GameSpot has finally addressed the firing of Jeff Gerstmann in public, and anybody who expected the site to admit to cloak-and-dagger shenanigans is going to be disappointed. Citing "legal constraints" for not telling the real story behind the controversy, the once-trusted site has nevertheless denied any and all accusations.
"... Contrary to widespread and unproven reports, his exit was not a result of pressure from an advertiser," GameSpot claimed in its post. CNET's Greg Brannan added that neither CNET nor GameSpot has ever allowed advertising to affect editorial content.
The whole address is very carefully worded. Terms such as "part ways," "departure" and "tenure has ended" are used and not once is there any direct clue that CNET/GameSpot had fired the man. In fact, the uninitiated may even be led to believe that Jeff's "departure" was amicable and that Gerstmann had happily skipped away to pastures green rather than discovered he was locked out of his office, as the "unproven rumors" claim.
What do we think? Is GameSpot pulling out the spin and serving us a steaming plate of PR bulls*it, or does truth tickle the tainted tongue of GameSpot's words? Just looking at the comments that follow 'Spot's post indicates that it'll take more than a sugarcoated denial to convince the site's readers. As for we here at Cashwh0re, formerly Destructoid, we'd just like to support GameSpot in what must be a very difficult time. We all know how hard it is to type a farewell post with all the gold chains and silken garments from the finest tailors of Savile Row weighing you down.
[Thanks, Timepants]
Jim Sterling serves as reviews editor for Destructoid.com, head of the Podtoid podcast, and produces a number of news stories, original features, one-of-a-kind videos. With his passionate argumentative style, controversial opinions, harsh delivery, and dedication to brutal honesty Sterling is a name that you can't help but recognize.
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Contest:
10:35 PM on 12.03.2007
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My totally uninformed guess: Gerstmann and his boss have not been seeing eye-to-eye on the new "casual gamer" focus at GameSpot for some time, and Larson decided to clean house by firing the perceived ringleader of his opposition.
That's 100% made up, but feel free to spread that one around too.
Stop nitpicking gags or no girls will like you!
Not that I even liked Gertsmann's style, but wrongs are wrong.
Guess all the flaming has gotten their attention. We will never hear the way it actually went down. But it's nice to know that they "care."
Now give me some more 9's and 10's!!
CASHWHORE 4 LIFE!
The cake is a lie but the BS in the story seems to be very real.
I can imagine gamespot staff must not be in the best of the moods... no en of year parties this time...
BULLSHIT SHIT SHIT!
thank you.
If the K & L video review hadn't been pulled and the text review hadn't be edited, I might be willing to give C|net benefit of the doubt. But they seriously fucked the dog in this whole situation.
It's still too late though. Gamespot can eat balls.
http://reviews.cnet.com/8300-11455_7-10.html?tag=cnetfd.pdcst
they bring up an interesting point, and that's that if the supposition that jeff was fired for his review turns out to be true, they would probably lose more than just traffic... a lot of their editors, for both cnet and gamespot, would jump ship too.
or he's legally gagged by terms of a settlement from saying anything.
or both.
either way, i'm sure he's enjoying the shit out of it, if he really was locked out of his office.
I don’t know anymore...I still think this is a bunch of PR bullshit, but now there’s the slightest bit of doubt that there was a controversy at all. As Necros said, we may never know what really happened...do those firing NDAs have an expiration date or something, so maybe Jeff can give us the gory details in, say, five years?
Seriously. If it was an amicable departure or even a "My boss hates me" situation, they still wouldn't just happen to pick the one video review that blasted the game they just happened to be advertising the shit out of that day.
They could have fired him and still kept the video review just fine. That's why I think this all smells of corporate bullshit.