It’s a real shame what greed and incompetence will do to a good thing. We saw it happen over at the site that shall not be named, and we are watching it happen live at Deadspin this very day.
It all started with an ad. Or rather, a series of ads as a result of a new, universally hated advertisement policy. Deadspin started to feature auto play, auto sound, video advertising. You see, Deadspin and it’s various collection of Gawker website always pushed the bounds of advertisement, but it was always at least semi-reasonable. Readers complained loud and they complained often. The writers put up a post describing the situation, that the ads were out of their control and they were begging management to stop it. That post was removed by management, in an apparent violation of their union agreement.
Following that post, management sent a memo telling Deadspin writers to “stick to sports” This…did not go over well. One of the key foundations to Deadspin has always been their ability to write intelligently about not only sports, but how sports relates to the rest of the world at any given time.
So the writers retaliated the only way they know how. They started writing posts that were clearly in defiance to their new edict, while following the letter of the law precisely. They started posting posts that were all tagged as “Stick to Sports” They started posting articles with not so thinly veiled coded messaging. Take this post about the MLS cup for example:
In order words, they posted using Malicious Compliance.
So management responded by firing deputy editor Barry Petchesky and have disabled comments site wide.
https://twitter.com/barry/status/1189224064788979712?s=20
The move has ground Deadspin to a halt as staffers have begun to resign in protest, one by one.
Writers Laura Wagner, Kelsey McKinney, Tom Ley, Lauren Theisen, Patrick Redford, Albert Burneko and Chris Thompson all tweeted today that they have resigned from Deadspin, the sports-focused site owned by G/O Media.
The list continues to grow:
As a result of this very public pissing contest, Deadspin has been left a husk of what it once was. Comments are disabled. Articles are few and far between, and the ones that are there lack their usual quality and content. Deadspin is dead ladies and gentleman. It’s a sad day. I honestly don’t know where I will go to get my sports news anymore. NBC’s site is a unusable mess, ESPN, Yahoo, CBS, SI are all impossible to follow with their no comment, don’t piss anyone off mentality. Official league pages such as MLB.com and NFL.com are full of watered down, neutered nonsense. Bleacher Report is OK I guess. I don’t know what is left? I’m open to suggestions here. In the mean time, all we can do is sit around and watch as incompetent management run one of the better sports sites into the ground.
And if anyone from Deadspin is reading this, you are more than welcome to join our little blog, and write whatever you want! I promise, no video ads!
Fan Interference 
Good riddance to the potty-mouthed MO-rons.
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So just to be clear, you are all for censorship and good people losing their jobs all because the word “fuck” triggers you? And they are the “MO-rons”?
That’s one terrible take.
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At my age, “fuck” triggers mostly nostalgia. Just as well. Testosterone made my hair fall out.
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I read the free parts of the 4-letter network’s website. I check Bleacher Report occasionally. They each have some things I like (there’s a monthly here’s who Mike Trout has passed this month in career WAR feature at ESPN that’s quite good.) I haven’t looked at what used to be called HBT since September. I tried posting comments there—they’d show up, then almost immediately disappear. At first I thought it was just some glitch—their website is awful, so that was plausible. However, I contacted them through different media, and they never responded. So maybe I’m actually banned for the heinous crime of disagreeing with Bill Baer too often. shrug
The demise of Deadspin is sad; I’ll miss it.
I’m considering subscribing to The Athletic, although I am a cheapskate and don’t like paying subscription fees. Anyone here subscribe to it?
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My wife complains that I’m hard to buy for, thinking about putting a subscription to the Athletic on my Christmas list to help her out. Kudos to you for disagreeing with Comrade Baer, most sane people do.
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The Christmas list idea is a good one. My wife always wants me to tell her what I want too. The truth is I have enough stuff, so that may work.
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If you do get it, please let me know how it is. I’ve heard good things, and if it’s worth it, I might fork over for it. There really isn’t much of anything left these days. All good sports commentary websites have been zombiefied.
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Paper has an Athletic subscription. He seems pleased with it. He’s offered to let me read with his access but I’ve not followed through on that — so I can’t give you 1st hand info.
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I remember seeing paperlions praise it a while back now you mention it.
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Paper says if you can get a referral from someone who subscribes, you get 40% off. He is willing to post the link here if people want to see if it works that way.
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For 40% off, it’s certainly worth a shot!
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I subscribe to The Athletic, and I don’t regret it at all.
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