game-ism.com

game-ism.com header image 2
← Halo Merchandising You Never Even Imagined My First Time →

Weighty Fail

July 29th, 2008 · 3 Comments

Oh, Kotaku, how I love it when you try and be intellectual.  To be fair, I love Leigh’s and Maggie’s think pieces (they’re the most intellectual editors they have), but Kotaku’s demo is just so overly fan-boy driven that their advertising (and commenters) tend to undercut any attempt at seriousness with a healthy dose of Shadenfreude.

So it came as no surprise to me, when reading Leigh’s discussion of the “controversy” over Fat Princess, that their own advertising campaign made a mockery of them.

The first screenshot (above) shows the very first ad that popped up when I opened the article to read it.  The second screengrab (after the cut) was on my co-worker’s screen when he opened the link in the email I sent him.  I swear, I didn’t have to fish for these.

I normally don’t like to point fingers and laugh at websites (it’s a fairly pointless troll-like endeavor), but I’m sorry, this is just hilarious.  Also, I like my daily dose of FAIL anyway.

For the record, I like Leigh’s take on her personal blog Sexy Videogameland better, anyway.

Bookmark and Share
[del.icio.us] [Digg] [Google] [StumbleUpon] [Windows Live] [Yahoo!] [Email] More »
Powered by Bookmarkify™

Tags: comedy · general

3 responses so far ↓

  • 1 Brian // Aug 6, 2008 at 2:38 am

    I have to say, I love your blog, but I am an avid Kotaku and Joystiq reader. That is, every time I find myself sitting idly, I check one or both to see what’s going on. And honestly, with the exception of Owen, I love all their editors. They’re not trying to be overly-professional like a newspaper, but they also have integrity…as much as a news blog owned by a corporation can have, anyway. I just know that if I had a blog, I’d take money from anyone who wanted to advertise there. Money’s money and as long as it doesn’t interfere with the content I am allowed to deliver, I don’t see the harm. Personally, I just ignore the ads anyway.

  • 2 spitfire // Aug 6, 2008 at 9:45 am

    I find it interesting that you can find integrity in a news source that will accept ads that appeal intentionally to base eroticism.

    I, personally, find those two things (news integrity vs. eroticism) to be mutually exclusive. I just denied an ad that was intentionally erotic, for example.

    I enjoy sites that can manage to find some middleground between the two using an editorial voice (such as Sexy Videogameland), but you can’t be hard-hitting AND play the sexually alluring card. But I guess we’ll just have to disagree :)

  • 3 Brian // Aug 10, 2008 at 4:02 am

    I understand that, but the integrity should lay with the person browsing the site, not with the news source itself. Kotaku does good, truthful, responsible reporting. If a friend buys me a shirt, and there’s nothing wrong with the shirt or me, but you hate my friend, and you make a point to criticize me and my shirt by extension…that just doesn’t make sense. I don’t know, I just make a point to ignore all ads and acknowledge that they have their audience, and those people do click them. None of my concern. But I just don’t think it should reflect on the website itself.

Leave a Comment