Cracked fires its full time contributors?

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Re: Cracked now requires a subscription to vote on comments

Postby DoglovingJim » Tue Dec 05, 2017 10:27 am

archaeologydalek wrote:So...I still have a job, it turns out. I know that's going to be a disappointment for A Combustible Lemon considering their passive-aggressive 'complicit' bullshit, which makes it sound like I spent the last few years committing war crimes in the Sudan instead of writing internet comedy. They're okay-ish jokes, Brent.

Anyway.

We lost most of our salaried staff and the main office in LA is now closed. The only full-timers to survive are Wong, Brockway, Kristi, Cyriaque, Alex Schmidt, and Ann, and as far as I can't tell that's because they're all department heads; Kristi is Workshop, Cyriaque is Quick Fix (hi!), Ann is Image Contests, Alex is Podcasts, Wong is Executive Editor, and Brockway is Ramping Cars and Drinking Whiskey. Probably. We've entirely lost Video.

As for us contractors, our 'orders' are to carry on as-is...which leads me to suspect that we've just been LA Weekly'd: drop the big-name talent, replace them with relatively-cheaper contractors and freelancers. It's...a thing, I guess.

I'm meant to get out of bed today and carry on as normal, but what the fuck is 'normal' these days? I can't dwell on the assholes who are crowing about our demise and saying that we deserved this -- I need to do my job and support my friends, and that's going to be the new normal for a long time.

I know there's still love for some creators at Cracked, and I know that any kind or supportive messages directed on social media would go a long, long way. If you love someone, tell them -- now more than ever.


Dalek as an employee what do you think is the state of Cracked, I mean are you optimistic it'd carry on or are you keeping your resume updated just in case it collapses entirely? Out of 100%-0% (100% you mean Cracked is certain to endure for many more years and 0% meaning that it's dead and decomposing) where would you put it?

[I apologise if you take this comment the wrong way considering Cracked is your source of income, I don't mean any insult)
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skoobadive wrote:It's the legendary DoglovingJim! Ohboy, this must be the greatest day of my life!

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Re: Cracked now requires a subscription to vote on comments

Postby archaeologydalek » Tue Dec 05, 2017 10:49 am

REDACTED
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Last edited by archaeologydalek on Sat Feb 10, 2018 7:02 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: Cracked now requires a subscription to vote on comments

Postby subotai » Tue Dec 05, 2017 1:49 pm

I'm surprised it took this long for Cracked, the decline has been obvious for a few years. It's not a good sign for any company to cut so many at once, it's survival mode, and time for remaining employees to start looking for work elsewhere.
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Re: Cracked now requires a subscription to vote on comments

Postby Marcuse » Tue Dec 05, 2017 2:51 pm

Dalek, I have expressed my sympathies elsewhere, so please understand if I have to get a little part of this out in the appropriate place. Needless to say I am incredibly upset that so many talented people have been put out onto the street with nary a goodbye and thank you.

Checking the PWOT forum for discussion about this, I stumbled across this nugget of information.

ProfessorRocketsurgeon wrote:Goodwill impairment reflects the loss (or perceived loss) in value of a company after it's been purchased, basically meaning E.W. Scripps bought Cracked for $39 million and then, a year later, decided they had overpaid by $35.7 million.


I have reproduced link and bolding as per original post.

Now, I'm pretty sure that deciding that a company is worth 8.4% of what you paid for it is a significant thing. But why did this ever happen in the first place? Why was the company ever allowed to be sold for such a ridiculously inflated figure and then sack the majority of the staff and close the LA office to cut costs? The short sightedness of this is mind boggling.

Now who do you think are not responsible for this excess of mismanagement? Probably the talent whose job it is to make content. The logic of this is frustrating, because if they think Cracked isn't going to make them any money, getting rid of the people who were bringing people to the site and making them want to stay and buy subscriptions is not the way to go about it. Already in that thread people are saying there's no point in subscribing with no recognisable faces to draw them in, someone even asked for a refund because the basis upon which the subscription was sold now isn't the case, which is probably a can of worms which will get him banned.

ArcheologyDalek wrote:We've entirely lost Video.


Yes, closing the one part of the site that even people who were critical of Cracked thought was the last holdout of the kind of content they wanted will definitely make them lots of money. Seriously, I cannot get over how mind blowingly stupid all of this is.

Pargin wrote:The site will continue to publish, we still need article submissions, we still need the freelancers to keep doing their thing (more than ever, actually) but it will be a bit of a scramble in the near term as we figure out who is doing what.


So this is manager-speak for "my staff has been cut down like wheat to the scythe and I'm expected to carry on as normal". I don't envy him his task going forward, but given that I blame him and his decisions for a lot of the worst reasons why Cracked doesn't have as much of an audience, has been scrambling for money and can't impress the new owners with their best material I don't have a ton of sympathy for him. In fact, he's about the only person I would say shouldn't be in place, given the absurd drop in value the company has presented.

For all my anger at the site in the past, I am truly sorry that it has come to this.

Do you know what? We've been saying this for a long time. I'm so so sorry but we have. All those people Pargin yelled at, banned, called cockroaches and said we smear shit on the walls. We could have been your reason (in small part) why the company was worth something. We could have been a resource base of people prepared to pay for subscriptions and prepared to view ads if it kept the site we loved on the rails. We could have helped you keep your business afloat, we could have been a bargaining chip in the fight with an incompetent owner. But we weren't, because we weren't wanted.
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Re: Cracked now requires a subscription to vote on comments

Postby Taluun » Tue Dec 05, 2017 3:35 pm

I'd love to still support the site but like what appeal does it even have still? What separates it from any other list site nowadays?
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Re: Cracked now requires a subscription to vote on comments

Postby sunglasses » Tue Dec 05, 2017 6:42 pm

I'm very sad that video is gone.

Also, I was going to link that stuff about Scipps, but Marc beat me to it.

You heard it here first folks-Marc beat me.


11.jpg
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Re: Cracked now requires a subscription to vote on comments

Postby Tesseracts » Tue Dec 05, 2017 7:09 pm

So, none of this makes sense. I especially don't understand why they closed down the video stuff. Video is where all the money is in online content right now. How do they expect the company to survive?
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Cracked fires it's full time contributors?

Postby LegionofShrooms » Tue Dec 05, 2017 7:41 pm

So...

Was reading the comments on this article and came across a post saying all of the full time staff at Cracked are now gone.

I've done nothing to verify this yet (I have to go back to work soon so I don't have the time), but is this true?

And if so, is this the beginning of the end for Cracked?
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Re: Cracked fires it's full time contributors?

Postby Taluun » Tue Dec 05, 2017 8:39 pm

So the moderators might split/combine some threads but you can see some information about it here.

viewtopic.php?f=6&t=10534&start=105
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Re: Cracked fires its full time contributors?

Postby Marcuse » Tue Dec 05, 2017 8:47 pm

Relevant posts on the firing of Cracked contributors have been moved to this thread.

Also, whoever is left should probably remove the images of all those poor people they fired from around the "please subscribe" thing. Nothing like playing on the goodwill readers have towards people the company threw away to convert players into payers.
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Re: Cracked fires its full time contributors?

Postby Jeckel » Tue Dec 05, 2017 9:13 pm

When they fired DOB, they fired the last tiny ember of care I had for the site. I've stuck around through all the crap they have done over the past 5 to 6 years (lord, has it really been that long), but this is the bridge too far. You don't fire DOB. As far as I'm concerned, the place can now burn to the ground and I won't shed a single tear. I suggest that anyone still working there get their resume in order, because if they are willing to fire all the Talent, then no one's job is safe.
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Re: Cracked fires its full time contributors?

Postby iMURDAu » Tue Dec 05, 2017 10:28 pm

Do you know what? We've been saying this for a long time. I'm so so sorry but we have. All those people Pargin yelled at, banned, called cockroaches and said we smear shit on the walls. We could have been your reason (in small part) why the company was worth something. We could have been a resource base of people prepared to pay for subscriptions and prepared to view ads if it kept the site we loved on the rails. We could have helped you keep your business afloat, we could have been a bargaining chip in the fight with an incompetent owner. But we weren't, because we weren't wanted.


Amen. I would've paid a subscription fee before the whole shuttering of comment sections and calling anyone who posted within them "part of the problem". Instead I left and never went back. I even avoided their youtube videos out of spite, not for the content creators but their asshole bosses who didn't see me as intelligent enough to digest and discuss the writing.

I feel a similar sense of trepidation at my workplace. The customers are being scared away by high prices and corporate is saying the problem is with how employees engage the customers. Well we didn't take over the store and jump prices 30% to make people run away. But if shit goes down and we close, I'm sure the higher ups that caused the issue will retain employment in another division.
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Re: Cracked fires its full time contributors?

Postby LegionofShrooms » Wed Dec 06, 2017 3:08 am

archeologydalek wrote:I know there's still love for some creators at Cracked, and I know that any kind or supportive messages directed on social media would go a long, long way. If you love someone, tell them -- now more than ever.


Well then, allow me to thank you now Dalek.

I've enjoyed your articles immensely these last few years. In a time of upheaval and declining quality, where funny and informative articles were by the by largely replaced with political agendas and cramming loaded opinions of what whichever author thought sucks down our throats or why I'm actually a terrible person, you-along with a few other writers-were a hail back to the old style that drew me into Cracked in the first place.

I've greatly appreciated that over these last couple of years, and I don't think I ever told you that.
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Re: Cracked fires its full time contributors?

Postby Irishjava » Wed Dec 06, 2017 3:00 pm

Seeing DOB of all people getting the ax hurt me physically. He was still positive and chipper and graceful on Twitter, giving other people pep talks, but OCPD was one of my favorite things on Youtube and his articles were always goddamn brilliant. Hope everyone involved (but especially DOB) lands on their feet, and I hope whoever made this decision realizes you can't make a company more profitable by excising the primary sources of profit.
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Re: Cracked fires its full time contributors?

Postby Krashlia » Wed Dec 06, 2017 5:01 pm

Tfw After Hours is done for. What the hell man? Where else am I going to get zany pop culture discussions?
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