google and Apple's shares of iPhone search activity were 9% and 18% respectively.

Interestingly, comScore measured the market well before the Apple WWDC conference and confirmation of the iPhone 3G hit later in June. Gizmodo's killer liveblog (attracting 14 million pageviews on June 9 alone) has since provided some of the best iPhone news available to searchers on the web.

See the press release and data at comScore

Explore Gizmodo's Apple iPhone coverage

Five Gawker Sites on Vanity Fair's Blog Map [Press]

Erin Pettigrew — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 21:28:01 -0400

Vanity Fair's "Blogopticon" is a cheeky, visual response to the question: "Who's worth reading on the Internet?" The diagram arrays the web's most influential blogs by tone and content and includes five of our titles:

Jezebel
Valleywag
Consumerist
Gawker
Defamer

From Vanity Fair: View the Blogopticon and Read the Article.

Jalopnik as in Jalopy [Video]

Erin Pettigrew — Sat, 14 Jun 2008 00:16:14 -0400

Stuart Varney of FOX Business Channel can't get enough of our automotive property's monicker: Jalopnik. His mild-mannered British exclamations bookend Jalopnik editor/expert Matt Hardigree's analysis of the luxury car market downturn:

So, yep, Varney's a smart one. "Jalopnik" emerged from a bit of arcane wordplay and possibly a few ice cold brews several years ago..!

226 Million Pageviews and Growing [Traffic]

Erin Pettigrew — Fri, 13 Jun 2008 17:07:19 -0400

We're a little late with blogging our pretty graph this month thanks to some [insert technical jargon here], but nevertheless here it is!

Gawker Media sites saw 226 million pageviews in May 2008. That's a slight gain over last month and another step toward resuming normal trending after January's unprecedented spike. Year-over-year growth continues to be impressive: our properties received 80% more impressions in May 2008 than in May 2007.

Of course we're not just keeping tabs on pages delivered but on audience growth as well...

Three key metrics for Gawker Media, May 2008:

Pageviews: 226 million
Unique Visitors (aggregate): 32.9 million
Unique Visitors (de-duplicated): 27.2 million

Sources: Internal traffic measurement and Quantcast

Jezebel's Unprecedented Feminism is Big News [Press]

Erin Pettigrew — Fri, 30 May 2008 16:47:27 -0400

Jezebel has, in its heady first year of life, ripped figurative glossy covers off women's mags, exposed dirty deceptions in beauty and fashion, condemned superfluous grooming and subservient social conventions, and forcefully remodeled our culture's understanding of the modern female's dilemmas and achievements. Whew!

But the site's readership — at over 1 million monthly unique visitors — isn't the only group to take note of the new feminism. The New York Times, The Wall Street Journal, and FOX News recently featured Jezebel for its prohibition against celebrity bashing. Big media has called this a ban against "bodysnarking," but it's just a slice of the broader, smarter conversation on femininity that's evolving from Jezebel and its vocal readership. Check out coverage of Jezebel and its editorial direction from the big newsmakers:

FOX News guest says Jezebel sets the example.

Jezebel.com is a very popular blog for women... They cover celebrity media, but they said "look, we're not going to tolerate our commenters making negative comments about women's bodies. That's a really positive step, and other media should take a cue from that.

Read the recap post on Jezebel >>

"The Rise of Bodysnarking" names the movement and Jezebel as one of its spearheads.

Jezebel... resolved to do something about weight. This wasn't a gimmick to kick-start dieting among its loyal band of female readers. This was a resolution aimed at changing the way young women talk about one another.... [Jezebel Editor, Anna Holmes] was blowing the whistle on bodysnarking, the snide, often witty, comments that have become a ubiquitous part of under-30 female conversation.

"Not On Our Blog You Won't" profiles Jezebel's unlikely editorial view and commenter community.

The Jezebel blog was founded last spring by Gawker Media as a smart, feisty antidote to traditional women's magazines (or "glossy insecurity factories," as Jezebel describes them).

Jezebel appeals to a young, urban demographic, with a roster of editors whose strong voices inspire loyal followings. Ms. Egan shares details of her intimate life that are not safe for work. Maureen Tkacik...gravitates toward politics and speaks out against what she calls the "idiocracy." Dodai Stewart...pokes fun at magazines and catalogs; in a feature called LOLVogue, she writes satirical captions for fashion spreads.

Jezebel's readers — they often call themselves "Jezzies" or "Jezebelles"— are permitted to post to the site after a first prospective comment is approved by a Gawker Media staffer, and must adhere to some basic rules: be witty and relevant, no whining and don't attack people.

Work in Advertising? You're Being Stalked! [New]

Erin Pettigrew — Mon, 19 May 2008 14:25:43 -0400

So a few of us are down at the iMedia Agency Summit in Austin, TX this week... and as usual, we're documenting all the after-hours thrills 'n spills!

For snapshots of ad industry folk caught stirring up mayhem, get yourself over to the "Advertising Edition" of our popular Gawker Stalker celeb tracker. Be sure to tag people you know, add captions, and make comments.

It's all here: AdStalker

Everybody's Doing It: Commenting [Comments]

Erin Pettigrew — Sat, 17 May 2008 03:56:34 -0400

We opened the floodgates to user comments in 2006 and have never looked back. As a result, commenting volume, quality, interactivity, and complexity have since increased multiple-fold on our properties. Undoubtedly some of the most interesting conversations and deep-linking narratives now occur in the expressive sandbox below our editorial fold — the commenters' dominion! Here's a look at how this subset of vocal readers is burgeoning at Gawker Media.

POPULATION
Nearly 100,000 new commenters registered this past quarter. This new registration sum is 220% higher than in Q1 2007. Newsbreaking editorial and opinionated discourse continue to attract new members to our group. (It should be noted that commenter status isn't attained by just providing an email address to get login credentials. Becoming a Gawker commenter requires a "first comment audition," and keeping the login requires continued high quality commenting!)

VOLUME & FREQUENCY
So just how much volume does this kind of registration growth create? Well, this same time last year our commenters were posting 4,300 daily missives. In Q1 2008, our readers published an average of 480,000 comments per month across our sites, which is a daily average of nearly 16,000 individual opinions. That's 270% growth in volume over the past year. With the population growth at 220% percent and the volume growth at 270%, the average number of comments per user is significantly higher. Our commenters are now engaging in a more frequent and intricate pattern of discourse than they were last year.

INTERACTION
In addition to making comments, our readers follow and befriend other commenters and keep track of their activity with a personalized friend feed. The uptake on these interactive tools since their introduction in late 2007 is impressive. The below graph depicts the continued increase in daily friend "following" over the first quarter of 2008. Most recently, our membership has been "subscribing" to between 400 and 600 new commenters every weekday.

So the quick 'n dirty takeaways on these charts and figures? Gawker Media commenters are growing in number, output, and interactivity year after year. And while visitor metrics are the traditional proxies for reach, tracking growth in active member participation gives a fascinating new view into how our network is expanding its audience and influence.

Gawker Traffic Holds Strong after Network Trimming [Traffic]

Erin Pettigrew — Fri, 09 May 2008 11:32:23 -0400

April traffic, at 221 million pageviews, sustained March traffic numbers. The modest, horizontal growth is the hybrid result of some lost traffic to our three departed sites (Idolator, Gridskipper, Wonkette) and new, record-breaking growth by sites that continue on in our group (Kotaku, Deadspin, Fleshbot saw new highs this month). The net-zero difference is exactly the negligible effect we expected to see after carefully trimming our titles.

As a collective, the Gawker Media group is still settling back into its proper growth slope after January's massive spike upset (in a good way!) our usual monthly traffic movement.

And Then There Were Twelve [News]

Erin Pettigrew — Mon, 14 Apr 2008 12:19:38 -0400

News hit the wires today that we're letting go of three titles: Idolator, Wonkette, and Gridskipper. You can bet these brands will be missed, but the individual losses will have negligible effect on the network as a whole. VP of Sales Chris Batty advises, "The company is organizing around [its] best opportunities" for marketers and "this is unmistakably good news."

Below some key facts on the Gawker Media network as it continues on today and then, head on over to Gawker for a Letter from the Publisher, Nick Denton.

GAWKER MEDIA KEY FACTS

* A dozen sites, Gizmodo first launched in August 2002, most recent, io9, in January 2008
* Gawker, Gizmodo, Kotaku, Lifehacker, Jalopnik, Deadspin, Defamer, Jezebel, Valleywag, io9, Consumerist, Fleshbot
* A record 18 "Bloggie" nominations in 2008, way more than any other blog collective (one of those was for Idolator)
* Audience of 29.7m unique visitors a month for the whole network, up 82% at annualized rate
* Each individual site has at least 1m uniques or, in the case of io9, soon will
* Pageviews of 227m in March — 219m if you take out the three sites being spun out — up 89% on a year earlier (Sitemeter)
* For those who measure these things, Gawker is the web's leading independent blog group

Gawker Invades Inboxes [New]

Erin Pettigrew — Sun, 13 Apr 2008 20:16:57 -0400

Breaking! Readers can now subscribe to weekly top headlines for any Gawker title. Sign up is simple — just enter an email address on the sidebar of your favorite Gawker site. Post roundups will be delivered each week to inboxes (or via Skype, AIM, Twitter, etc.).

You may be wondering why we're doing this, since e-newsletters are embarrassingly 1999.

Well, we're aware of that. This new feature, though, is less about technology and more about finding the most important, provocative pieces on our sites and serving them up in a neat, consumable package.

Over time, our publishing rate has accelerated markedly. Right now, we publish thousands of posts per week across Gawker titles: Gizmodo does about 350 stories a week, Gawker does around 300, and so on. Helping our audience out of its crazed blog-reading myopia to see what resonated in the past week and what's worth continued discussion are the real goals.

Funny how sometimes growth can seem backward and really, actually, move you forward.

TIME Mag Begrudgingly Calls Us Useful, Interesting [Awards]

Erin Pettigrew — Mon, 07 Apr 2008 20:16:05 -0400

More evidence that print media is bowing out of the race (but not without some self-aggrandizing humor)!

"From millions of blogs about nothing" Time Magazine selected for its First Annual Blog Index the 25 online pubs that are the "best about something." Huh? What are they implying about the purpose of digital publishing there? We're not sure whether to bemoan our "nothingness" or be glad for our "somethingness," but we got a warm, fuzzy feeling upon seeing that Consumerist, Lifehacker, and Gawker made their first "top blogs" list!

So even if it seems like Time is barely acknowledging our existence, we'll go ahead and take the confusing accolades in whatever shape they come. They're probably just mad no one reads them anymore. But any compliment is a good compliment, so check out the reviews!

Lifehacker

Sometimes, life throws so many problems at you at once that you just want some quick and dirty solutions. That's what makes Lifehacker one of the few truly — gasp — useful blogs on the net. Lifehacker is full of tips, shortcuts, downloads, web sites, do-it-yourself projects, and how-to's for getting small things done and moving on with life.

Consumerist

The Consumerist is the blog where shoppers can bite back and sometimes even leave deep teeth marks. As the editors put it: 'We're not anti-capitalist; we're anti-stupid-capitalist.'

Gawker

This is the blog that turned snark into success...Gawker's relentlessly critical, headache-inducing cynicism about, oh, practically everything...would seem downright mean it weren't for its usual juicy targets: the self-important boobs that rule Manhattan media and society.

Jezebel Sellout Tops April Fool's Pranks [Jezebel]

Erin Pettigrew — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 18:06:20 -0400

The great bastions of digital (and even print) media view April Fool's Day as a 24-hour window for lawlessness and deception. Hence Google's burgeoning collection of 4/1 tomfoolery and many media outlets' archives of fake news. Gawker Media's love for April's opening day is no different (though some would say that behavior isn't necessarily confined to a single holiday).

This year's punditry? Jezebel announced a sellout (in more ways than one!) to CondéNast's digital arm, CondéNet — complete with a faux press release and requisite notices of editorial slayings. The ladysite then spent the day bathing itself in the Vogue-esque fashion doctrine, vapid celebrity idolatry, and unquestioning man-worship that its audience so loathes. Nothing like dipping into the submissive side of feminism to incite an uproar in the Jezebel community!

The prank won acclaim as one of the day's best from Crain's , the Chicago Tribune, and The New York Times as well as a smug, humorless rejection from CondéNast itself [via Portfolio].

Check out the coverage!

Gawker has finally started to sell itself off. And the first buyer—perhaps unsurprisingly—is Condé Nast. Or so it seems.
At least, that's how Gawker's Nick Denton would like us to report the pseudo-news that Gawker Media has sold its shoot-from-the-hips women's fashion and celebrity site, Jezebel. With cross-postings announcing the sale—and disposition of the staff—on both Gawker.com and Jezebel.com Tuesday morning, Gawker Media has apparently and at long last entered the fast-paced media acquisitions market.

A press release, supposedly found on PRNewswire, proclaims that Gawker has sold Jezebel to CondéNet, the Internet arm of Condé Nast, at the top of its popularity. "Launched in May 2007 with only three staff members, the site quickly [has become] popular with affluent, well-educated female 'tastemakers,'" the release declares, claiming Jezebel got "more than 14.5 million page views" in March 2008. The only insight into the gag: A quote from CondéNet president Sarah Chubb, noting that "Of course, even the best concepts need airbrushing!"

By late afternoon, the Jezebel website was emblazoned with a new logo reading Condé Nast's Jezebel, and further announcements of staff changes. (Editors Anna Holmes and Dodai Stewart to leave; editors Christine Taylor-Wood, Eva Braunstein and Daphne Martin, to take over.)

Like most good April Fool's Day pranks, the Gawker/Jezebel hoax had reporters scratching their heads... [Crain's]

And, browse the entire day's spoof coverage on Jezebel!

Traffic Hits 228 Million Views in March [Traffic]

Erin Pettigrew — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 17:53:06 -0400

This time we'll let the graph speak for itself with a few minor notes:

Five of our fifteen sites hit all time records for pageviews this month —

Kotaku 35.1 million
Fleshbot 18.6 million
Consumerist 12.9 million
Wonkette 5.8 million
Valleywag 5 million

The sum total of views across the network was 228 million.

For an inside view on the editorial side of the madness, see this related Traffic Report, which details how Gawker has surpassed expectations by growing its readership and continuing to break news despite criticism.

Lifehacker and Jezebel Win Bloggies! [Awards]

Erin Pettigrew — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 14:56:43 -0400

For thousands of nerds who descend on Austin for SXSW each year, the Bloggies are just a 20 minute blip amidst a frenzy of panels, parties, and nerdery.

But there is something to this awards show that still attracts a lot of attention in the virtual roundups after SXSW, especially as each year sees the blogging medium closer and closer to adulthood. That something is the Bloggies' representation of pure democratic economy at work: blogreaders choosing their favorite blogs. Effectively, consumers electing their favorite producers. It's a sort of "People's Choice Awards" of the blog scene.

This year, Gawker Media received a number of nominations from the blogosphere that culminated in three sweet wins for two of our sites!

Best New Weblog: Jezebel
Jezebel burst onto the lady blogging scene in 2007 and (literally) pissed on the female magazine paradigm of man-pleasing grooming and sex tips.

Best Group Weblog: Jezebel
These ladies know how to work together: their frequent IM chat postings and back-and-forth liveblogging prove it.

Best Computers or Technology Weblog: Lifehacker
Lifehacker, a perennial favorite amongst geeks, continues to publish compelling and fresh technology content.

Cheers to our winners, especially their hardworking editors and the news/gossip that keeps their keyboards clacking!

'50 Most Powerful Blogs' Includes Jezebel and Gawker [Lists]

Erin Pettigrew — Mon, 10 Mar 2008 11:27:31 -0400

We awoke this morning to the Observer UK's list of "The World's 50 Most Powerful Blogs." Within the admittedly "idiosyncratic" compilation of regular web favorites and obscure indie blogger manifestos, Gawker took the #10 spot and Jezebel the #22. Although a global canvass, the UK list isn't about empirical figures like reach or pageviews. Instead it serves up what are — in The Observer's opinion — damn clever reads that are stirring up controversy in the educated digital populace.

On Gawker's editorial trendsetting:

"Gawker and its brethren are the epitome of a certain kind of blogging - fast, furious, scurrilous, bitchy and unashamed."

On Jezebel's gritty feminist revolution:

"Last year Gawker Media launched Jezebel - a blog which aimed to become a brilliant version of a women's magazine. It succeeded quickly, in part by acknowledging the five big lies perpetuated by the women's media...It offers the best lady-aimed writing on the web, along with lots of nice pictures of Amy Winehouse getting out of cars."

For full coverage from The Observer at The Guardian site:

Nick Denton and the Observer's favourite blogs
The Brit dishing the dirt on America
The world's 50 most powerful blogs

Gawker Readers Post 16,000 Comments per Day [Traffic]

Erin Pettigrew — Tue, 04 Mar 2008 17:41:57 -0500

January's traffic magnets (MacWorld, CES, Scientology) were difficult acts to follow, but February made gains of its own.

Readers posted an astounding 485,393 comments across our 15 sites in February. That puts the average at 16,738 comments per day, which is the highest activity level we've ever seen across Gawker properties.

At 219 million pageviews, traffic declined softly but continues to show momentum. Setting aside the January spike, growth from December to February held strong at 29%. Contributing heavily to this increase — Kotaku (33.8m), Jezebel (16.4m), Consumerist (10.8m), and Valleywag (4.4m) with their highest monthly numbers ever.

Takeaways? Last month's noisy news events may have exited, but publishing and reader activity on Gawker properties continue to chug along, month over month.

8.1 Million Read Gawker Titles Says Nielsen [Metrics]

Erin Pettigrew — Fri, 15 Feb 2008 13:47:54 -0500

With January's explosive traffic and addictive newsbreaking also comes an increase in projections of Gawker Media's audience size. Nielsen, the heralded media statistics machine, now projects that Gawker Media's audience is 8.1 million monthly unique users, aggregated across home and work access points.

This figure nearly doubles Nielsen's measurement in December (4.7 million), but for varying reasons actual monthly growth is difficult to assess. Yes, traffic spiked phenomenally in January, but this month is also the first time that Nielsen's figure consolidates audiences for all of Gawker Media's 15 titles (where before it ignored several properties and underestimated our total network size).

As for accuracy, this new 8.1 million estimation keeps pace much better with our internal metrics but still falls behind our own site-hosted analytics. That gap will always be difficult to close due to the differences in projection by an outsider and actual measurement on the inside. The good news for you, though, is that since Nielsen now considers all of our properties in its estimation of Gawker Media's audience, our network figure can more accurately compare to Nielsen figures from other web publications going forward.

A January to Remember [Traffic]

Erin Pettigrew — Fri, 01 Feb 2008 13:46:58 -0500

At exactly this time last year, the collective pageviews of Gawker Media sites had just crested 100 million (see January 2007 traffic for details). This January, our stable of 15 titles steamed past their own benchmarks again to garner an unprecedented 248 million views.

The increase represents 46% growth over December and a 130% swell over 12 months ago.

January is traditionally a strong month with heavy tech attention on MacWorld and CES, but the launch of our sci-fi site io9, newsbreaking by all properties, and a Scientology celebrity exclusive made this January exceptional.

Eight Gawker Media Sites Nominated for 2008 Bloggies [Awards]

Erin Pettigrew — Thu, 24 Jan 2008 16:45:25 -0500

Every year, blog popularity contest The Bloggies invites the Internet-at-large to select and promote achievers in independent online publishing. Though their cachet and sex appeal are embarassingly far below real do-gooder contests like Pulitzer or Oscar, The Bloggies do say a lot about what the web audience reads and recommends to others online. So what's buzzing in digital content this year? For starters, 8 of our titles with a collective 18 award nominations!

Deadspin, Idolator, and Kotaku will each vie to win Best Weblog awards in their content categories.

Gizmodo and Lifehacker are nominated for several awards each, including Computing/Tech, Design, Lifetime Achievement, and Weblog of the Year.

New face Jezebel burst on the scene this year with noms for Best Fashion Weblog, Best Group Weblog, and Best New Weblog.

Industry darkhorse Consumerist received nods in the Best Topical Weblog and Weblog of the Year categories.

And lovely lady Gawker will vie with her old guard brethren for the Lifetime Achievement award.

Hearty congrats to our editors and readers for their recognitions in the 2008 Bloggies!

Haven't voted for your favorites yet? Click on over and mark your ballots! Polls close January 31.

Gawker Infiltrates the Cashmere Mafia [Gawker]

Erin Pettigrew — Sun, 13 Jan 2008 16:05:10 -0500

We're a bit late in pointing you to this self-referential morsel, but the leggy ladies of Cashmere Mafia namechecked Gawker in the ABC show's second episode:

Bonnie Sommerville to Lucy Liu: "...it got over 6,000 hits on Gawker!"

Consumerist Is "OK" [Consumerist]

Richard Lawson — Thu, 10 Jan 2008 13:31:43 -0500

In a recent AdAge article on expanding brand communities, our watchdog site The Consumerist got a nice shout-out. The article says:

The Consumerist tends to post follow-up stories, so what begins as a warning against a certain company can reveal the care and concern by that same company reaching out to invest itself in customer concerns.

Expand Your Brand Community Online
[AdAge]