The spirit of Gawker keeps finding new ways to die: G/O Media shuts down Splinter and warns staffers not to write about the closure

Splinter is following in the footsteps of its predecessor, Gawker, in a not-great way: It’s being shut down.

The site’s private equity firm owner is Great Hill Partners, which acquired Gizmodo Media Group, including what was left of the Gawker family of sites, from Univision earlier this year, renaming it G/O Media Group. It cited Splinter’s struggle to gain an audience, per The Daily Beast’s Maxwell Tani.

While an internal memo had said that Splinter’s seven employees would be moved to jobs in other parts of the company, senior writer Hamilton Nolan told The New York Times that they were actually all laid off without warning. (It’s worth noting that Nolan was a prime mover behind the unionization of what was then Gawker Media four years ago, which really kicked off the wave of digital media unionization that we’ve seen since.)

Splinter shared a lot of editorial DNA with the original Gawker, but its origin story is a bit more complex. It originated as the prose-focused part of Fusion, the Univision/Disney cable-channel joint venture aimed at a younger and more diverse audience. In 2016, Univision purchased Gawker Media, which had been driven to bankruptcy by a Peter Thiel-funded lawsuit, but not the flagship site, Gawker itself. A year later, Fusion the cable channel was split from Fusion the news site, with the latter renamed Splinter and evoking the old Gawker editorially. (Meanwhile, Gawker now belongs to Bryan Goldberg, who owns everything. An attempt at relaunching it earlier this year was a flop. Splinter had plenty of fun with it: “Here Are the Media Chuds Joining Fake Gawker.”)

HuffPost’s Dave Jamieson got his hands on another email sent out by G/O editorial director Paul Maidment in which he instructed editors not to write about the end of Splinter: “I see no compelling reason for any of our sites to be writing about the decision to cease publishing Splinter. There is already external coverage, LeadPR will handle our external communications, and this is a time to be respectful of colleagues who have just received difficult news and for whom we will be trying to find new positions.”

Sorry, Paul, Twitter’s already covering it.

Going out on a limb here, but I think maybe his objection to reporting on the company isn't *actually* about the Splinter staff's feelings! https://t.co/vYJ8iTSHfM pic.twitter.com/iZkO0RnGiU

— Megan Greenwell (@megreenwell) October 10, 2019

if you are in media and your company is not unionized, do not wait another second to talk to your colleagues about it. you never know when things might change and you'll wish you had a contract to protect you when things like this happen.

— guy fieri 2020 campaign manager (@libbycwatson) October 10, 2019

Just to get this straight: two weeks after the 2016 election Fusion laid off half its staff to "focus on politics," rebranded as Splinter, and then in the lead up to the 2020 election our new corporate overlords shut down the site. Truly fuck this industry.

— kelsey mckinney (@mckinneykelsey) October 10, 2019

As of today, Splinter will cease publication. It has been my greatest honor to have been the editor of this site and I will love this staff to my dying breath. Thank you to all of our readers, fans, and haters—it’s been a thrill. Further details TK. Splinter forever.

— aleksander chan (@aleksnotalex) October 10, 2019

Please hire these excellent journalists: @jackmirkinson @aleksnotalex @kath_krueger @TheJewishDream @pblest @samjgrasso

— Hamilton Nolan (@hamiltonnolan) October 10, 2019

if you're gonna shut down a journalism site you gotta take whatever articles those journalists want to write about the closing and fucking deal with it https://t.co/VOnGNVzzD2

— Steven Rich (@dataeditor) October 10, 2019

Anyway, this is why Jim worked so hard to hire only his dearest little friends, and this is why they are morbidly obsessed with G/O Media not writing about itself. The only thing they care about more than folks not wearing shorts in the office.

— Anna Merlan (@annamerlan) October 10, 2019

Imagine buying GMG, issuing an order like this, and not realizing that it’ll prompt the other sites to write *way more* about the shutdown than they would’ve otherwise https://t.co/urF7RBsdBI

— dylan matthews (@dylanmatt) October 10, 2019

Splinter was great, as was Pacific Standard, Into, Broadly, ESPN Magazine, ThinkProgress, Governing and all the other publications that folded in 2019. @LorenaSGonzalez, how are freelancers under AB5 supposed to get hired in an industry that is shrinking? https://t.co/KlbGoN7w2i

— Steven Blum (@stevenblum) October 10, 2019

It appears that this Naomi LaChance piece will be Splinter’s last. Its final words: “Thanks, I hate it!!!!”