Gawker Gets Krucoff'd

i miss "friends"

you people are dumber than i originally thought. quite amazing. then again, it's just two or three miserable nutsacks posting at this point so at least the stupidity is exposed to just a few. but come on dudes, write more! we know you can do it.

i propose a nyc bloggers rumble to replace the happy hour and other events at the soho store....maybe gathamist can plug the Home Depot in an interview and then we'll all go buy our pipes and chains there...whadda ya say...the first "Gothamist Rumble"...."More Floggin less Bloggin"...whose in ?

Boy, everybody sure is in a tizzy. Guess they don't like to hear it when people disagree. A shame.

And waaaaaa, the logic is your own. By calling it "dumbass" you're only degrading your own comments. But I guess you don't really understand that. Or maybe you do, but just are afraid to admit it, since you suggest shutting down the comments immediately after your own defensive post.

So, where does this leave us? It seems we are stuck with a circle-jerk of bloggers that doesn't like it when the reading (read: non-blogging) public that they've cultivated start to complain about the creeping insularity of their posts and subject matter. So who is the intended audience, really? Is Gothamist only supposed to be read by tech-savvy yuppie bloggers who love to watch TV, eat at expensive restaurants, and follow the arts with ironic detachment?

Good lord. You want pure news on NYC? Try the NY Times. Pure gossip? Page Six. A nice mix with some funny sidenotes and the occasional in-joke that will lead you to other fun pages? Gothamist. Now shut up already. It's not like this is the only place to read about news in NYC, crybaby.

And stop being so pissy about the interview comments. My guess is that they had a hard enticing people to be interviewed on a page full of nasty comments. Go bitch in the Forum. Or don't read the page at all.

re: "THEN STOP READING YOU FOOLS. don't waste your precious time here."

but some stuff is good...i like reading the good stuff...then i complain about the bad stuff...so there is then more good stuff than bad stuff to read...

thats dumbass logic. i enjoy replying to your stupidity. see, if you really thought this through then you'd realize your braindead comment wouldn't even be here if you didn't read this post. catch my drift, honey? i'm sure you don't. but yes, this is all very silly and we're all feeding the obsession. pretty sad.

[proof submitted that this comments thread should be closed now not for any censorship reasons/hurt feelings but the discourse has become so dumb that its very existence offends basic human intelligence.]

Now now kindergarteners... behave well, or Jen's going to put us on timeout and take away our crayons...

hey waaaaa, if you don't like specific comments, don't reply to them. Simple as that. Same logic.

THEN STOP READING YOU FOOLS. don't waste your precious time here.

Yes, pjh. Very much so.

anyone else tired of watching nyc bloggers blow sunshine up each others megalomaniacal asses...wholly masturbatorial undertones...

i know krucoff and if you brainless twits are so obsessed with his cab-riding habits then you should know he was JOKING with that post. he's all sarcasm and it's wildly hilarious to see you people take him seriously word-for-word. if you knew him at all you'd know he's broke as a dog and lives in a dirty lower east side tenement that's infested with rodentia and roaches. that certainly doesn't give him any cred but he aint zooming around town in taxis either.

and trooper, your attempt at parody couldn't be more retarded. what on earth is that even supposed to mean?

but i guess the ol' boy has started to make a name for himself, hasn't he? the road to success is not without the ramblings of jealous freaks. i'm sure krucoff smiles at all of this. keep it up.

"Who gives a F*ck if Krucoff takes a cab to work every day."

Considering how I take the subway to work each day, I understand why people who be playa-hating this Krucoff fellow.

With all due "Respect":

Who gives a F*ck if Krucoff takes a cab to work every day. He does what he wants without worrying about being an "authentic"--the sign of a true LES/NYr (you're probably the same scab who posts on Craig's R&R about that shite). Give me a fucking break with your "authenticity" already. He lives and works here. Pays taxes here. 'nuff said.

krucoff, you do suck less than I thought you would.

Try being more gay or something.

if blog entries were the best part of blogs for you then you clearly missed the point. maybe no one gives a crap what bloggers have to say. but if bloggers feel the need to say it, by all means bloggers have many other ways to voice your opinion other than a blog. what kind of moron blogger complains about something as ridiculous as this? it's a blog! first amendment rights are not at stake!! idiots.

if comments were the best part of the interviews for you then you clearly missed the point. maybe no one gives a crap what you have to say. but if you feel the need to say it, by all means you have many other ways to voice your opinion. what kind of moron complains about something as ridiculous as this? it's a blog! first amendment rights are not at stake!! idiots.

I agree, you do suck Andrew.

I find the comments the best part of a blog. Interviews are not as interesting without the ability to comment. The comments were more entertaining than the interviews.Turning off comments is the proverbial "cutting off nose to spite face".

let's review, this is the last time i'll say something here then i'll leave you feeling smug with your eventual hyper-cool follow-up reply: you can *still* comment on the interviews in the gothamist forums. does it upset you that can't make a comment on the interview page with a link on your name to your site? how so blog unfriendly of me when i'm supposed to be a "blogfucker." criticize me all you want. it's a riot. there were just too many stupid comments directed at the interviewee (major payne, interviewee = the person being interviewed, not me. i think you are having trouble with this concept.) i said before, even *positive* comments were stupid. it's not supposed to be a freakin' friendster testimonial either. thing is, i never thought comments should have been turned on in the first place. it's an interview, not a regular blog post. you have *many* options to air your opinion. for you to dictate that the terms must be ON the post is kind of, how you say, assholish?

but as far as my gawker stint, i agree. i totally suck.

my two cents: You make an excellent point. Not to take away from what the editors have made out of this site, but you hit the nail on the head about broadening content.

I give the editors at least a bit of credit, though, for leaving threads like this up in their entirety, and not deleting comments that stray on the side of ad hominem attacks. They certainly could do that as an editorial policy and it wouldn't be egotistical in the least. I do feel that some of the criticisms today came across in an immature manner, as if the intent were to embarrass the editors on their own site. I have yet to see a trend here where constructive criticism is being stifled.

"degrade the level of discourse?"

Please, aren't we being a little hyperbolic? I am glad for Major Payne's criticism, because I think that Gothamist, if it aspires to be something more than a gaggle of close-knit friends writing about each other and each others' interests, must stop suggesting that any criticism is a deviation from a pre-established script.

Broadening focus would help, too. I check into Gothamist for NYC-centric happenings, but judging from many of the recent posts, you'd think all that New Yorkers cared about were TV shows filmed in NYC, foodie gossip, and stalking Elvis Mitchell.

OK, now I'm exaggerating, but the range of subject matter in here is really getting a bit stifling. Again, if Gothamist aspires to grow, and truly live up to the cultural mantle that a forum at the Apple store suggests (on a cynical note, how many ipods did you shill that night to Young Manhattanites?), I would suggest broadening the focus (and not just by adding weather features and other functionality, but by broadening content and subject matter).

Krucoff has dictated that all comments be removed from interviews. He did this only when comments did not stroke his ego.

Yeah. Or you mean "He turned off the comments on the interview section." So now they're not blog interviews, they're just like regular print interviews that don't have discussion boards. This is proof of his God complex.

I mean, I'm not entirely sure why the comments on the interviews were turned off, but deciding to publish online without using accompanying discussion forums and comment systems doesn't necessarily mean that the author is too full of themselves to give anyone else a chance to criticize.

Besides, I'll be direct... I'm calling you out on your criticism because your language is embarrassing for the site authors, and it's embarrassing for you as well. I can't tell you to stop, I can only respond to you such that your attempt to degrade the level of discourse on this site does not go unchallenged.

"Not to mention the name calling, which is a highly respected form of editorial discourse practiced only by the godlike..."

Krucoff has dictated that all comments be removed from interviews. He did this only when comments did not stroke his ego. Ditto with Krucoff's endless stream of pithy, snide name-calling of readers who dare to say anything about him.

Who has the "diety" issues in that case, chief.

Gothamist posts some great stuff. But the mutual blogger adoration society is simply what irks "blog haters" the most.

Pssst, wanna know why Gawker was so great when Liz Spiers was the first editor? She did not spend post upon post talking about blogging and blogging culture.

Major Payne:

I reread your comments, including the parts where you distinctly addressed the site editors and writers with "please pull your head away from your bellybutton," "get a life," "Lower East Side brat who has Upper East Side snotbag aspirations," "you bloggers have egos more fragile than depression era glass," "You people just are so damned full of yourself at times," and "twitchy Queens."

Well now, if they're not toughened up at this point, they may never be!

I mean, no one claimed they were ever perfect. I suppose you think you're good enough, though, to pass judgement. Perhaps you think it's your right to have your merciless opinion displayed on the offending site more prominently than it's own title... your opinions on the things that are wrong with this site seem to be clearly more important to you than what they're trying to write about.

Not to mention the name calling, which is a highly respected form of editorial discourse practiced only by the godlike...

I mean, shit man, why do Jake, Jen, Andrew, and crew even get out of bed in the morning? Sheesh! I'll tell you what, I vote to give you the keys for Gothamist and Gawker for the rest of the week. Maybe even nytimes.com too.

I think a few of the overzealous blog defenders really should reread what I wrote when I said "...did it also ever occur to you that perhaps the reason people are posting on your blog is because they like some aspects of Gothamist but do not like other aspects. I do come to this site for New York featurish news and enjoy it. But I can't say the same thing about stupid self-promotion fluff pieces."

That's basically it. I think the big problem blog writers and their egos have is that unlike print, they have not toughened up to criticism. At least in the print publishing world, you pay your dues, spend years learning the ins-outs of the business and then by the time you reach the level of "columnist" you've at least toughened up enough to not run crying the second anyone even remotely says something that is not 100% cheerleading "Yay! This is great!"

Thanks to blogging you get the positive of quick and fast publishing of minor and major news at a very low cost. But thanks to blogging you also get ego fragile ninnies who get upset when anyone dares to say "Uggh, that is not good."

That's basically it. If your a public voice expect people to say the good, the bad and the ugly and stop crying anytime things don't result in universal self-focused praise.

And by the way, I wouldn't have discovered half the sites I read on a somewhat regular basis if it wasn't for this crazy, incestuous cross-promotion.

It is an integral component of blogging. Considering the barrels of money earned by shitty, sell-out publications like the New York Times, and the real-world damage their anti-professional ass-licking does to journalism, I'm more than willing to cut bloggers plenty of slack when they are vying for a few crumbs off the table.

They certainly entertain me more than Amanda Hesser giving hand-jobs to anyone willing to provide glowing praise for her book.

Well at least he "scooped" the Post and the Daily News on the closing of Below 14th Street. Big news of the day for Gawker. All the Webby awards will be well deserved. Hah.

On second thought, it seems utterly devious to post a news article about a rival's setback to get that "meh, slow news day" reaction.

I don't know Krucoff from a can of paint so I wouldn't know about any major or minor problems. But I do know that Choire is cuter and wittier and more all-around fun.

Proof: this lame chain of angry yelpings is more entertaining that anything on Gawker today. Yawn. Blame it on the server...

Tully,

Why is he so sensitive? He sure can't take criticism...

Cool. Dibs on the servers, including the little hamsters and gerbils that provide pedaling power.

And I get Krucoff's hairpiece, too.

if you people actually knew Andrew Krucoff you would certainly not waste your time commenting on him. i don't know where to begin, and so i won't. suffice to say, the guy has got some MAJOR problems. i give him until Wednesday afternoon before that entire site comes crashing down.

better yet, lets get one of those smoke filter doohickeys to clear the air here.

We can try to reuse attacks... "Geez, Gawker has really gone to crap ever since Krucoff took over for that nice girl who used to run it"

damn, pretty lame attacks dontcha think? major payne, step it up and get out of the minors! be creative with this stuff. makes it so much more enjoyable for everyone. i'll try to get my friends in here cause they could do a much better job of trashing me. thanks.

"you forgot stupid, ugly, disrepectful..."

If I could edit above comment, I would change "write like crap" to "choose crappy topics", as that's the accurate accusation being made. I come back to Gothamist every day because I like the writing (and the topics), so there's no Freudian slip there.

Ever hear the phrase "piss in the trough"?

Jake had a good point against the hate going on here (and it had me laughing). Why would you care so much if you really dislike it? Why publicly attack publishers and writers because you think they write like crap... are we going to all agree with YOU for being the master of criticism and jump on your cool kid wagon?

I find it highly ironic that, in the process of launching an ad-hominem attack so one can stroke their own ego, the attackers here are railing against the Gothamist staff for self promotion! What exactly is it that you think YOU'RE doing by posting here to make your attacks? One has nothing to gain by putting their name here with a negative opinion other than to gather attention.

So we're all ATTENTION WHORES! Woo woo! Maybe a backflip in Washington Square Park will get you a few dollars, too!

(Note: I'm a self confessed attention whore, I have a pitiful blog here, and I do nothing productive at the moment except hit the F5 key on my favorite sites every 5 minutes while pretending to look for a job. There's nothing you can say to make me feel lower! so hah.)

oh man, depression era glass!! that's classic major payne. btw, if people don't comment on my sports entries, i'm going to have to invest in some ego enhancing pills...

Major Payne, I understand your comments more now - basically, it bores you when we write about other bloggers we happen to be friends with and that's understandable, it's totally your opinion. I guess I reacted to your initial comment because there was less context to it. It's just odd for us not to comment about krucoff writing for Gawker, because it seems like blogs are initially built on having a network of friends who blog as well - nepotism, sure, since in no way do we look like a larger media organization (no Graydon Cartergate type comparisons would ever apply, unless it involved giving us some tootsie rolls or something) because at the end of the day, it's something that interests us (as is Choire being questioned for the Martha Stewart jury voir-dire, other bloggers speaking at WYSIWYG tonight, etc). There's always great stuff on sites of people we like, so why not point it out, and at the same rate, why not point out that a friend might be moonlighting at another blog. So, thanks for the further reasoning (and spelling tips!), but I don't know if we're going to stop posting on other bloggers' activities soon.

Jake and Major Payne: get a room already!

Wound a little tight there, aren't ya Major Payne? I'm neither a blogger, blogger-hater nor lover, just a well-adjusted, reasonable person and I find myself wondering why you would bother with blogs if you have have so much disdain for the bloggers.

Jen, before you shut down the comments here, it's "deterrent"

Jake, it's mostly cuz we're bored at work and can't look at porn at the office. if you have recommendations for other sites, please give them.

also, it's not like it's a new phenomenon where you are addicted to something you find somewhat vile or stupid. for instance, i feel the same way about the real world as i do about the guy who writes whatevs.org. they're both really, really lame, but also entertaining.

Jake, did it also ever occur to you that perhaps the reason people are posting on your blog is because they like some aspects of Gothamist but do not like other aspects. I do come to this site for New York featurish news and enjoy it. But I can't say the same thing about stupid self-promotion fluff pieces.

Gawker and Gothamist often comment on obvious nepotism in larger media circles. Which is why it's funny to see Gothamist get upset when readers point out similar nepotism in your own house. Is the pot calling the kettle black? Or does it seem that most "bloggers" can happily dish out the dirt, but get upset like twitchy Queens when other people call them on their nepotism.

Jake, none of us commenters understand why you bloggers have egos more fragile than depression era glass and get upset when people don't stand around and stroke your collective ego.

The fact that your panties are all in a bunch are one of the main reasons people are "blogger haters". You people just are so damned full of yourself at times and this post on Krucoff being on Gawker deserves criticism for it's logrolling obviousness.

Do you notice any of us "blog haters" posting on other comments? Or is it only on this Krucoff hand-job piece? Makes you think Jake. At least if you have the capability to think beyond personal self promotion.

As for comments on Interviews, or on other places on Gothamist, if the comments function is abused, we close it down. krucoff felt (and we support his decision) that the Interview comments were becoming less constructive and more of a deterrant. And while it's not Russia, this is also a private owned site. You're welcome to your opinions and telling them, but it's our call whether or not it appears on this site.

he he, that guy looks like one of them kennedys.

honestly, i don't get blog haters who seem to spend all their time reading blogs. if it's so wack, why are you commenting for a second, third, or forth time on the same post? it just makes you seem like you worship the ground krucoff walks on and/or you are completely obsessed with him. not that i blame you- i've been sneaking into his apartment every night for the last two weeks and touching his face while he sleeps. that guy just rocks!

I like the interviews but wish that Andrew would do a bit more ID up top so I understand exactly who is being interviewed. It feels a little insidery sometimes. Would it be too uncool just to say who the heck the person actually is?

I have a mirror attachment that I have added to my monitor to allow blogs to better look at themselves without getting in the way of me reading other things.

Krucoff's comment removal decision is a very punk (as in lame) move, but it's not surprising. He's clearly a Lower East Side brat who has Upper East Side snotbag aspirations. Sort of like reverse slumming. But more transparent. *YAWN* when will bloggers simply go away.

Oh yeah, major irritant. Whatever. If a blog can comment on something a reader can comment on that blog. We're not in Russia you know.

botox.afs

I lost my respect for krucoff when he stopped allowing comments for the "interviews" and I learned that Mr. Authentic Lower East Side took a taxi to work every day.

What photoshop filter did they use to remove the wrinkles?

major payne:

so what's that say about readers of a blog about blogging about bloggers blogging who take the time to whine about bloggers blogging about bloggers blogging?

whoa, head rush.

Gothamist publishes Krucoff's interviews. Krucoff praises Gothamist. Krucoff now gets a Gawker gig. Gothamist praises Krucoff.

Regarding that comment about "that's interesting to about ten people", please pull your head away from your bellybutton and realize that not too many people care about bloggers blogging about bloggers blogging.

As the prophet once said, get a life.

I have to say that today's interview with Chris Eigeman is fabulous. He's my favorite portrayer of uptight yuppies/Wasps/stiffs EVER. Who knew that someone in a Whit Stillman film could be in a show with Jennifer Grey as Jennifer Grey or on The WB? I love Chris Eigeman!