GameSpot addresses Gerstmann-gate concerns in depth

So that's what the smell was?

"The Kane & Lynch video review was taken down because the "audio was deemed inferior due to a faulty microphone."
Bullshit, I have the video review right here and the audio was fine.
http://youtube.com/watch?v=aBD0cUeeEQc
Thats it Gamespot, no podcast, out of my bookmarks...dont let the door hit you on the way out.

Sounds like bullshit to me too. And I managed to get my 10 year plus account banned in gamespot, boycott that shit.

Ok, there is some good stuff in there

BUT!

Microphone issues! I can come up with better bullshit without even knowing what really happened.

BUT!

At least they put the review back up. That's speaks more than their bullshit words.

Good job, Spot! A little, a bit late. But better.

I believe what you sir, are smelling is the scent of someones pants on fire, after which they are appearntly put upon a telephone wire.

acutally what your semlling is the scent of someones pants that are on fire, appearntly that is a punishment for being a consistent liar, after the flaming pants of course comes the hanging of the said articles of clothing upon a telephone wire.

I agree.

A big company like that can't just jump out with a reply. They need to clear things with the legal department and make sure the statements they make are well thought out. It could have been done it a faster manner but I'm thinking there are a few reasons why it wasn't'
-Gamespot thought it was going to blow over.
-Too many people were on vacation.
-They suck and are lying.

It's really hard to say what the truth is without being in management of the company. I'll suspect we won't know for sure, but we can sure speculate.

Do you honestly think that would have made things better? Please don't try to suggest so. IMO, changing the score would have been even worse. The only thing they SHOULD have done, is leave the review alone and not take down the video one... whether they are guilty of this crime or not.

@PaulM - I believe Sam's point was the silliness of their justification. Why change one instead of the other, as the logic runs both ways?

no kidding. I've watched plenty of cnet videos that had crap sound or other flubs that weren't taken down.

I'm sorry, but if gamestop/cnet expects us to believe that ALL these things were just a coincidence... that they were all indepently unrelated but all happened at the same time then they must figure us for bigger fools than I thought.

"insufficient resources to reshoot and re-edit the video review."

Yes, I suppose having fired the person who did the video review would result in "insufficient resources."

Here is the article so no body gives gamespot a hit(their alexa rating is going up because of the fiasco).

"Hey All,

GS Newsman Tor Thorsen here for a quick personal aside about the past couple days. As I'm sure most of you know, it's been a long week at GameSpot. I haven't been this tired since E3 2006. However, after days of effort and frustration, we've finally been given the go-ahead to post a FAQ about Jeff Gerstmann's termination from GameSpot, which nobody here is happy about.

Despite feeling subjective personally, I took it upon myself to write the story as I would write any other news story--as objectively as I could with the facts I've been given by my bosses at GameSpot and CNET. Anyone who's worked for the corporate world know it's very rare for a company to make their inner HR workings transparent following a firing. We've convinced our higher-ups to let us do that in this one instance as best we can, just to explain to you guys how this "perfect storm" was unleashed into the information void. I went to the ad sales dept and got the schedule, I talked to the GSlive guys, I talked to the bosses, and just laid it all out in that news piece in as "newsy" a manner as I could. Here it is:

http://www.gamespot.com/news/6183666.html

I know many of you out there are going to see this as the latest in a series of attempts at damage control. Guess what? You're right. It is damage control, because--let's face it--GameSpot has taken a beating over the past week. However, just because it's damage control doesn't mean we're being disingenuous or misleading.

Though silence following dismissals is par for the course in the corporate world, it's by-now obvious that the standard PR approach to Jeff's dismissal backfired. It was totally ill-suited to the gaming community and was timed to be in the middle of an site-wide advertising campaign many took as a smoking gun. We're addressing that unfortunate series of events in the article and on this week's HotSpot and On the Spot in the most straightforward manner we can.

Here we have a series of coinciding events revolving around one event--a game shipping. Since Kane & Lynch was released on November 13, its text review and video review went up right around then, and Eidos was publishing ads right around then. There's a perfectly rational explanation for all those going up at the same time. And given the crush of games coming out in the two weeks before Thanksgiving, it's easy to see why nobody had time to redo the K&L video review before the turky binges began.

So why was Jeff fired when he was fired? Honestly, the editorial rank and file don't know the official reason. (Though we do know it couldn't have been more badly timed.) All the information given to us is in the story above--we don't know any more, and neither management nor Jeff can talk about it for legal reasons as well. That's the way big companies work. And if you think CNET is big, remember two of our biggest competitors are owned by NewsCorp and TimeWarner. That's big.

What we editors do know for a rock-solid hard fact is that, to a man, we miss Jeff. He is amongst the funniest, craziest people I've ever met, and he's forgotten more about games than I'll ever know. I consider him a good friend and a fallen comrade.

We also know that, if anything, this whole mess will make us even more resistant to any kind of advertiser pressure, even though we've never, ever buckled to it in the past. Now, we've have opened up our books to you, the readers, as much as we possibly can about the sad chapter that is so-called "Gerstmanngate." We hope a lot of you will believe us, stick around, and keep reading.

Cheers _ TOR "

Weird! The author of the article was changed from Tor Thorsen to Staff!

I guess that was probably because clicking on "Tor Thorsen" was bringing you to the honest blog post I was mentioning. What the hell is GS doing?

Tor Thorsen had to change the author from his name to Staff because of a huge amount of hate mail.

Everybody grab a broom!

hahaha, i can't believe no one else called shenanigans on GS yet. This truly is the beginning of the end!

Hey Halpert, what's the name of that restaurant you like with all the goofy shit on the wall and the mozzarella sticks?

"I swear to god I'm going to pistol whip the next person who says shenanigans"

Wait, wait, wait. Are you seriously telling me that joke in Penny Arcade is TRUE. So, Jeff was given NO notice about his termination, and was escorted out of the building with his shit in a box? OMG!!! It's so f**king obvious what happened?

One of the top clowns at "Edios" or "IO", called the Brand-NEW Gamespot CEO Stephen Colvin for a "Favor" (an Old-Boy, back scratching).

Colvin -- We'll be take Gamespot in a "NEW direction", and get rid of all this "Geek Routine". We want to step-towards a more "hip kid look", and the Kane & Lynch game is perfect vehicle use, with a non-stop ad-campain. So, we'll make sure the game get's a "GOOD" review."

And since Gerstmann already had a history of gruff, aggressive behavior towards the NEW management, and direction the site was taking. Refused to change his reviews or his tactics in reviewing future games.

Colvin -- "What? Who does this guy think he is? I'm the CEO, so Gerstmann is gone. Bring him up here, and than show him the door."

It's not that fact that you fired Jeff, it's the way it happened, and the smell behind it all. I'm absolutely sure that exec-Colvin has fired many people at many magazine companies the same way, the only difference THIS TIME he didn't count on just HOW popular Jeff Gerstmann is with the online community. Now Colvin totally screwed himself, because his actions have come back to bit him in the ass.

Nobody told Colvin, that Blog sites and Magazines are 2 different things. Just because you're successful at one doesn't mean, you'll be successful again -- unless you're willing to change with the times -- which is clear, he's not.

//Rant over

There's a statue in the books that prevents a company from disclosing any details about a person's termination to protect the privacy of the person being fired. The company can only release that information to specific parties (like the unemployment agency that decides if you qualify). This isn't a case of GS refusing to disclose information because they have something to hide (which may or may not be the case). They, legally, can't, which sucks for them if that info could prove the firing was on the up and up...

Then again, considering the rabid interweb denizens who've cropped up since this thing happened, anything they released would be labeled as BS, regardless of it's veracity. Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

@cxm

I kinda figured that much, I was more wondering what specific law (i.e. name / number) so I can state specifically "This one." In the past I have been quoted the same thing in numerous states I have been employed in. Usually when another company calls for a reference all you can say is "I would / wouldn't hire them again." and not much else.

I'm slowly thinking www.joystiq.com should be www.GerstStiq.com

Any real game news today?

Internet traffic has gone up..but Gamespot has lost thousands of dollars from lost subsciptions. (I'm sure people are using adblock though)

DURKA DURKA ALA DURK

are you the guy with that list?