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CBS Interactive (GameSpot parent company) buys Giant Bomb

E

EternalGamer

Banned
ashbash159 said:
It still seems like we'll be getting the same Giant Bomb but they'll have more money to do crazier things? What's wrong with that? If they stayed with Whiskey Media they would end up with no money. Anyway they need some new video editors so they can push out more amazing video content.
Click to expand...

Because a big company offered them more money out of the goodness of their hearts?

No CBS is going to want revenue results. Year over year gains in fact. And thus we start down the same path as always.

I'd be cool with them just remaining four dudes doing podcast and a handful of voice over quick looks. I don't need fucking virtual studios and foreign correspondents or whatever the fuck.
 
K

killer_clank

Member
ashbash159 said:
It still seems like we'll be getting the same Giant Bomb but they'll have more money to do crazier things? What's wrong with that? If they stayed with Whiskey Media they would end up with no money. Anyway they need some new video editors so they can push out more amazing video content.
Click to expand...

The people involved ALWAYS say this sort of thing, and they probably do believe everything they say right about now. But big business doesn't work like that. They'll be wanting profits and results, and who knows what happens in the future? A new management team could come in and decide they don't need 2 gaming websites, and GB is closed, or they could introduce rules and ways of working that make the site worse.

Of course, the same risk of them being closed downchanged someday was the same under whiskey, but don't kid yourself into thinking nothing can change and the site can't get worse under CBS.
 
O

obonicus

Member
EternalGamer said:
You replace "Giant Bomb" with "1up" and and Gamespot with "IGN" and you have the same bullshit marketing we heard 2 years ago. We know where that lead.
Click to expand...

That's... not even accurate, so I have to conclude you don't know what you're talking about. 1up was bought by UGO first. They immediately fired a ton of 1up's personalities, which in turn led to a mass exodus among those who hadn't been fired. This was the 1upocalypse. 1up was still tied to EGM at the time, and was in real risk of dying for good. The UGO thing happened last year, after 1up became a shadow of its former self. Between these two events they had been hemorrhaging what other personalities they had left, however.

The only thing this has in common is that a larger business is buying a smaller business. That's it.
 
H

Hoo-doo

Banned
Banana Kid said:
I totally disagree. The status of the interns has been my number one question throughout this, and I really want the classic Internal Affairs crew around.

Kessler's a cool guy who can lead a raid like nobody's business! I want him to come back!
Click to expand...

Their internships are effectively terminated. Perry stated this in the GB chat.
 
E

EternalGamer

Banned
obonicus said:
That's... not even accurate, so I have to conclude you don't know what you're talking about. 1up was bought by UGO first. They immediately fired a ton of 1up's personalities, which in turn led to a mass exodus among those who hadn't been fired. This was the 1upocalypse. 1up was still tied to EGM at the time, and was in real risk of dying for good. The UGO thing happened last year, after 1up became a shadow of its former self. Between these two events they had been hemorrhaging what other personalities they had left, however.

The only thing this has in common is that a larger business is buying a smaller business. That's it.
Click to expand...

There were at least two other batch firings at 1up after IGN bought them. But the UGO was just another example of the same thing.

It all just proves my same point. Big companies are concerned with year over year revenue growth. That becomes the dominant passion and it is forced to be the passion of those running the website.
 
A

andycapps

Member
EternalGamer said:
Dude, because I have been watching what happens to big videogame media sites for the better part of two decades. I know where this leads.

I would watch the video but Jeff and co have apparently become so egotistical that they want me to watch 10 minutes of them eating pancakes before they ever say anything substantial. I wish I were joking. It's fucking absurd.
Click to expand...

PANCAKES! Can you believe they're eating pancakes!

That's just like your opinion, man. And if they'd broken it by just saying immediately what was going on, they wouldn't have been Giant Bomb.
 
K

Khezu

Member
EternalGamer said:
You replace "Giant Bomb" with "1up" and and Gamespot with "IGN" and you have the same bullshit marketing we heard 2 years ago. We know where that lead.

I can't believe so many people are so naive just because Jeff told them otherwise while pancakes. I am 15 minutes in to this video. he has provided NO evidence that this was fiscally necessary. Do you guys just automatically trust them without any proof at all? Especially seemingly out of the blue when no business problems were mentioned previously and they have been hiring and employees have been buying houses in the nice suburbs?

And Jeff's reasoning is totally schizophrenic. He implied, but never said directly, that they couldn't keep going by saying "members have kept them going" (why couldn't this just continue) on the other hand he delviers an argument that this is about "getting bigger" and expanding. I personally don't need Giant Bomb to get better. Watching 10 minutes of pancake eating tells me that their egos are getting big enough.

It pains me to say that too because GB has been my favorite website for years now. It is the only one I have ever donated money to.
Click to expand...


GB would probably be sustainable by just memberships, the problem is that there part of a bigger thing, WM, and that wasn't doing too hot. Screened, anime vice, and tested did not work out so well and were dragging GB down with them.
Plus no matter what Jeff and the rest of the GB guys say selling the stuff is all up to shelby not them, they probably had some say in it, but one way or the other shelby was going to profit from this.
 
B

bonesquad

Member
You really can't compare this to what happened with 1UP. 1UP was already split up and a shell of its former self when it merged with IGN. In this case Giant Bomb is going to GS fully intact. Sure in a year or so I'm guessing GB and GS won't be the separate entities that they are saying they are now, but Giant Bomb is all about the personalities and entertaining video content. As long as that continues, whatever they need to do to keep that happening is fine with me.

I will say though I don't see me renewing my membership in September.
 
J

JABEE

Member
ashbash159 said:
It still seems like we'll be getting the same Giant Bomb but they'll have more money to do crazier things? What's wrong with that? If they stayed with Whiskey Media they would end up with no money. Anyway they need some new video editors so they can push out more amazing video content.
Click to expand...

I hope what you are saying is true, but I still worry that after the honeymoon is over and someone like John Davison leaves to do better things, GB could be left in the hand of uncaring suits who cut costs to serve their own investor's interests. Running one gaming site and absorbing the talent of what you just bought would mean less overhead and a more efficient operation. I hope that this doesn't happen.
 
D

Darklord

Banned
You know Jeff knows what he wants in Giantbomb. Was fired from Gamespot. And has NEVER wavered from his position.

I was freaking out but after months of negotiations, a much better head of the company, and agree the ONLY reason they are there is because of their independence. I have faith in them.
 
Interfectum

Interfectum

Member
The biggest problem with this deal is there will be a potential chance in attitude around GiantBomb both by the staff and fans.

Before they were this small rag-tag outfit that banded together after an unfair firing. They built a website from the ground up. They worked overtime to do fun stuff and help build a loyal audience.

Now they are owned by a huge corporation they don't have as much incentive to build other that getting overtime or a pay raise. What they are building now is so far from being something they have a personal ownership in that they'll eventually settle into working for the sole purpose of collecting a paycheck. Their creative outlets will start going to places outside of GiantBomb.

For now everything will be fine but just wait... one by one the cast of the bombcast will drop off. I predict Brad won't make it to 2013 at GB.
 
O

obonicus

Member
megamerican said:
Yeah, it's really strange because the crew's whole mantra has been about having a small, but intense focus. I swear that I remember Jeff saying that he didn't think GB would benefit from getting bigger.
Click to expand...

http://www.neogaf.com/forum/showpost.php?p=29934321&postcount=11229

Monsterdunk said:
But all I hear when people complain about Patrick or Alex or the interns or anyone else is people not wanting to see the site grow beyond the "core four" or whatever. I, on the other hand, need this staff to grow so we can cover more things and become a bigger, better site. So when you complain about additional personnel, all I can really take from that is "STAY SMALL FOREVER SO YOU CAN FEEL GUILTY ABOUT DUMPING EXTRA WORK ON THE REST OF THE GUYS EVERY TIME YOU TAKE A VACATION, ASSHOLES, BECAUSE I DON'T LIKE IT WHEN THINGS CHANGE." It's both the blessing and the curse of running a personality-driven site like this, I guess.
Click to expand...

EternalGamer said:
It all just proves my same point. Big companies are concerned with year over year revenue growth. That becomes the dominant passion and it is forced to be the passion of those running the website.
Click to expand...

The first point is a truism, it doesn't have to be said. The second is not a given, and doesn't follow naturally from the first. You're taking an example of a website that was incredibly poorly-run and bleeding money, and thus had to be trimmed aggressively, and extrapolating that every such purchase must function the same way. This is verifiably untrue. I'm a natural pessimist, but this is beyond pessimism, it's chickenlittleism.
 
Big-ass Ramp

Big-ass Ramp

hella bullets that's true
What I'm worried about is redundancy. It doesn't make much sense for CBS to have Gamespot AND Giantbomb, and I don't GB to become GS.
 
I

Infinite Justice

Member
JABEE said:
I hope what you are saying is true, but I still worry that after the honeymoon is over and someone like John Davison leaves to do better things, GB could be left in the hand of uncaring suits who cut costs to serve their own investor's interests. Running one gaming site and absorbing the talent of what you just bought would mean less overhead and a more efficient operation. I hope that this doesn't happen.
Click to expand...

this is what i'm worrying about since Davison is looking like the anchor for this deal and if he decides to go somehow, how will it go?
 
E

EternalGamer

Banned
Khezu said:
GB would probably be sustainable by just memberships, the problem is that there part of a bigger thing, WM, and that wasn't doing too hot. Screened, anime vice, and tested did not work out so well and were dragging GB down with them.
Plus no matter what Jeff and the rest of the GB guys say selling the stuff is all up to shelby not them, they probably had some say in it, but one way or the other shelby was going to profit from this.
Click to expand...

That's a reasonable and believable explanation.

I personally would have just rather them ax all the other sites. They are probably going to end up getting gutted over the next couple of years any way.
 
J

JABEE

Member
skip said:
and a small business doesn't?
Click to expand...

With increased costs, GB will probably have to will have to reach more people. What if they can't expand beyond where they are now? What if there current audience is all they are able to reach. Running Giant Bomb with the costs associated with a large media entity seems like a big risk.
 
Vire

Vire

Member
Posted in other thread but it seems like the discussion is happening here:

More than anything I really hope in today's interview with Jeff is that he is completely honest.

I don't want any revisionist bullshit history where he tries to explain it was just all one big misunderstanding, because clearly that wasn't what happened.
 
A

ashbash159

Member
Okay, you guys are making me re-assess my optimism.

I really hope Giant Bomb doesn't change too much in terms of the content they have been doing. I'm excited for these guys.

To be honest, I'm not fully aware of times in the past where things you guys are saying: "starts off hopeful, always ends up bad", has happened to other websites. I'd love to be taught some history lessons. I've never been a 1UP.com regular but I mostly listened to most of their podcasts in 2008. I wasn't part of NeoGAF back then either. So maybe I don't have the best knowledge of this subject.

Yeah of course the team will be optimistic, it sounds awesome so far from what they have said. Let's just hope that continues a year from now when they've settled in to the new company.
 
I

infinityBCRT

Member
EternalGamer said:
You replace "Giant Bomb" with "1up" and and Gamespot with "IGN" and you have the same bullshit marketing we heard 2 years ago. We know where that lead.

I can't believe so many people are so naive just because Jeff told them otherwise while pancakes. I am 15 minutes in to this video. he has provided NO evidence that this was fiscally necessary. Do you guys just automatically trust them without any proof at all? Especially seemingly out of the blue when no business problems were mentioned previously and they have been hiring and employees have been buying houses in the nice suburbs?

And Jeff's reasoning is totally schizophrenic. He implied, but never said directly, that they couldn't keep going by saying "members have kept them going" (why couldn't this just continue) on the other hand he delviers an argument that this is about "getting bigger" and expanding. I personally don't need Giant Bomb to get better. Watching 10 minutes of pancake eating tells me that their egos are getting big enough.

It pains me to say that too because GB has been my favorite website for years now. It is the only one I have ever donated money to.
Click to expand...

1. John Davison is a really really smart guy, way ahead of the curve. He was behind all of the freaking amazing shit that 1up/EGM was doing back in the 2006-2008 era. He also was behind making GamePro not a shitty magazine too. Albeit, both of those properties went to shit, but that happened after he left.

2. GiantBomb holds the hammer here. Whats really valuable is THEM. Their personalities. If things go bad, they could cut ties and start again. They've done it before, they can do it again. It would be a similar situation to when Bungie left MS. Bungie didn't like being under MS anymore and said "We're leaving one way or another", and all MS had to decide was whether or not they wanted to keep the Bungie brand name.
 
J

JABEE

Member
How much equity do the Giant Bomb staffers have in the company? Did Whiskey Media have a controlling interest before this sale or was it all up to Jeff and the team?
 
T

Thomper

Member
Big Ass Ramp said:
What I'm worried about is redundancy. It doesn't make much sense for CBS to have Gamespot AND Giantbomb, and I don't GB to become GS.
Click to expand...

I've seen this argument a number of times now, but no, that shouldn't have to be a problem. 'Big Media Companies' will happily own a dozen sites about the exact same topic, as long as they approach it in a different way. GiantBomb and GameSpot might both be about video games, but the way they deal with it editorially is completely different. Their content adds to the content CBS Interactive already owns in a meaningful way; there's relatively little redundancy there.
 
Big-ass Ramp

Big-ass Ramp

hella bullets that's true
infinityBCRT said:
1. John Davison is a really really smart guy, way ahead of the curve. He was behind all of the freaking amazing shit that 1up/EGM was doing back in the 2006-2008 era. He also was behind making GamePro not a shitty magazine too. Albeit, both of those properties went to shit, but that happened after he left.

2. GiantBomb holds the hammer here. Whats really valuable is THEM. Their personalities. If things go bad, they could cut ties and start again. They've done it before, they can do it again. It would be a similar situation to when Bungie left MS. Bungie didn't like being under MS anymore and said "We're leaving one way or another", and all MS had to decide was whether or not they wanted to keep the Bungie brand name.
Click to expand...

I like this optimism.




I guess I like this better than GB fading away without any money.
 
L

Loxley

Member
I have to say it's really amusing seeing people getting their feathers ruffled and going all hipster over this "Clearly they've sold out to the man and care more about getting a check instead of their loyal fans." The meltdowns that this news has caused alone is worth it. For those making sternly worded posts about how you will no longer be a fan of Giant Bomb and are imposing some sort of weird personal exile of yourself from their content going forward...don't let the door hit you on the way out.

I know there's no point in arguing with those of you who've already made up your minds about this and have already decided for yourselves that GB only did this for the money and that they are now forever ruined. Fine, whatever, I throw my hands up in defeat. Personally I'm really curious to see what the next few months will bring. And as others have said, between John Davison as the head honcho at Gamespot and Gerstmann stating may times that they will maintain complete creative control over the site...I see nothing to get truly concerned about for the time being.

And just a side note - of course they care about getting a paycheck, who the flying fuck doesn't? Giant Bomb is not the gaming equivalent of The Salvation Army. The crew aren't volunteers, they have bills to pay just as much as anyone else does.
 
M

Mr. Enigma

Member
Whether anyone likes it or not, this was likely the goal from the start: Get established while losing the least amount of money as possible until someone buys you.

It just happened to be the company that owns Gamespot.
 
Big-ass Ramp

Big-ass Ramp

hella bullets that's true
Thomper said:
I've seen this argument a number of times now, but no, that shouldn't have to be a problem. 'Big Media Companies' will happily own a dozen sites about the exact same topic, as long as they approach it in a different way. GiantBomb and GameSpot might both be about video games, but the way they deal with it editorially is completely different. Their content adds to the content CBS Interactive already owns in a meaningful way; there's relatively little redundancy there.
Click to expand...

OK, ok, good.


I'm watching the livestream and they are talking about "partying" with the GS crew from here on out. I don't know what that means. Does that mean they will be merged?
 
D

Darklord

Banned
infinityBCRT said:
1. John Davison is a really really smart guy, way ahead of the curve. He was behind all of the freaking amazing shit that 1up/EGM was doing back in the 2006-2008 era. He also was behind making GamePro not a shitty magazine too. Albeit, both of those properties went to shit, but that happened after he left.
Click to expand...

So when Davidson leaves, we're truly fucked.
 
L

LCfiner

Member
I would say that if GB is still doing what it’s doing now after 12 months, then they might be OK from additional meddling in the long run. the first few months won’t really mean much

But I just can’t help but think about the problems inherent with the situation if management at CBS changes and then - bam - new atmosphere and potential for fucking things up.

sigh... I just wish that staying independent was an option - that there was more money in minimal ads and subs.
 
O

obonicus

Member
Thomper said:
I've seen this argument a number of times now, but no, that shouldn't have to be a problem. 'Big Media Companies' will happily own a dozen sites about the exact same topic, as long as they approach it in a different way. GiantBomb and GameSpot might both be about video games, but the way they deal with it editorially is completely different. Their content adds to the content CBS Interactive already owns in a meaningful way; there's relatively little redundancy there.
Click to expand...

Yep. News Corp owns a lot of newspapers, for instance.
 
K

Khezu

Member
Big Ass Ramp said:
OK, ok, good.


I'm watching the livestream and they are talking about "partying" with the GS crew from here on out. I don't know what that means. Does that mean they will be merged?
Click to expand...

No, just same building, like when will and norm showed up in random GB stuff.

Only problem is the gamespot staff is pretty bland.
 
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