Nick Denton, owner of the influential blog network Gawker media, said on his blog on Sunday that he would fold the Hollywood gossip site Defamer into the main gossip blog, Gawker.

 

Defamer had been for sale since December.

 

In an email to CNET Denton said that he had "two serious bids. But ad revenues (were) better than expected, so less pressure to cut costs." 

 

Denton has been reducing the size of his blog network, selling Consumerist last December to the publisher of Consumer Reports. He already shut down Valleywag, covering Silicon Valley, and folded that into Gawker, and sold off three of his smallest blogs last April, blaming the softening online advertising market for the sales.

 

Denton has strong traffic, but his content makes advertising a difficult sell for some brands.

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