A not insignificant number of mic checks would start with Dan and Grubb mid-conversation about a piece you wrote on old weird/tech, it was always fun to see two great sites overlap.
left this comment on the latest game mess decides podcast. I know GB's just a brand. but it disappearing (possibly/probably) is still strangely insulting when its like this.
I spent years working under suits that didn’t understand what you did, who your audience was, and what your field was and every day is torture as they insert themselves between you and your job.
Sometimes it feels daunting to be an equal partner in a media venture but it does make you realize how much of the fat was just upper management and high end real estate.
They never sold Giant Bomb. CBS bought Whiskey Media, who then sold Gamespot/Giant Bomb/Game FAQs to red ventures who then sold it to Fandom. Giant Bomb are just softballs being batted about from one company to another.
The disconnect seems to be that studios care more about turning a profit for shareholders than offering a quality product, and that's not a problem exclusive to websites.
... It's not making their point because nowhere in any of these processes did Giant Bomb themselves *have the ability to keep from being bought*, because they were initially founded *as part of a company* and kept getting sold off.
This wasn't some independent studio that sold to a larger company.
They were ALWAYS part of a larger company.
Your "point" is a good one, but also has no bearing on the current topic, because the people running Giant bomb never, at any point in their history, had a choice about being bought or sold.
Interesting that Fandom still thinks there's money to be made in guides when basically every other former gaming websites on earth has already been turned into a guide spewing cesspool.
That last point really grinds my gears. Guides and location info for recent big RPGs like Stalker 2 are a nightmare to go through and sound like they're written by someone unaware that there's more to a video game than the quest your currently in.
Are you talking about them censoring Russian disinformation from their search results in 2022? Or was it when Torrentfreak reported that they had blocked torrent results, which ended up being a search algorithm issue? It's wild that people like you just make shit up without hesitation.
In 2022 their CEO said that they would "combat Russian disinformation" by changing how their search algorithm worked. In reality what it did was prioritize stories in line with the US State Department, much like Google does. There is a difference between those two approaches.
Also, fandom just sucks total ass. It's the most dogshit kind of wiki and even with ad blockers, it's almost impossible to use because of how poorly designed it is. I have a filter that actively scrubs that out of search results.
The dumb part is that for a period of time there seemed to be people within the company who were advocates for the kind of things GB was trying to create, the Keighley couches looked really well-produced and the content has been great.
And now a new CEO comes in with some fuckass ideas and zero clue
I use https://kagi.com a paid search engine and it has specific filters you can use to remove certain results from being served to you. They have a free version.
Fair. But it is something you can try. For the type of work I do, its worth the subscription fee but I totally get that not everyone wants to or can pay for a premium search service.
Google has just become so shitty with SEO that I had to find another alternative.
I had a secret hope that this was a worked shoot where we had the emergence of a Dandom faction that ultimately prevailed against B. Rand Saftee who turned out to be Mike Rotunda
Comments
I hope these guys go on to make their own Aftermath.
but the baby has one hand on the trigger of an RPG-7 and if you don’t keep it clapping and distracted it kills you both
But there's something weirdly fitting to finding out what's going on via a SomethingAwful forum post
absolutely mandatory in 2025
This is also great. Helps surface alternate wikis to replace Fandom with
There are consequences to cashing out with the highest bidder.
This is going on with studios too, just not gaming websites.
Creativity - games or streaming content - will always be at fault if the profit line must forever go up.
And let’s be honest here - Whiskey Media sold itself purely for profit because the offer they got was for a silly amount of money.
They were ALWAYS part of a larger company.
Your "point" is a good one, but also has no bearing on the current topic, because the people running Giant bomb never, at any point in their history, had a choice about being bought or sold.
And now a new CEO comes in with some fuckass ideas and zero clue
If you're on google, this might work: https://support.google.com/websearch/thread/223739218/how-to-block-a-site-so-it-never-will-be-shown-in-search-again?hl=en
Google has just become so shitty with SEO that I had to find another alternative.
it's free and replaces fandom wikis with alternatives when available.