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The math of media bosses who told Deadspin to ‘stick to sports’ doesn’t add up

latimes.com

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Re: The math of media bosses who told Deadspin to ‘stick to sports’ doesn’t add up

#51

Post by valenciarose »

tracker1 wrote: post #6

G/O Media has several brands that already do woke journalism. How many do they need for this? How many concentrate on sports exclusively? To use a sports metaphore, it's about zone coverage. As I said on prior posts... Deadspin should stick to sports for the same reason Pizza Hut doesn't sell Tacos. Coverage across brand identities. Even if Tacos may make more money than Pizza in aggregate, they aren't there to sell…

Deadspin was the ONLY sports site I would go to, largely because it was the one place where you could count on the writers to examine the context that sports occurs in. Sports doesn't exist in a vacuum. Deadspin was the place where we might get the next Cosell.

Re: The math of media bosses who told Deadspin to ‘stick to sports’ doesn’t add up

#52

Post by InvisibleCities »

aristophenes wrote: post #21

I am largely confused about this whole discussion. Why are we trying to figure out if the Deadspin bosses are justified in whether they want their writers to write about sports related things? This isn't about free speech. Each one of the writers has the ability to write to their own blog, to tweet whatever they want. This is about some writers insisting that a company pays them money to write about whatever the writ…

Let’s say you worked at a profitable restaurant called SaladSpin. SaladSpin, true to its name, sells salads, and they’re pretty good. However, SaladSpin also sells pizzas, and these pizzas are absolutely incredible. People travel from miles around to eat these pizzas, and they easily outsell the salads by a ratio of two or three to one. One day, SaladSpin comes under new management who decide that they want SaladSpin to “stick to salads” and stop selling pizzas. Wouldn’t you, as a worker who both takes pride in the quality of pizzas you make and understands that pizzas are the key to SaladSpin’s popularity and profitability, try to fight this decision? Personally, I think that loyalty to SaladSpin’s customers, who love the pizzas, is more important and worthy than loyalty to these purported superiors who don’t really understand or care why anyone liked SaladSpin in the first place.

Re: The math of media bosses who told Deadspin to ‘stick to sports’ doesn’t add up

#53

Post by drewbug01 »

dlbucci wrote: post #42

I'm surprised commenters here seem to be siding with management when: * They only bought the site about a year ago. * They've replaced a number of women/minority executives with white, male, nepotism hires. * The editorial mandate to "stick to sports" violates the CBA with the GMG Union, which prohibits the owners from having editorial say. * There have been numerous complaints from both writers and commenters on the…

> I'm surprised commenters here seem to be siding with management

Why is this surprising? HN is an outlet that worships startups, makes founders into deities, and generally comments “if employees aren’t happy they should leave” on every worker-related article.

It makes more sense if you read the comments understanding that many commenters want to be the founder of the next “unicorn” and get rich.

Re: The math of media bosses who told Deadspin to ‘stick to sports’ doesn’t add up

#54

Post by drewbug01 »

lefstathiou wrote: post #41
kaikai wrote: post #37

The reason this is a story is that it's calling out the bullshit reasoning of management, not that management doesn't have a right to decide the content of their media properties. Many of us have sat through meetings with leadership who are endlessly rationalizing their decisions with crappy data, and felt the frustration that comes with being able to see through the half-truths. This article is interesting because t…

Welcome to the 21st century where you can have valid reasons but face the endless threat of bad press and litigation for giving them. Almost every manager and CEO I know is afraid to give constructive feedback in employee reviews. The fact that they came up with some bs explanation with holes isn’t news to me. Imagine what the press would be if they said “I told them to do their f’n job 5x and they didn’t”

> Welcome to the 21st century where you can have valid reasons but face the endless threat of bad press and litigation for giving them

These are both strong indicators that the reasons are not valid.

Re: The math of media bosses who told Deadspin to ‘stick to sports’ doesn’t add up

#55

Post by tracker1 »

Traster wrote: post #15
tracker1 wrote: post #6

G/O Media has several brands that already do woke journalism. How many do they need for this? How many concentrate on sports exclusively? To use a sports metaphore, it's about zone coverage. As I said on prior posts... Deadspin should stick to sports for the same reason Pizza Hut doesn't sell Tacos. Coverage across brand identities. Even if Tacos may make more money than Pizza in aggregate, they aren't there to sell…

Let's turn it around and think about tech, Google amazed people with their 20% time. 20% of your time to do wha you want to do - it kept engineers motivated and spawned new ideas. It was a fantastic recruiting tool too. If you stick someone in a box and tell them they're never getting out, guess what? They're going to lose motivation. Pretty much one of the fundamentals of tech is getting engineers motivated. A motiv…

And with time, they changed that factor... they made a business decision to largely cut the 20% time projects previously allowed. Owners and Management made a decision to change things, as they often do.

The same applies to Deadspin.

Re: The math of media bosses who told Deadspin to ‘stick to sports’ doesn’t add up

#56

Post by tracker1 »

Angostura wrote: post #19
tracker1 wrote: post #6

G/O Media has several brands that already do woke journalism. How many do they need for this? How many concentrate on sports exclusively? To use a sports metaphore, it's about zone coverage. As I said on prior posts... Deadspin should stick to sports for the same reason Pizza Hut doesn't sell Tacos. Coverage across brand identities. Even if Tacos may make more money than Pizza in aggregate, they aren't there to sell…

Are you suggesting Pizza Hut should stop selling salads and drinks?

I'm saying that MAYBE senior management and ownership has a plan, and shouldn't have to explain themselves on their decision making to have one of their brands bring in a more narrow focus.

Re: The math of media bosses who told Deadspin to ‘stick to sports’ doesn’t add up

#57

Post by tracker1 »

dandelo53 wrote: post #20
tracker1 wrote: post #6

G/O Media has several brands that already do woke journalism. How many do they need for this? How many concentrate on sports exclusively? To use a sports metaphore, it's about zone coverage. As I said on prior posts... Deadspin should stick to sports for the same reason Pizza Hut doesn't sell Tacos. Coverage across brand identities. Even if Tacos may make more money than Pizza in aggregate, they aren't there to sell…

Cross pollination provides diversity. It's not always a good thing, but you make it sound like it is something to be avoided. Seems like a good way to superficially limit opportunity with that line of reasoning.

I am saying that the people signing the checks made a business decision to narrow the focus of one of their brands. In my own opinion, a large number of the people working at Deadspin should have rightly been fired at this point.

Another thread mentions Google's 20% time, something that largely doesn't even exist anymore and for a long time still required approval to work on. Business changes and adapts with time. They aren't asking their writers to generate fake news stories or to not include culture in their sports writing, but that articles should have a focus on sports. They have other brands that write the types of articles they're asking Deadspin to stop writing.

In the end, the owners don't want another general millenial rage bait woke journalism site. They want a focused sports brand that they can grow in that space. Branding is important, and having a focus on branding is important. That's why PowerAid isn't labelled "Coca Cola". There are many valid business reasons why the people paying for the site want a specific brand focus.

I'm pretty sure that this has been explained at least once to Deadspin editors. However, it seems to me like the editors are a bunch of petulant children who don't understand that there are times where the person signing your check makes decisions you don't agree with, and not everything deserves to be rallied or protested against and that the adult decision is to either comply or find another job.

I've left jobs when decisions were made that I didn't agree with. I once mentioned I'd leave if the MPAA were taken on as a client. There wasn't malice, there wasn't a fit involved that brought a lot of undue public attention. These people need to grow the fuck up already.

Re: The math of media bosses who told Deadspin to ‘stick to sports’ doesn’t add up

#58

Post by dandelo53 »

tracker1 wrote: post #57
dandelo53 wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Cross pollination provides diversity. It's not always a good thing, but you make it sound like it is something to be avoided. Seems like a good way to superficially limit opportunity with that line of reasoning.

I am saying that the people signing the checks made a business decision to narrow the focus of one of their brands. In my own opinion, a large number of the people working at Deadspin should have rightly been fired at this point. Another thread mentions Google's 20% time, something that largely doesn't even exist anymore and for a long time still required approval to work on. Business changes and adapts with time. Th…

Point taken. Ultimately, being an employee means being willing to accept things you disagree with. Until you can't.

I can see people taking this personally. Tough spot all around, perhaps.

And we all act like children, some of us never stop :)

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