Gawker Moves Hint At Ad Downturn

An assortment of personnel moves and the dumping of a pair of poorly performing blogs under the Gawker Media umbrella will take place for a series of reasons, the first being a fear of an advertising downturn. Gawker Media founder Nick Denton Sploid and Gawker, Wonkette departing: Over time, on the same beat, all journalists get into a routine, or too close to sources, or go native. For Gawker titles, which have always sought to take the outsider's perspective, this is a particular risk. We need always to be open to fresh editorial talent, even if that means wrenching changes. One change, the Dealbreaker blog. While Denton cited fears of an advertising downturn as partial motivation for the changes, he also noted increasing expenses in running the business. He describes the pay scale for editors as being "within the range" of mainstream media. That may be a surprise to Nick Douglas, the blogger behind report cited Douglas' contract as paying him $550 a month plus expenses; we hope he's getting a taste of that ad revenue as well. Add to Del.icio.us | Digg | Yahoo! My Web | Furl Bookmark murdok: David Utter is a staff writer for murdok covering technology and business.