pitchfork is dumb (#34985859340293849494 in a series.)

jon otm across the board. they were getting better all the time. even i, in all of my cynicism and vitriol, still became at least a weekly deep reader in the past few years because, well... it was finally getting good! there was even some redemption happening.

big sigh.

best wishes to everyone here affected.

Ugh really sorry to hear all of this, even if it's not shocking. I had long wondered how viable Pitchfork was. I don't always love or agree with Pitchfork, but it's one of my regular stops and I have definitely been introduced to lots of stuff I like via them.

I've started downloading PDFs.

a lot of love to you Alfred and to all who have put in the work at this site. feel like it took this shoe a lot longer to drop than I expected but they really seem to be dropping the hammer now. everybody has their beef w/Pitchfork on this or that matter, me included, but it's been a big part of the story in my life over the years.

Sending good feeling to all who work/write for them.

An unconscionable decision, tbh.

I wasn't really following at the time, but was there any serious backlash on the CN sale back when it happened? Of course it seemed like a good decision at the time, I'm sure, but I also have the punk side of me that's like... "never trust the big corporations, they will drop you as soon as you become unruly or unprofitable." that isn't really smart business thinking, but it's advice that i think could be whispered into more ears more often.

At the time there was a lot of lolling about Millennial Males.

table, i recall being "that guy" and thinking it would go the route of rolling stone, but for millennials: everything's pretty okay and terrible things happen and here's your favorite music worth listing, again.

i will say that i'm glad i was wrong. great work, all involved since then.

You know why Conde Nast broke them? Because they unionized.

That is sad.

it is infuriating.

Pitchfork was never more diverse than when they joined CN and Puja became editor. They unionized during the CN era -- there's an irony of history for you. Of course the expansion of their coverage exposed them to criticism, much of it deserved, much of it noted on this thread, but instead of making their mistakes in college newspapers like many of us did these younger writers were doing it with what remained of a dimming spotlight.

Whatever remains of the publication it doesn't deserve absorption into whatever the fuck GQ is these days.

i have not the proper language to express the intensity of my feelings about this situation.

thank for the wise words + insight, alfred.

*thanks

I've started downloading PDFs.

Wisdom. Doublechecked and have my files backed up in a couple of locations, there if I need them.

the NYT article begins "Pitchfork, once a cultural bastion for music criticism..." (oof)

but I also have the punk side of me that's like... "never trust the big corporations, they will drop you as soon as you become unruly or unprofitable." that isn't really smart business thinking

On the contrary, every day that looks more and more like smart business thinking

Also I hear that one person who worked at Pfork for nearly two decades, who invented fundamental aspects of its editorial content, who is one of the nicest and most solid people in this often nasty music biz, got laid off. No names bc privacy. But it's brutal and wrong

— Feeling Distant (@annkpowers) January 17, 2024

(I mean I was hoping that person had survived.)

As of 3:30 p.m. today I know one person.

I should note that Conde Nast hired Puja after a yearlong tenure at SPIN during which she expanded the range of review coverage, including who wrote the reviews. She hired me as part-time assignments editor -- a giddy time. CN hiring her in the fall of '18 was an inevitability. I don't pretend to know the machinations of corporate politics, but it's become obvious that, like Wilde said, each man -- I emphasize man -- kills the thing he loves.

I went looking through the reviews archives and when I clicked into a review was told I needed to create a CN account to read it. Not sure how long that’s been the case, but it’s the first time I’ve run into that.

the website that publishes four reviews daily often of experimental and art music just got gutted and a bunch of podcast parasocial gossip addicts are excited for what this means about Poptimism, absolute morons

— david drake (@somanyshrimp) January 17, 2024

I just found out I'm still employed but I cannot fathom what pitchfork will be without @evanminsker @jillian_mapes @ryandombal @MarcHogan @allisonhussey @hatlindert @PoRican. They aren't just talented writers & editors. They're incredible, generous, kind people who deserve better

— Nina Corcoran (@Nina_Corcoran) January 17, 2024

Sam Sodomsky and Marina Kozak were wise enough to ditch twitter, but all of them make pitchfork what it is and put an absurd amount of time & care into it behind the scenes. What a genuine privilege to learn from them, be edited by them, and make bad jokes over slack with them

— Nina Corcoran (@Nina_Corcoran) January 17, 2024

so that's at least 10 staffers including Patel

Pitchfork refugees need their own Defector

Already a bunch of chatter suggesting same, understandably. Whether it'll happen who knows but a couple of Defector folks have posted saying they'd be happy to take questions from anyone interested in their model.

iirc there was another similar subscriber-based site/model launched by former video game writers at Kotaku, WaPo and Vice. Aftermath?

Yeah, there's that, also 404Media for general tech.

Giant Bomb was ex Gamespot editors who got bounced over a dispute with a review, that was 08, probably the first of the community supported ex pats thing

Keith Harris and some other City Pages folks started Racket to fill the gap when the Star Tribute shuttered our free weekly, I'm a happy subscriber

https://racketmn.com/

welp, as Ann P. hinted at:

Welp… it happened. My time @pitchfork is being brought to an end, as it was announced today that the publication is being folded into GQ. It’s been the honor of my life to have worked here for the past 18-and-a-half (!) years…

— Amy Phillips (@amyhphillips) January 18, 2024

Heartbroken and left numb as the scope of devastation becomes clear. @Pitchfork, one of the most recognizable brands in media, was massacred today for no apparent reason.

— Jayson Greene (@Jayson_Greene) January 17, 2024

My condolences to everyone, this is really senseless. I honestly don't think it makes economic sense - it's their publisher's own failure if they don't believe they can do well with a devoted and faithful audience of music devotees that's never going to go away - but this is far most costly where it counts.

Shocking in a way other online guttings and collapses weren’t. I only look at PFork when there’s talk on ILM of something really dumb but there’s no reason the online criticism brand shouldn’t have been able to just keep pumping along forever at a reasonable profit margin.

This is insane. Like the new york times going out of business, of harvard university. Pitchfork always seemed like a stable institution. *the* hub of music journalism for as long as i have been paying attention.

I’m not sure why people are so surprised about this. For the past few years it has seemed like they’ve been grasping for a broader audience with their news coverage and reviews while completely abandoning coverage of music that was foundational to the publication. I’m not blaming this on poptism or whatever but there have been many times where I’ve thought “how many readers are they attracting with the T Swift coverage versus losing?” I’ve long been interested in seeing their readership numbers and demographic data but it has just felt like they have been trying too hard. Does anyone have a sense of what their readership was?

This feels like it’s been a long time coming. I’m optimistic that another better website will emerge that isn’t owned by a massive corporation. But unfortunately their writers probably won’t get paid as much as I assume CN pays.

Anyway, I’m genuinely interested if anyone has any insight into the business side of this.

For the past few years it has seemed like they’ve been grasping for a broader audience with their news coverage and reviews while completely abandoning coverage of music that was foundational to the publication.

people need to completely disabuse themselves of the notion that you can run a website that employs dozens of people while covering, what, news about arcade fire and animal collective? look around. how much money do you guys think news stories about mitski generate?

what other businesses do people look at and just pretend like two full decades haven't elapsed? it's not 2004. let go of this fantasy

completely abandoning coverage of music that was foundational to the publication

genuinely what are you talking about

their lead story for the day is about adrianne lenker's new album and tour lol it's not like the place is wall to wall travis kelce updates

i don't think anyone will deny there has been a shift to news & reviews being broader in coverage than before, but that shift happened like, over a decade ago for the most part, and they definitely haven't stopped covering and reviewing indie rock or whatever else is supposed to be foundational

what other businesses do people look at and just pretend like two full decades haven't elapsed? it's not 2004. let go of this fantasy

There's an irony in that the publication before it that it was most often (though mistakenly) compared to, Rolling Stone, absolutely relied on an eternal 1970-or-so for decades, thus me wondering as a reader in the Poppy Bush Interzone why there always seemed to be a Jerry Garcia cover story once a year, for instance.

and rolling stone has basically been a k pop clickfarm factory for years

there is potentially possibly not really but let's just run with this idea perhaps one person on planet earth who if they devoted their entire life to reviving coverage of the music that was foundational to pitchfork for several years could at some point down the road eke out a modest full time living via a small subscriber base that loves indie rock music journalism enough to pay for it monthly

That’s one example. You can’t tell me there hasn’t been a massive increase in coverage of Taylor Swift. And im not complaining, so please save your energy in piling on the idiot or whatever. If they are folding it under fucking GQ, then I’m probably not that far off in my assumption.

You can’t tell me there hasn’t been a massive increase in coverage of Taylor Swift.

this is like the one example in pop that's more recent because they didn't review her at all until 2019 which was a real notable absence in their coverage of the pop landscape at the time

but again, they definitely haven't stopped covering indie rock and no one is disputing their coverage has gotten broader over time

Anyway, I figured someone on here would have some insight into the readership numbers so we could skip all the speculation or bemoaning how it’s unconscionable.

very sad news. i love pitchfork

https://www.similarweb.com/website/pitchfork.com/#traffic

11.8M total visits in November
vs.
23.1M Rolling Stone
17.6M Billboard
9.1M NME
3.1M Stereogum
1.5M Spin

(Can't see traffic over time without a paid account.)

Xxpost so which numbers do you need? How much less Pitchfork would have made without the Taylor Swift news? How much more they would make if they turned into indie Mojo and just did oral histories of the Moon and Antartica or whatever? Some insight into why a huge corporation might decide to slash a bunch of jobs?