super duper.

Simon, are you trying to ruin everybody's fun? (And can I at least appreciate that Shadow reference without having to fact check that someone else said it first?)

And this sort of shit is precisely why I don't read Kotaku or Joystiq. Also why I don't consider 99% of bloggers journalists, no matter how many times their mommies tell them they are. The only gaming blogs I even bother with for news - because so far they've proven generally believable, coherent, and even occasionally intelligent - are GSW, Edge Online, Gamasutra, and Game Politics.

When I saw the PS4 headline I knew it was bunk. Do any of these sites actually take a few seconds to think about what they are reporting? Even if a sony rep had said it, you have to take it with a salt mine's worth of salt due to the fact it's a european exec. The euro branches of the big three are far from the decision makers. Not that american PR folks are perfect. (I'm looking at you Perrin)

I also love when a site over-reaches on remarks given by Japanese developers. They seem to forget that the questions go though a translator. It's pretty obvious to me that in most lengthy Q&A sessions at least one question is misunderstood and you get a fairly unrelated answer.

amen tetsuo.

and amen simonc, especially the digg situation. i am sick of digg.

Amen to the whole thing. Digg is filled with stupid nerds and Joystiq really needs to learn how to factcheck once in awhile.

Thank you and good night.

When did games journalism not suck? Old Man Murray is full of unintentionally hilarious quotes from game journalism, and it's been down for years.

(My favourite: "'There's a tendency among the press to attribute the creation of a game to a single person,' says Warren Spector, creator of Thief and Deus Ex.")

Last week I did throw out a bunch of feeds, for exactly the same reason. They provide no value at all, Digg and Kotaku where among them.

Something else that's really tiring are the comments on most sites. It's like almost every blog is populated with retards that are there to express there opinion, no matter what. Can't call that a discussion It's just people shouting at each other.

I on the other hand am dugg of sick.

:)

I have some real concerns about the so-called Web 2.0 movement and this is one of them.

When users are responsible for content the quality of the content is decreased. As many people enjoy a good headline it leads to a heavier focus on entertainment than education. Much like mainstream media the quality is lowered to flashy headlines and information of little importance. It takes the whole of society along with it.

I think the following quote sums up the issue well...it's not just leadership, it's information and a million other subjects, and it is sad to see the masses moving towards mindlessness.

"LEWIS: People want leadership, Mr. President! They're so thirsty for it, they'll crawl through the desert toward a mirage, and when they discover there's no water, they’ll drink the sand.

PRESIDENT: ….People don't drink the sand 'cause they’re thirsty, Lewis. They drink it 'cause they don’t know the difference."

Man, enough with the research and informed critique already! You think I come to blogs for this? Give me a funny Halo music video or something and then give me some juicy dirt about Sony/Nintendo/Atlus stealing technology or lying to customers or something based on a sketchy forum post or a faked photograph somewhere, preferably framed with some clumsy references to the male anatomy. If it's wrong, so what? It'll be off the main page in a few hours anyway.

that's why i get my "news" from gamasutra.

you're talking about the difference between newsweek and people magazines. blogs are basically huge op/ed/ltte cascades -- NOT NEWS.

1) blogs are about colorful conversation.

2) news is about reporting hard facts.

it's not really that hard. i don't come to gamasutra to TALK about news -- i go to joystiq. i come to gamasutra for facts. their relationship is symbiotic in nature not interchangeable.

if i want facts, i read carless. if i want fun, i read murray.

m3mnoch.

Is this issue really the fault of the so-called "Web 2.0" or even "new games writing"?

I think it's silly to take the fact that Joystiq is a "blog" that talks about games "professionally" (i.e., gets money from ads for it) and use it to shuffleboard sites from that broad "2.0" spectrum into some awful category.

It's a separate issue from the fact that Joystiq (and Kotaku, since it was mentioned) regularly pull off things like this. This is more of an issue of lack of credibility, lack of objectivity and lack of reasons to go there. It's the fault of their writers and the guy who runs it (who has, himself, posted some pretty terrible, baiting articles before) and nothing else.

If anything, putting any of the blame on that movement takes away (if only somewhat) from where the blame should solely be placed... and that's upon the writers of that site.

Honestly, I have no idea why anyone even goes there anymore. I suppose it's largely force of habit.

Nice work. I've had a bunch of experiences with both Joystiq and Kotaku reporting on work I'd done or been involved with recently, and I've come away from each with a pretty bitter taste. From what I understand, the guys posting to these sites are paid around $10 per post: to make it worth their while they'll need to seriously stream new stories to the site. It's the kind of pressure that's always going cause chaos.

Hallefuckinglujah. That pretty well summarizes a lot of my drunken outpourings over the last year or so. I wish I could be a journalist when I want and throw on a blogger mask whenever I fuck up. That'd be swell.

Not that I'm some kind of shining beacon of responsible journalism; I'm just some dick who plays games and yells about it. But I'm accountable for mistakes, and I know whenever I make anything remotely resembling a factual error, real or otherwise, because someone on Kotaku/Joystick/Slashdot/Digg will invariably be there to call the kettle african-american.

Well, here you go:

http://www.joystiq.com/2006/12/06/playstation-4-is-forthcoming-so-what/

No admission of actual responsibility, mind.

I received the same "tip" email that they did. But I quickly marked it as SPAM. I was surprised to see they posted it as news.

Wow, that new Joystiq article really is something else. They're so far up their own arses it must hurt.

Ya, we sat on it as well. We've even gotten into the habit of crushing the rumors that seem to like to spread on gaming sites.

http://kotaku.com/gaming/rumor-smash/

"So, the linked story itself is from the The Smarthouse News guys simply plagiarized the first couple of paragraphs of that story (yes, plagiarized - check out the missing apostrophe and odd capitalization on 'Analysts'), adding some Australian-relevant comments as the article descends into registration-only land."

It wasn't a plagiarist, it was.. the phantom of the internet... http://www.abc.net.au/mediawatch/transcripts/s2178689.htm

check out the video as well (Episode 3)at http://www.abc.net.au/mediawatch/vodcast/