Current Events > Jason Schreiber leaving Kotaku due to the dumbass guys who killed Deadspin

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Antifar
04/16/20 11:36:08 AM
#1:


https://www.washingtonpost.com/video-games/2020/04/16/jason-schreier-is-leaving-kotaku-citing-go-media-reason/
Jason Schreier, a journalist known in the video game industry for covering working conditions inside tight-lipped game development studios, announced his resignation from the video game news site Kotaku on Thursday, citing dissatisfaction with the ownership and direction of parent company G/O Media. Schreier, who will soon take a position with another company he declined to detail, is the latest of several Kotaku employees to depart the company while invoking G/O as the predominant reason.

Kotaku has been owned and operated by private equity-backed G/O Media since 2019 when it was sold by Univision, along with other sites formerly under the Gawker banner. The site network, which includes Gizmodo and The Onion (as well as the now-defunct Splinter) to name a few, has gone through a series of tumultuous ownership and business changes, most notably after the landmark Hulk Hogan invasion-of-privacy lawsuit that shut down its original ownership in 2016.

Ive been through a lot with this company. Since 2012, weve been through a whole lot of management shifts and resignations and firings and drama, Schreier told The Post. Ive been through a lot of cataclysmic shifts because it always felt like, through it all, we were guided by people who always cared about journalism, and unfortunately, Im not sure thats the case anymore."

High-profile resignations have plagued G/O Media in the last year. The companys staff has publicly clashed with ownership over how to run its sites. Last summer, Deadspin lost its top editor, Megan Greenwell, over the disagreements and eventually its entire editorial staff departed or was fired.

Schreier, 32, said his breaking point was when Deadspin fired senior editor Barry Petchesky for disagreeing with a management mandate to stick to sports, which angered journalists on staff who had cultivated a reputation for aggressive, off-color reporting and eccentric commentary. They argued it would betray the online readership and community borne out of their past work.

Schreier wasnt the only editor to leave G/O Media this week. Just Wednesday, Gizmodo editor in chief Kelly Bourdet announced she was resigning.

He is also only the latest in a series of high-profile departures from Kotaku. In December, award-winning reporter Cecilia DAnastasio (now at WIRED) wrote a farewell piece taking shots at G/O Medias past decisions, including the dissolution of Kotakus investigative reporting unit. Reporters Gita Jackson and Joshua Rivera also resigned in January, saying the new management made it impossible for us to work here.

In a statement to The Post, a G/O Media spokesperson said, We thank Jason for his contributions to Kotaku and wish him well in his next venture.

Over the years, Schreier has gained acclaim and notoriety for breaking numerous stories about labor practices in the gaming industry. His stories helped bring wider scrutiny to crunch culture and overwork inside large video game studios and publishers. Even rabid critics of Kotakus news coverage generally concede that Schreiers reporting has been important to the industry. Hes also built a reputation of breaking insider-fueled stories packed with preliminary information about games.

Schreiers stories often caused large companies to steer abruptly into damage-control mode, sometimes releasing press statements and posting blogs in direct response to his pieces. Minutes after Schreier posted a 2019 report on alleged mismanagement and overwork at Bioware for its game Anthem, the company put up a defensive blog post that called his work unfair."

In 2018, Schreier reported on how 60-hour workweeks had become the norm at gaming giant Rockstar Games, makers of the blockbuster Grand Theft Auto series. For one of his final pieces at Kotaku, Schreier published a follow-up about how Rockstars work culture has improved since the issue was brought to light.

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MC_BatCommander
04/16/20 11:38:15 AM
#2:


Literally the only good part of Kotaku lol


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Ivynn
04/16/20 11:39:35 AM
#3:


MC_BatCommander posted...
Literally the only good part of Kotaku lol


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Hop103
04/16/20 11:47:26 AM
#4:


MC_BatCommander posted...
Literally the only good part of Kotaku lol



Hopefully he finds better work. The rest, screw them, they are really toxic.
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Hayame Zero
04/16/20 11:49:45 AM
#5:


Cool, Schreiber's awesome and he deserves better.

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furb
04/16/20 11:57:06 AM
#6:


Deadspin (and Gawker in general) was among my favorite websites. The Hogan lawsuit and the subsequent departure of my favorite writers made me less interested to visit. After the debacle with Deadspin in the fall, I basically stopped going there or any of their other sites. I've yet to find a replacement service though.

Like univision was bad but it has got so much worse since.

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Hexenherz
04/16/20 11:58:32 AM
#7:


And nothing of value was lost. That guy was a corporate toolbag.

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Tyranthraxus
04/16/20 11:59:10 AM
#8:


Hexenherz posted...
And nothing of value was lost. That guy was a corporate toolbag.
lmao what

You ever read any shit from him?

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Romulox28
04/16/20 11:59:26 AM
#9:


MC_BatCommander posted...
Literally the only good part of Kotaku lol
this, dude is the best journalist in the games industry

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TheGoldenEel
04/16/20 12:01:52 PM
#10:


furb posted...
Deadspin (and Gawker in general) was among my favorite websites. The Hogan lawsuit and the subsequent departure of my favorite writers made me less interested to visit. After the debacle with Deadspin in the fall, I basically stopped going there or any of their other sites. I've yet to find a replacement service though.

Like univision was bad but it has got so much worse since.
yeah, I was a big AV Club fan and its so depressing seeing old articles and how great the comments sections used to be

suits just do not give a fuck about maintaining a quality website

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Hexenherz
04/16/20 12:04:13 PM
#11:


Tyranthraxus posted...
lmao what

You ever read any shit from him?
I stopped caring when he actively defended Gawker's extremely inappropriate hit piece on Conde Nast's CFO.

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Antifar
04/16/20 1:11:36 PM
#12:


I apologize for the typo. That's autocorrect's fault, probably.
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hockeybub89
04/16/20 1:13:08 PM
#13:


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Lorenzo_2003
04/16/20 7:48:31 PM
#14:


Antifar posted...
Schreier, 32, said his breaking point was when Deadspin fired senior editor Barry Petchesky for disagreeing with a management mandate to stick to sports, which angered journalists on staff who had cultivated a reputation for aggressive, off-color reporting and eccentric commentary. They argued it would betray the online readership and community borne out of their past work.

Damn, it sucks when employees are expected to do their jobs.

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Smashingpmkns
04/16/20 7:51:56 PM
#15:


Damn he really was the only good thing about Kotaku besides Tim Rogers if he counts. I wonder where he'll go. He should just do his own thing.
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Kavatar
04/16/20 7:51:57 PM
#16:


Weird that he waited until now to leave over that. Was he waiting to have another job lined up?

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Darmik
04/16/20 7:53:18 PM
#17:


Smashingpmkns posted...
Damn he really was the only good thing about Kotaku besides Tim Rogers if he counts. I wonder where he'll go. He should just do his own thing.

Tim Rogers has also left.

Kavatar posted...
Weird that he waited until now to leave over that. Was he waiting to have another job lined up?

Most likely yeah. The guy has a 6 month old daughter.

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DEKMStephens
04/16/20 7:57:01 PM
#18:


What killed kotaku for me is when they made their MOTHER FUCKING WEBSITE REDIRECT TO KOTAKU AUSTRALIAN OMG THAT SITE IS GARBAGE I'M NOT EVEN AUSTRALIAN.

For awhile I found ways around it but I guess they figured out how to ensure I couldn't get around the redirect. Idk why they even did that tbh video games are pretty international no need for region websites

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Darmik
04/16/20 8:02:17 PM
#19:


DEKMStephens posted...
What killed kotaku for me is when they made their MOTHER FUCKING WEBSITE REDIRECT TO KOTAKU AUSTRALIAN OMG THAT SITE IS GARBAGE I'M NOT EVEN AUSTRALIAN.

For awhile I found ways around it but I guess they figured out how to ensure I couldn't get around the redirect. Idk why they even did that tbh video games are pretty international no need for region websites

Kotaku Australia is better because they don't have a lot of the filler garbage.

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MrMallard
04/16/20 8:02:44 PM
#20:


TheGoldenEel posted...
yeah, I was a big AV Club fan and its so depressing seeing old articles and how great the comments sections used to be

suits just do not give a fuck about maintaining a quality website
The biggest casualty of the AV Club changing hands was that they deleted all their old AV Undercover videos. They only left the new ones up, and they were over-produced pieces of indie pop shit, not a bunch of people sitting in a small room playing covers.

Like damn - even when they moved out of the round room and into a bigger studio, it still felt pretty chill. There's a really good cover of Linger that some Redditor managed to save, I've got that shit downloaded somewhere. And then you've got Tubthumping by They Might Be Giants, or Without You by Superchunk.

AV Undercover was getting shit, the POWR BTTM cover of Mr Jones really got under my skin for example, but there were a wealth of awesome covers on that show. And they wiped the fucking lot.

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Lonestar2000
04/16/20 8:19:40 PM
#21:


FYI Jason Schreier celebrated the death of Palestinian children.

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Doe
04/16/20 8:21:55 PM
#22:


Lonestar2000 posted...
FYI Jason Schreier celebrated the death of Palestinian children.
source?

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#23
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Darmik
04/16/20 8:27:44 PM
#24:


Doe posted...
source?

Google lead me to alt-righters spreading a photoshop of a post-it note on his chin. So he fell for that.

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KiwiTerraRizing
04/16/20 8:30:49 PM
#25:


I used to read Deadspin every day before Drew left.

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Lonestar2000
04/17/20 1:45:52 AM
#26:


Darmik posted...
Google lead me to alt-righters spreading a photoshop of a post-it note on his chin. So he fell for that.
Nope, he used to post about it all the time on LL just a few years ago. Unfortunately they nuked the archives recently.

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ChuckSDeuces
04/17/20 7:40:37 AM
#27:


This sucks for shitty gaming news Youtubers like Yonyea. How will they find content to blatantly read into a camera now?

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NinjaBreakfast
04/17/20 7:45:27 AM
#28:


TheGoldenEel posted...
yeah, I was a big AV Club fan and its so depressing seeing old articles and how great the comments sections used to be
yeah honestly the old av club comment sections were great. a draw in its own right. everything about the avclub is just kinda below par these days unfortunately.

i know a load of people tried to get an av club style website started up based on the comment sections (the avocado?) but iirc it got hit by some big mod transphobia scandal smdh

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Hexenherz
04/17/20 7:45:42 AM
#29:


Lonestar2000 posted...
Nope, he used to post about it all the time on LL just a few years ago. Unfortunately they nuked the archives recently.
Yeah that's shitty, his past got buried. I'm sure someone has copies of it because creeps.

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myzz7
04/17/20 7:48:41 AM
#30:




MC_BatCommander posted...
Literally the only good part of Kotaku lol


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Kolibri X
04/17/20 7:58:58 AM
#31:


Romulox28 posted...
this, dude is the best journalist in the games industry
Really fucking sad state of affairs. He had connections, that's all.

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Antifar
04/17/20 8:00:38 AM
#32:


Kolibri X posted...

Really fucking sad state of affairs. He had connections, that's all.

That is a big part of reporting, yes
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Shablagoo
04/17/20 8:02:01 AM
#33:


Lorenzo_2003 posted...
Damn, it sucks when employees are expected to do their jobs.

Thats like if the Bulls got a new owner and told Michael Jordan to stop making jumpers.

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Lorenzo_2003
04/17/20 8:41:52 AM
#34:


Shablagoo posted...
Thats like if the Bulls got a new owner and told Michael Jordan to stop making jumpers.

No!

This is like if the Bulls changed to a football team and told Michael Jordan to stop shooting the football at the uprights, but then Jordan got mad, refused, argued with the new owners and kept shooting jump shots with the football until he was fired.

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Shablagoo
04/17/20 8:50:05 AM
#35:


Lorenzo_2003 posted...
No!

This is like if the Bulls changed to a football team and told Michael Jordan to stop shooting the football at the uprights, but then Jordan got mad, refused, argued with the new owners and kept shooting jump shots with the football until he was fired.

Well to be fair the owners are stupid for expecting pro-hoopers to play pro-football, but I hear you.

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Lorenzo_2003
04/17/20 9:25:37 AM
#36:


Shablagoo posted...
Well to be fair the owners are stupid for expecting pro-hoopers to play pro-football, but I hear you.

Honestly, I dont want anyone to lose their job, whether they were fired or felt pressured to quit. Ive been in a toxic workplace more than once and it sucks. I chose to move on and I was lucky I could, but of course others might be in worse situations.

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deeewooh
04/17/20 9:29:38 AM
#37:


Romulox28 posted...
this, dude is the best journalist in the games industry
kinda says a lot about the state of this shitty industry

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