Gawker Media made a pair of notable moves on President’s Day.
Nick Denton’s bloggy empire – sometimes the target of media companies looking to buy properties -- made the first acquisition of its own: Cityfile, the city guide with an enviable database of boldface names founded by Remy Stern, a former editor at Radar.
Denton wouldn’t disclose the sale price, only to say it was "significant." The Cityfile site will become a "channel" on Gawker.com similar to the way Gawker's own Valleywag and Defamer were folded into the flagship last year.
As part of the deal, Denton (right) is replacing Gabriel Snyder, Gawker’s editor, with Stern (below, left).
Snyder had served in that role for a year-and-a-half. During that time, according to Quantcast estimates, Gawker.com's traffic has roughly doubled. (Cityfile's traffic, by contrast, is relatively small, at least by Gawker standards.)
On Friday, Snyder even boasted about Gawker's record January traffic in a post on the site.
Which is perhaps one reason why he sounded blindsided by the move.
“For reasons which I'm not too clear on, but I'm sure Nick Denton will explain momentarily, I am being replaced as editor-in-chief of Gawker,” Snyder wrote in an exit memo. “Honesty is Gawker's only virtue, so it seems inappropriate to engage in the usual corporate euphemisms of ‘wanting to explore new new opportunities’ or ‘take a larger role in the company’ or ‘spend more time with my family’ (though eighteen-hour days and seven-day work weeks do take their toll on personal relationships), so I'll put this as plainly as we'd report any other masthead ouster: I am being canned.”
In an e-mail, Denton wrote the sale had been in the works for "about two months, though we'd raised the possibility more than a year ago."
I asked Denton what his expectation for an editor-in-chief is, in terms of traffic, scoops or otherwise.
"I'd like to get Gawker US uniques to 5m," Denton wrote. "And that requires a series of huge scoops. But once we're there, I'm sure we won't pause for long before the next ambition."
I also asked Denton if there's another purchase in the works. "One other we've been looking at seriously," he wrote. (It appears Denton's memo is also effectively working as a solitication notice for other sites looking to "sell out" -- he said he's already received "three propositions" in the hours since it was posted on Gawker.)
Snyder was not immediately available for comment. But here is his memo, followed by Denton's:
From: Gabriel Snyder
Date: February 15, 2010 3:47:23 PM EST
Subject: Farewell
For reasons which I'm not too clear on, but I'm sure Nick Denton will explain momentarily, I am being replaced as editor-in-chief of Gawker.
Honesty is Gawker's only virtue, so it seems inappropriate to engage in the usual corporate euphemisms of "wanting to explore new new opportunities" or "take a larger role in the company" or "spend more time with my family" (though eighteen-hour days and seven-day work weeks do take their toll on personal relationships), so I'll put this as plainly as we'd report any other masthead ouster: I am being canned.
