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GameSpot officially comments on fired editor
Author: Joe MartinPublished: 4th December 2007
GameSpot allegedly fired Gerstmann over his review of Kane and Lynch: Dead Men.
Speculation has been rampant since the rumour first started and Eidos, Gerstmann and GameSpot have all been either reluctant or unable to comment. Now, GameSpot has broken the silence and issued an official comment on the situation.
The comment once again denies the accusations that advertising pressure from Eidos lead to Gerstmann being fired - an opinion which is now being taken as fact by many readers regardless of the official position.
"Neither CNET Networks nor GameSpot has ever allowed its advertising business to affect its editorial content," said Greg Brannan, CNET Networks Entertainment's vice president of programming. "The accusations in the media that it has done so are unsubstantiated and untrue. Jeff's departure stemmed from internal reasons unrelated to any buyer of advertising on GameSpot."
"Though he will be missed by his colleagues, Jeff's leaving does not affect GameSpot's core mission of delivering the most timely news, video content, in-depth previews, and unbiased reviews in games journalism," said Ryan MacDonald, executive producer of GameSpot Live. "GameSpot is an institution, and its code of ethics and duty to its users remains unchanged."
Many readers remain unconvinced however and GameSpot has allegedly had to cope with mass subscription cancellations. What do you think though? Let us know in the forums.
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Comments (37)
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if they do, just buy the games that not advertisted on there site..... logic would state that they are the bestest games.
... just shut the f**k up.
Because the minute the news broke, everyone, including bit-tech was already of the opinion it was over the K&L review. Penny Arcade had a strip up a day (or two) later, and every blogger known to man who dabbles in video games had already taken the moral high ground of "Advertising Pressure doesn't affect my reviews". This is a no win situation for Gamespot, so wether they came out with it on day one, or 2 months later I highly doubt any of you would have believed them because they are a site that generates revenue and for the most part that is evil.
We all knew GS would deny that it was the advertisers pressure that cost Jeff his job. There was no way they would admit to that. Not to mention that Jeff isn't allowed to disclose the reason he was fired for legal reasons. If the reason was as they say they would have let us hear it from his mouth, it would have had a far greater impact.
I'm happy to hear about the mass subscriptions. That will teach them to pull a stunt like that.
"Grap The Cocaine"
As far as Gertsmann getting fired for the review? If it looks like a duck, talks like a duck, and walks like a duck.. it's probably a god damned duck. You'd think that Gamespot execs would be smart enough to figure out that firing the guy who reviewed K&L so soon after the review (and then editing the review and pulling the video review) would make it look like an awful big coincidence (see duck analogy above) to the public....but then again, the RIAA can't figure out that they need to stop treating customers like criminals, so maybe Gamespot execs just are that stupid.
However, people will forget, googlers will continue to read, advertisers will continue to give them money. The only thing we can do is hope the general public vote with their mice and click elsewhere for their content.
:D:D:D
I've deleted my bookmark. I don't see a reason to go back.They might have not fired him for that and it WAS all bad timing.... but the internet is a big place. There are just too many other sites, like this one, which are less of a uncertainty.
What ever happened they handled it monumentally badly... that shows they either have no clue what's going, or are just inept.
Plus the canned "suite" response from Greg betrays them as asshats.
A candid "we ****ed up" response and maybe a video/podcast where they discus it would be a good idea. The big players in the incident need to get together on a TWIT (or game related podcast) that's neutral ground, state their case and try to save their reputation.
As someone GS has stated: "What a wonderfully vague piece of journalism..."
Oh well money and greed ruins alot of things.
Ironically Gamespot has lost out big time both ways, it has lost one of their most senior editors and subsequently have also lost alot of advertising funding at the same time, double loss. Burn ...
Lmao, how did you find that in the source code for the page?
Damage control, LOL.
That was great, now that is the invisible ink that just tells you the truth. LOL.
here it is