excaliburps Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 Title says it plainly enough. Over the past few days I've noticed (as I'm sure most of you as well) the significant decline of Kotaku's hits and comments. I mean each story is lucky if it can break 100 comments! Which was the norm in the "normal" Kotaku. Unless it's TAY. Only that one surpasses 300 comments and whatnot. And most of 'em are about the redesign and bitching about it. So, hits and comments drop rate. Yay or Nay? Will this mean that Denton will be forced to accept defeat and go back to the original format? Do a lot of you even care or has damage been done? Let's discuss! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RockyRan Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 Personally, I think it'll be short lived. Yes, I'm personally firm about my decision to leave the site, but in general people really aren't. The fact of the matter is, people will get used to the redesign for better or worse and more people will come in. I have no solid evidence, but based on personal observation of many site redesigns over the years I see activity go down but then go back up as people "get over it". I doubt Kotaku'll ever suffer a permanent drop in activity like Digg did. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pirandello Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 Cosplay articles are guaranteed 40k+ hits and 1k+ comments. Period. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peteer01 Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 (edited) I'm cool with visiting Kotaku as long as CyberToyger's old Kotaku URL redirect method works: http://board.pressxordie.com/topic/752-the-old-kotaku/ I'm definitely reading and commenting less, but as long as the old format option is there I will be happy to visit occasionally with that...but it seems like commenting is already less meaningful, since most people are being subjected to the new format. Edited February 11, 2011 by peteer02 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Strangelove Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 I hardly ever post anymore because its a hassle on my phone, but i still visit. I dont think theyre going to revert the website though. Websites and companies have a hard time admitting they were wrong. the people who hate the new site will leave and get replaced by the people who never saw the old site. Theyll get used to it and theyll become the new commenters. Kind of like me with g4. I wasnt around when it was techtv or whatever, so i still thought g4 was alright when i had cable. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SanaEquiesterer Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 After the change to Kotaku, someone linked to an article that noted all Gawker websites had a 25-33% drop in visitor count, and I've also noted the lower article viewcount. Even though I think the new layout is discouraging to newcomers, I think things will eventually be back on the upswing. I go there to see what they're posting, but then I'll go elsewhere to read about it. I'll probably make a list of all the sites they link to and just make them my homepage. There was an article from the head of Gawker about why they changed everything, and he made a lot of comparisons about the success of advertising and programming on TV and how that should work out for the new look. I wonder if the change never would have happened if maybe Gizmodo or io9 were the original founders that started the Gawker sites. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
RockyRan Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 (edited) After the change to Kotaku, someone linked to an article that noted all Gawker websites had a 25-33% drop in visitor count, and I've also noted the lower article viewcount. Even though I think the new layout is discouraging to newcomers, I think things will eventually be back on the upswing. I go there to see what they're posting, but then I'll go elsewhere to read about it. I'll probably make a list of all the sites they link to and just make them my homepage. There was an article from the head of Gawker about why they changed everything, and he made a lot of comparisons about the success of advertising and programming on TV and how that should work out for the new look. I wonder if the change never would have happened if maybe Gizmodo or io9 were the original founders that started the Gawker sites. I read kind of like impromptu interview with the CEO and he came off as a complete douche. Typical "I know what everyone wants" and "Consumers are idiots" mentality. He even literally said they were going to listen less to the commenters because they didn't like what they were saying. My assessment? Gawker Media wants to play like the "big boys" in news media, but the higher actually don't know how (the redesign certainly shows that), and are afraid/don't want to hear any consumer backlash (them repeatedly greenlighting the redesign even though users hated it from the beta) and shut out their ears. They simply aren't ready to "play like the big boys" if they can't make something like this work, pure and simple. Actually, Dean has it linked somewhere in the boards. I'll dig it up later. Edited February 11, 2011 by RockyRan Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Enervation Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 (edited) http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/kotaku.com The almighty Alexa network shows us percentage statistics and fancy blue colored line graphs! Mainly, this graph: http://www.alexa.com/siteinfo/kotaku.com#pageviews_per_user Edited February 11, 2011 by Enervation Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
TheForgetfulBrain Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 (edited) Personally, I think it'll be short lived. Yes, I'm personally firm about my decision to leave the site, but in general people really aren't. The fact of the matter is, people will get used to the redesign for better or worse and more people will come in. I have no solid evidence, but based on personal observation of many site redesigns over the years I see activity go down but then go back up as people "get over it". I doubt Kotaku'll ever suffer a permanent drop in activity like Digg did. I agree with this - I don't comment much on Kotaku anymore, but that's because this place - I don't really give a shit about the crappy new design. Thing is though, with all the users they're losing, they'll probably get a bunch of new users from wherever who don't know the old design and don't know what they're missing out on. That's just how these turnovers tend to work on the web, as I've seen. Edited February 11, 2011 by TheForgetfulBrain Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pirandello Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 Personally, I think it'll be short lived. Yes, I'm personally firm about my decision to leave the site, but in general people really aren't. The fact of the matter is, people will get used to the redesign for better or worse and more people will come in. I have no solid evidence, but based on personal observation of many site redesigns over the years I see activity go down but then go back up as people "get over it". I doubt Kotaku'll ever suffer a permanent drop in activity like Digg did. I agree with this - I don't comment much on Kotaku anymore, but that's because this place - I don't really give a shit about the crappy new design. Thing is though, with all the users they're losing, they'll probably get a bunch of new users from wherever who don't know the old design and don't know what they're missing out on. That's just how these turnovers tend to work on the web, as I've seen. Well, for the most part, Kotaku is already regarded generally as a bad gaming site from what I understand. I doubt there's going to be a large turnover when there's already so many other sites out there who can do the same, and some even better. Unless we get another equivalent of the Gerstmann incident which results in the rage-quit of hundreds of users of another site, anyways. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
peteer01 Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 I read kind of like impromptu interview with the CEO and he came off as a complete douche. Typical "I know what everyone wants" and "Consumers are idiots" mentality. He even literally said they were going to listen less to the commenters because they didn't like what they were saying.Us peasants is dumb. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 You guys would be looking for this: http://twitter.com/#!/gabrielsnyder/status/32975739020115968 As for it being a Yay or Nay? Yay that they're getting their just desserts for being so damn arrogant, also Kotaku could do with being knocked down a peg or too, might have to actually starting putting in some effort to get readerbase. But Nay in that the commenters over the past few years have being pretty cool and it's a shame to see them all go and be broken apart over this. Which I touched up on a fair bit the other day Thing is from what Denton has said, and Luke echoed, they reckon it'll be like Facebook; People complain, but ultimately still stick about. What Denton & his disciples forget is that you can count the amount of sites like facebook on one hand.....and still have 3 fingers and a thumb left over. There is nowhere to really go from facebook. Your friends and family are there, and unless they're also on Imaginary Site X too, then that one has nothing to offer you. There are however at the very least 34 alternatives to Kotaku (since that's the amount of feeds in that pack I made the other day, and that's still short a few sources). And Kotaku & co have nothing unique to offer other these other gaming sites other than science articles and the occasional Japanese tittes. And you can get them other sites too. You can head to Joystiq and apart from lack of TAY you won't much skip a beat in the content you read. Actually TAY, I lie they did have more to offer over others and that was it's community. Shame none of the higher ups recognised that fact. In fact as seen multiple times and in Dentons own words (it's in the Fuck kotaku thread) they actively want to discourage us pretty much. Kinda forgetting the community = readerbase = pagehits = advertising revenue. Which I always thought funny when the Kotaku defendees would be "this is a free site, do you pay them?" and I'm like "well not directly, but if a bunch of us all fuck off, then the Advertisers won't pay them". And hey, look what happened. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thorgi Duke of Frisbee Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 You guys would be looking for this: http://twitter.com/#!/gabrielsnyder/status/32975739020115968 As for it being a Yay or Nay? Yay that they're getting their just desserts for being so damn arrogant, also Kotaku could do with being knocked down a peg or too, might have to actually starting putting in some effort to get readerbase. But Nay in that the commenters over the past few years have being pretty cool and it's a shame to see them all go and be broken apart over this. Which I touched up on a fair bit the other day Thing is from what Denton has said, and Luke echoed, they reckon it'll be like Facebook; People complain, but ultimately still stick about. What Denton & his disciples forget is that you can count the amount of sites like facebook on one hand.....and still have 3 fingers and a thumb left over. There is nowhere to really go from facebook. Your friends and family are there, and unless they're also on Imaginary Site X too, then that one has nothing to offer you. There are however at the very least 34 alternatives to Kotaku (since that's the amount of feeds in that pack I made the other day, and that's still short a few sources). And Kotaku & co have nothing unique to offer other these other gaming sites other than science articles and the occasional Japanese tittes. And you can get them other sites too. You can head to Joystiq and apart from lack of TAY you won't much skip a beat in the content you read. Actually TAY, I lie they did have more to offer over others and that was it's community. Shame none of the higher ups recognised that fact. In fact as seen multiple times and in Dentons own words (it's in the Fuck kotaku thread) they actively want to discourage us pretty much. Kinda forgetting the community = readerbase = pagehits = advertising revenue. Which I always thought funny when the Kotaku defendees would be "this is a free site, do you pay them?" and I'm like "well not directly, but if a bunch of us all fuck off, then the Advertisers won't pay them". And hey, look what happened. For me, there is no alternative. Destructoid, Joystiq, IGN, and all those other sites have horrible writers. The one other site that has professional, journalistic qualities is Giant Bomb, and they don't exactly write a huge amount on their site every day. On Kotaku, I see articles that resemble proper, honest-to-God investigative journalism and interesting opinion pieces. Sure, it sucks that a portion of the community has left, but the articles have always been the most important part to me. The layout could be even worse, and I would still suffer through it to read the articles. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 On Kotaku, I see articles that resemble proper, honest-to-God investigative journalism and interesting opinion pieces. For srs? You accidentally reading Kotaku Australia or something? Investigative journalism: http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/02/09/will-bulletstorm-murder-your-children-no/ http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/02/09/churnalism-fox-news-selective-quoting/ http://www.rockpapershotgun.com/2011/02/10/the-fox-news-debacle-techsavvy-update/ Which then became: http://kotaku.com/#!5756624/how-fox-news-gets-video-games-so-wrong If reading other sites and linking to them is investigative journalism then those newspaper folks put in way too much effort. Still more power to you if you feel their articles are informative n such. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thursday Next Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 For me, there is no alternative. Destructoid, Joystiq, IGN, and all those other sites have horrible writers. The one other site that has professional, journalistic qualities is Giant Bomb, and they don't exactly write a huge amount on their site every day. On Kotaku, I see articles that resemble proper, honest-to-God investigative journalism and interesting opinion pieces. Sure, it sucks that a portion of the community has left, but the articles have always been the most important part to me. The layout could be even worse, and I would still suffer through it to read the articles. Investigative journalism! Aaaaaaaaahahahahahaha! They never investigate anything. The second they get a sniff of a story they post it under a "Rumour" TAG and then as other sites investigate it they post updates until it is confirmed, then they re-post it as a fact. I'm glad they redesigned it. I was too lazy to look for another site. I have now deleted all the bookmarks and cookies associated with it meaning that I will never again visit the site because it is too damned inconvenient. If they do ever print something worth reading and truly original I'm sure it'll get reposted somewhere good. Dean and others are right. I only went there because of the community. That's dwindled away now till there are no regular helpful interesting people. Occasional flashes of commenter brilliance are all that remains and I'm not going to trawl through a cumbersome site and lack lustre articles to find that when most of the people I actually listened to at Kotaku are members here. 2 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kearneybobs Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 (edited) I had a very quick look at the alexa site there. Interesting stuff. The number of comments and page views are really really low, compared to what they were. They do seem to be creeping back up though, but the kind of articls that usually get over 20,000 views and a couple of hundred comments within a few hours are barely able to reach that in two days and end up with half the comments. Edited February 11, 2011 by kearneybobs Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 Just to hammer home what Kearney said: Here is last week http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2066351/Screenshots/Kotaku/Last_week.png (2/2/11, see I chose a nice international date) And here is yesterday (cos recent articles will be low anyway) http://dl.dropbox.com/u/2066351/Screenshots/Kotaku/Yesterday.png (10/2/11) Both are big files btw. 80-90% of articles struggle to get past 100 comments, whereas last week 80-90% were well past the 100 comment mark. Hit's are roughly similar though. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Showmeyomoves! Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 (edited) I've been unable to login at Kotaku since yesterday. Not that I care, but if it's a widespread issue it could be another factor in the sudden decrease of comments... Edited February 11, 2011 by Showmeyomoves! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 I'm still logged in(network wide hiccups tend to log everyone out, I've not had to log in for over a week now) and it doesn't seem to be an issue for anyone else(You're only one up to now that's brought it up). Also that screengrab is yesterday and a bit of the day before. When was it yesterday you stopped being able to log in? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Thursday Next Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 (edited) http://www.penny-arcade.com/comic/2011/2/11/ Not sure if that's been posted here yet, but it has now. Possibly twice.. Edited February 11, 2011 by Thursday Next Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
deanb Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 Yeah, I'm waiting on their blog post though. See what they actually have to say on it. The tweets that came from them were a start, wonder if they set the tone of the blog post. Side effect of commenters dropping off: Less than 2 weeks into the month and they're having to recycle TAY pictures. I'd of said it'd be a case of Totilo not realising, but he has put in a special plea for new images. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kearneybobs Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 I was logged out two days ago,but I could log back in no problem. Although there was a weird glitch that happened. I tried to post a comment, only to be asked to log in. I clicked cancel, logged in only to see my comment already posted. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
King Jimmeh Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 I wonder if that Penny Arcade comic will get published in the Sunday Comics 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
kearneybobs Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 I wonder if that Penny Arcade comic will get published in the Sunday Comics It was the first thing in TAY today on Kotaku. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Johnny Posted February 11, 2011 Report Share Posted February 11, 2011 I left Kotaku long ago, but I hope they go back just because I still read Lifehacker. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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