Blogs such as Gawker won't be running 5,000-word-long features any time soon, nor giving writers weeks to investigate. But the web—other blogs, search engines and social network sites—increasingly rewards original items. So we're looking for an additional reporter for the team.
Mark Twain once suggested that we rejoice at a birth and weep at a funeral because we are not the person involved, and that, along with the cartoon you see here, is about as close to my philosophy of life as you're ever gonna get. So guess what? I'm kind of shockingly sad to be leaving Gawker. There will be tears. Who would have thought?
22-year-old N.Y.U. dropout Alex Pareene has been forced to live in Washington, D.C. for more than a year now. He took over at Wonkette in January, 2006. That is sad, because D.C. is no place for the young. (Except for the getting robbed. That's good for kids.) I have rectified this situation. As Alex Balk leaves us, although he may be irreplaceable, at least a new Alex shall rise. He starts Monday after next, and will be back in New York as soon as he and his girlfriend (I know, right?) can work that out. It's not like we pay relocation costs or anything. I'm sure they'll find an apartment somewhere Rockaways-adjacent!
So what the hell happened here last week? A girl can't take a couple weeks off between jobs without all hell breaking loose? And I was so looking forward to tormenting my soon-to-be-former coworker Alex Balk on a daily basis. Moment of silence for The Cock, people. So I'm Maggie, and I'll be your Associate Editor (and apparently Gawker's token Gentile) for the remainder of the flight. As previously mentioned, I sold out to the man for a few years and spent some time shilling for the Village Voice and the New York Sun, but regular paychecks and solid benefits get old fast. Happy to be here. Let the wild rumpus begin!
Alex Balk, the man who drunkenly typed his way through a thousand angry posts on the deficiencies of Radar, has done the unthinkable. He's leaving Gawker to become the executive editor of Radar.com. Do you know what this means? It means he was right about every single thing he said. We claim victory. All sort-of kidding aside, what can we say? We love him and we'll miss him terribly; it's sick. We are taking his fingernails now to clone him. And his last two weeks here should be a wild ride.
A new addition to the gang here will begin work on September 24th. Her name is Maggie Shnayerson, and she has been employed most recently as the PR chick at the Village Voice. (Her official title: publicity director.) Prior to that, she's reported for the Sun, freelanced here and did some stringing there, was an editorial intern at Time and was an editor at The Dartmouth. We were most impressed with Maggie when dealing with her on stories about the Voice: She was a complete hardass. Kind of a bitch, in fact! But a superfun bitch. This is a prime requirement for working here. I also liked that she has experience with how the business side of media things are run—and also a great ear for how PR spin is propagated. What else? She likes a stiff drink, which is key. Also she attended Brearley. Heh. We're so pleased to welcome her back to the other side.
Near the end of day yesterday, Gawker's Doree Shafrir handed in her two weeks notice. She'll be leaving us for the New York Observer, where she'll write and report on "ideas." (That role has been, it seems, officially unfilled since the departure of Sheelah Kolhatkar for Portfolio over the winter.) Doree began here as an "associate editor" last October, and early this year transitioned to reporting on the media full-time. She can only be replaced here at Gawker with a terrifying room full of jerry-rigged threshing machines held together with baling wire and lubricated with grain alcohol. We sincerely wish her the best of luck in destroying Jared Kushner from inside his own shop—or, at least, in bringing that paper what the boy publisher may not know it so desperately needs.
Hi, do you use Firefox? We do too! We love it! Unfortunately, our website hates it right now. It crashes for us too! All the time! We're pissed! We'd strike, but we're month-to-month permalancers! Anyway, we hear they're working on it.
Just for today and tomorrow, you get one more taste of the salty juice of Nick Douglas, former Valleywag editor. Publisher Nick Denton is done editing the site, except to insert one-line items gushing about his new iPhone, and I assume new editor Owen Thomas wanted a long Independence Day break. (As if gays love America!) Today's agenda (Facebook bitching! Neologisms!) is below. Oh, also: I'm drinking a six-pack of Pabst today.
Right! There's a new editor in town and he commanded that I tell you our new Digg policy! There'll be no more foolin' around here, so listen close! (Executive summary: We don't care what you digg, go nuts, but it's your funeral.)
Yes, there's something new going on up top of this here website! The powers that be believe that you, the person of the year, would like to have choices in the ways you look at things. So! Your default view (called, for no known reason, "Picks") will be just as it always was: New stuff at the top, our older blatherings at the bottom. "Popular" means that things will be ranked by what is supposedly most popular. "All" is a little misleading. It does not quite bring the entire internet into this browser window. That would make your head pop like an overripe pumpkin on Halloween night, as Ann Magnuson so famously said. Instead it brings in content from a good number of the sites we read throughout the day. (On that page you'll find some wacky "promote" buttons, which, if pressed enough, bring posts to the front page of Gawker, apparently. NEAT. SUPER. Ah, that turned out to be a management lie! Yay.) Beneath that are some popular categories. And up top on the side there, "summary" is for people who can't be assed to read a full post and "thumbs" is for the entirely post-literate crowd who'd prefer to not have much text disturbing them at all. Please enjoy exploring. And you can totally email us with questions! Except we'll be all, "What the hell do we know?"
Because we all like to be warned when something changes—remember when you came home one day in third grade and daddy was gone and mommy was crying and then you had a new apartment to live in every other weekend? Or, say, when your New York Times arts listings were suddenly moved around? (I certainly don't!)—please be apprised that the tech people who actually run this site have installed something cute here. You'll notice more links appearing in posts to our stunningly-organized archives. They appear automatically. Anyway, enjoy, or ignore, and in the future, I'll try to give y'all a warning when little new things are coming. This one took me from behind and by surprise last night. (Yes. That's what he said.)
This Gothamist style book "royal we" around here is driving me crrrrazy! As those who care may know, here on Gawker we've got our Dickensian-monikered Alex Balk, and, pictured at right, Doree and Emily, and our new buddy Josh, and I pop in on the site now and then when I'm not lunching or leaving early or going down on management. (Plus, there's Jon Liu and Leon Neyfakh on Gawker Weekend!) At this point, it's gotten too hard for y'all much-appreciated readers to know to whom you should address your hate mail. Although it goes without saying that as at any publication, or in our case, "publication," each of us rarely acts entirely alone (we steal from each other, disagree, re-agree, and so on), still it seems that the benefits outweigh the deficits, and so henceforth let there be bylines. Obviously not every lil' round-up or whatever needs them, and of course, management reserves the right to change their—err, his!—mind.
Joshua Stein has labored in the lifestyle trenches as the editor of Gridskipper since last June. Now, we are magically teleporting him over here to Gawker. As our new After Hours Editor, he'll report each day on restaurants, dining clubs, chefs, hotels, beignets, sommeliers, Meatpackers, gentrification and un-gentrification, and neighborhood culture. And Balthazar. You are encouraged to reach out to him at josh AT gawker.com. [UPDATE: Yes, he will be posting about things that occur after hours, not actually posting after hours. Also, he likes to spend his actual After Hours times with his FEMALE WOMAN GIRLFRIEND. We know!]
WHO: Two interns for a project!
WHAT: Two interns! Project!
WHERE: New York City
WHEN: ASAP
WHY: Because you have an irrational obsession and a healthy disgust for women's magazines, celebrity weeklies, fashion, dating tips and Gwyneth Paltrow.
HOW: Email us at fashionwhore@gawker.com and tell us who you are and why you want to spend 20+ hours a month explicating the content in everything from Jane to Jane's Defence Weekly. IMPORTANT: Emails with attachments will be deleted before opening.
Valleywag, Gawker Media's Silicon Valley gossip site, is searching for a senior editor—someone currently practicing business journalism who fancies moving to the San Francisco Bay Area and mastering a whole new batch of Masters of the Universe. The job is full-time and offers highly competitive pay to go along with high visibility. To apply, send an email (no resumes or attachments, please) with a paragraph or two about yourself and your interest in the job, plus links to blogs or articles you've written, to jobs@gawker.com.
Hello catdogs! Sorry for showing up so early on a Saturday, but the weekend is short, and there's four pounds of The New York Times to get through. For those of you who usually read Gawker as a distraction from work, good news: now you can read it as a distraction from brunch.
Beginning this weekend, and ending whenever we feel like it, please enjoy Gawker Weekend. On Saturdays and Sundays, Gawker Weekend editors Jonathan Liu and Leon Neyfakh will delve deep into the weekend lifestyle and culture media so beloved, or presumably beloved, by the sorts of people who actually get weekends to shop, relax, and, you know, just be themselves in pictorials with nice furniture. Come with us—if you're not too busy antiquing!—to the land where newspapers believe that books are extremely decorative and the hustle and bustle of the financial district pales in comparison to the joys of extreme boating, film-going, fun apartment-hunting and the enjoyment of the other advertiser-friendly weekend lifestyle arts.
Not necessarily in light of recent developments in the media-world's job market, but still conveniently enough, we're relaunching Gawker Jobs. Should you be hiring, you can post jobs here. Recruiters can and should email jobshelp AT gawker.com to request special coupon codes. Crazily enough, super-fun ads may even end up here on Gawker. Why not? Seriously, some afternoons we just spend the day looking for apartments on Craigslist and searching online for better jobs.
Do you like moving pictures? Do you prefer working but two to three days a week? Do you have a reel, maybe some experience with Final Cut Pro, and a love of working as a video production assistant? Then read on!
