In a small but anticipated victory for gamers, several Australian branches of media outlets such as Refinery29, Gizmodo, VICE, and Kotaku are being shut down.
Dozens of jobs are expected to be cut as Nine Entertainment’s Pedestrian Group announced cost-cutting and organizational restructuring efforts, with paper media ventures continuing to bleed capital.
As part of this effort, Pedestrian Group CEO Matt Rowley will depart, and up to 40 jobs will be eliminated. The restructuring will involve splitting the business and Pedestrian exiting its licensing deals to publish third-party brands, including Vice, Refinery29, Gizmodo, Lifehacker, and Kotaku in the coming months. These titles will no longer be published in Australia, resulting in the majority of their staff being let go.
However, this does not necessarily mean the end of these Australian media ventures. There is still a possibility that they could be acquired by another company interested in keeping them operational, though the chances of this actually happening are slim to none.
Matt Rowley announced the changes on Monday morning. “We’ve made the tough decision to focus on our wholly-owned Pedestrian brands, where we control the strategy, the content, the product, the sales, and the outcome – the entire business,” he said. “This will have an impact on roles within the group, and I appreciate the uncertainty this change creates. We will be in contact immediately with those affected.”
Gizmodo Australia Managing Editor Athina Mallis confirmed on LinkedIn that “Gizmodo Australia will no longer be in Australia,” describing it as “a massive blow to tech journalism in Australia.”
Another casualty of the layoffs is Kotaku Australia Managing Editor David Smith, known for advocating the banning of gamers’ hardware for abusive or harassive comments made in in-game voice chats.
Smith, who likely ejaculates fat-free soymilk was pleased when Riot Games, owned by Tencent announced that they would be imposing HWID bans to problematic players following manufactured outcries from female Twitch streamers.
David Smith announced the news that his tenure at Kotaku Australia, a publication often criticized for its harsh stance on gamers, has come to an end. Kotaku has frequently labeled gamers as racist bigots and has condemned games like Stellar Blade for misogyny due to the sexualization of women, while coincidentally excusing similar portrayals in queer-friendly games like Hades 2.
Gaming journalists have never truly supported consumers; instead, for over a decade, their efforts have aimed to transform the industry negatively. Individuals like Alyssa Mercante have defended entities such as Sweet Baby Inc even after one of their employees incited a cancel campaign against a single individual for making a list of publicly available information that compiles games made in collaboration with the DEI pushing firm.
Alyssa even asserted that it was impossible to be racist towards White people.
Sweet Baby Inc are currently facing allegations that they attempted to extort $7 million from Chinese developers Game Science for consulting on their game, Black Myth: Wukong.
It’s important to note that Alyssa Mercante, now senior editor at Kotaku is an ugly, tattoo riddled whore who previously worked as a sex worker prior to devoting her life to upholding “the message.”
As a supposed games journalist by condemning those who dare defy the progressive agenda laid out by BlackRock CEO, Larry Fink while defending and praising her industrial buddies because games journalism has no ethics.
It’s not a conspiracy, despite the efforts of journalists gaslighting the general populous into believing that Gamergate was about misogyny and racism, it was really about ethnics in games journalism, prior to the exposure of an incestrious relationship between hack indie “developers” and journalists giving unfair and favorable coverage in exchange for sexual favors.
G/O Media has been ransacking its failed publications over the past year, shuttering their feminist focused Jezebel outlet in November 2023 while laying off employees at Kotaku.
More recently, G/O Media offloaded Deadspin, resulting in the entire staff being let go. Kotaku has also been struggling, with its Editor-in-Chief resigning. G/O Media had pressured Kotaku writers into voluntarily resigning by shifting their focus away from propaganda by instead requiring them to produce a minimum of 50 game guides per week.
G/O Media reluctantly reversed its decision after backlash from Kotaku employees who were expected to play video games and perform typical journalism tasks like writing reviews and guides. Despite efforts to shift Kotaku’s image and regain relevance, Editor-in-Chief Jen Glennon quickly announced her resignation.
Kotaku is currently searching for a new Editor-in-Chief to oversee the activists and ideologues who have been steering the site. The long-term effects of these Australian closures on Kotaku and its parent company, G/O Media, remain uncertain. It is unlikely that Kotaku Australia will be salvaged or relicensed by another corporation which is a good thing.
Journalism in this day and age is no longer sustainable, just like video game development which has also been taken over by incompetent workers who are fixated on political agendas and activism.
There are no shortages of media publications that exist shouting the same politicized messages, “boobs bad, dick good, games need more fat ugly queer women for representation, beauty and femininity is sexist and discriminatory.”
You’ve heard it all before, they all tote the same message to different audiences, that’s by design.
News publications and journalists no longer generate sufficient revenue. Younger audiences have shifted to digital media, preferring video reviews and other online content over traditional paper media or websites. Paper media is obsolete.
Outlets like Kotaku rely on activism to generate income through rage clicks. Their anti-gaming propaganda is designed to provoke anger, encouraging readers to engage with their website or respond on social media, thereby boosting their exposure.
Games journalism is thankfully dying a brutal death, with IGN stepping in to salvage the entire Gamer Network of publications, including GamesIndustry.biz, Eurogamer, Rock Paper Shotgun, and VG247, in an acquisition deal back in May.
Time is running out for game journalists as Kotaku faces another significant setback. While their main operations continue unimpacted, the future of Kotaku and similar ventures is almost certainly death and despair. I certainly won’t be shedding a tear when these disgusting piles of shit are evicted out of a job.
