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Giant Bomb Mega Thread


David
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The reason people were upset isn't that they're charging for stuff, it's that they said they wouldnt take things away from their regular punters. No one minds that you have to pay for the HD stuff, or the live show, or new community features, but they got where they are because of the bombcast (i know it's WM charging, and for their whole network not just GB) holding it to 'ransom' is what's annoying people.

As for the bigger picture. I think what it means in the future is that there will be fewer big sites and news agencies. Frankly our podcast was better than most out there, so how can people justify charging for one, unless it's head and shoulders above everything else. Same with reviews etc, if anyone can make a website/youtube video then why would anyone pay for stuff? The customers have the power at the minute

It's why the Times paywall isn't going to work. Why would you pay for their content when the bbc, Guardian etc etc are free

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Oh yeah I completely agree about them holding the podcast to ransom, but there's also a percentaqe of people that are going nuts about never paying for a podcast. Besides the work that gets put in, bandwidth costs money and you either pay for it because it's your hobby and you're happy to do so (that's me), you're getting paid to do it because it's part of your job (eg, BBC podcasts) or you're getting advert and sponsor money to grab back some of the costs.

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As soon as you started getting paid to do something it becomes your job. It might seem awesome at the time, but even the most excellent job in the world becomes a millstone round your neck when you have expectations form other people. And this is what's happened with GB. they have set a regime out where they do whatever until they get bored of it. Hendo got bored of doing the podcast and rightly wanted a break, because his heart wasn't in it anymore. These guys should have done the same, just put out the work when it was viable instead of batting a 2 hours show out each week, plus all the other shit they do.

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It is their job though, and always has been. They've never done it purely out of love, just that they had to do it. The only difference now is that their plans of how to make money are out in the open.

It's still gonna be tight for them - 5000 donations of $50 is $250,000 and they employ a lot of people now.

Completely un-scientific and unreliable for exact figures but during the Live show, someone flicked between the different Whiskey Media sites to see the stats for how many people were watching the show on each site at that time. The results show just how much GB is carrying the other sites:

Giant Bomb: - 10,250

Tested: - 423

Screened: - 300

Comic Vine: - 182

Anime Vice: 80

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Not surprising, games and internet go hand in hand really.

I am not sure what we are witnessing tbh. I just don't think they way of supporting them is going to work. I'm not sure, I don't use the website much and I don't listen to the podcast all that often, and I would probably pay them less attention if I was to be either charged or have content filtered because I was not contributing cash to them. I am not sure why anyone would want to pay money for something when it can be found elsewhere in more or less the same form.

Like Ben, I don't think paywalls will work, people will just go to the next best place to consume whatever they are going to consume. I think doing this will be bad for GB. People will go look, get locked out, go else where. Next time they are on, they will got to GB, get locked out and this behaviour will carry on until they drop off checking on GB and start going more to their other site. Loosing hits is never good.

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I'm surprised this hasnt already been posted because I read it on Eds twitter, but the bombcast is now free... again

For all my bleeting about it I'll still listen and I wish them the best, I'm half expecting them to react badly to the abuse they've had but i hope not. Gives me something to listen to in work again so alls' good

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  • 11 months later...

Congratulations to Giant Bomb for making TIME magazine's 'The 50 Best Websites of 2011'. Well deserved, I say.

Former GameSpot editors Jeff Gerstmann and Ryan Davis are the brains behind Giant Bomb, a mashup of a traditional game-info destination like GameSpot and a Wikipedia-style site. It's got news, reviews and video — all looser, funnier and more opinionated than much of the stuff on game sites owned by larger media companies. And members of the thriving Giant Bomb community, who can edit the site's massive collection of gaming knowledge, provide much of the content.

http://www.time.com/time/specials/packages/article/0,28804,2087815_2087939_2087927,00.html

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  • 4 months later...

"It's the most wonderful time.....of the year...."

Love the time between Christmas and New Year - loads of podcasts and videos from GB on the past year.

So far...

<iframe width="640" height="360" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/VJnoOgAwDvM?wmode=opaque" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

<iframe width="640" height="360" src="http://www.youtube.com/embed/Cg2-IY0NuO4?wmode=opaque" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen></iframe>

More up later today. I'm looking forward to the arguments on the GotY podcast.

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I fell asleep listening to day 1 last night. I woke up to hear Brad saying that some people didn't like the narrator in Bastion, Jeff responds "well you take that away what's the point in playing it?" I did this face :unsure:

I don't think he said that specifically, he just said something about "why would you turn that stuff off?".

I'm up to date now with all the videos and podcasts so far, I think it's the final arguments and fighting today that I'm looking forward to.

Predictions for top 3 of the year - Skyrim, Saints Row : The Third and Bastion.

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I fell asleep listening to day 1 last night. I woke up to hear Brad saying that some people didn't like the narrator in Bastion, Jeff responds "well you take that away what's the point in playing it?" I did this face :unsure:

I don't think he said that specifically, he just said something about "why would you turn that stuff off?".

I'm up to date now with all the videos and podcasts so far, I think it's the final arguments and fighting today that I'm looking forward to.

Predictions for top 3 of the year - Skyrim, Saints Row : The Third and Bastion.

I ended up listening back to it and he does say something along the lines of "at that point why are you even playing it?". To give him the benefit of the doubt he could meant that the narrator is a big part of what makes the atmosphere of the game, so removing it harms the game, but it's Jeff so he might also just be dismissing people who dont like the narrator.

I think you're right with their top 3, I wouldn't be surprised if Saints Row won goty, which is staggering to me as much as I enjoyed it, but each to their own

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When I woke up I was listening to them argue the cases for best story and Mortal Kombat came up, how it's explained everything and done everything really well, and I was brought back to yesterday when I was playing it tag team with my mate and we got to Cyber Sub-Zero.

"Well, actually, he's the real Sub-Zero but he gets killed and re-born as a robot and the other Sub-Zero is his brother who is there to carry on the Sub-Zero name and legacy.....wait, what am I doing?!"

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  • 1 month later...

I watched the live vita coverage the other night, most of which is up as quick looks on the site. They did a bit about Fifa (which isn't up yet, unless it's in the premium stuff) and it was so painful to watch. Jeff did fine playing the game itself, but their british-isms and 'knowledge' of football was cringe-inducing

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  • 1 month later...

I'm watching the Giant Bomb live stream, the big reveal is they're going back to gamespot, or at least the company that owns them (CBS interactive I think?). Probably a bigger deal for them than everyone else.

Nothing else to report on it as things stand, it sounds like it's staying the same. It's being shot from Dave's house, as was the chilli thing the other day, wonder if they've been kicked out of their building or something?

Edit: Yep, first day at gamespot today with a live video later today where Jeff tells why he was fired from gamespot (I wonder if it's a tamed version now he's over there again)

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