Gawker Media was an independent media company and blog network, spanning several sites. Founded in 2002, it was the largest independent media organisation in the world, prior to its bankruptcy in 2016. The Gawker Guide to Conquering All Media is a how-to of sorts, tongue planted firmly in cheek.
I feel like any student of the media will invariably come across Gawker at some point. So, I figure I may as well write on them, even if this book is (mostly) a joke. Written by founder Nick Denton and his editorial team, it definitely reflects the snarky tone of Gawker in its heyday. That tone was not just directed at bloggers, but media moguls, and all social climbers looking to position themselves on top.
Not gonna lie, this book was actually pretty interesting. The tone and irreverence serve to shine a light on the absurdity and vain ambition of the media world. Themes of media hierarchy and power structures, celebrity and status obsession, blogging as a weapon of war, and complete detachment on the path to success are all explored. Poking fun at established journalists versus bloggers, advice on climbing the social ladder, attacking institutions and celebrity egos, and strategies on exploiting scandals and cultivating enemies… it’s all laid out nice and neat, in a Gawker kind of way.
And in typical Gawker fashion, it all manages to be smug, catty, and nihilistic, while also being funny and weirdly informative. And it’s all drenched it pop culture references and cliches, as was Gawker’s style. Less of an actual how-to guide and more of a pisstake, it recalls a time when blogs seemed to be punching up at the establishment, and were laughing during every second of it. Of course, whether one interprets the text as a parody, or an actual how-to guide, or some strange combination of the two, is entirely up to the reader. I just had a few laughs and enjoyed it.
Then again, that punching up eventually became punching at everything and everyone. From Hulk Hogan’s lawsuit, to Gawker’s Cayman Islands stock, to the whole unpaid interns saga, one would do well to observe how the once anti-establishment media organisation eventually became everything it stood against — powerful, unaccountable, and perhaps worst of all, unaware. Or maybe it’s just the progressive belief that punching down is fine as long as you can frame it as speaking truth to power.
They’re good writers and editors, for sure. Shame the staff of Gawker Media had to be such shit people, and I do miss some of their better sites, like Gizmodo and Lifehacker.
Amor fati.
Lawrence Deveney 