The Gawker Media Style Guide

Everything is “so” something.
If it’s not so something, it’s so not worth talking about.

Ask a rhetorical question, then immediately answer it.
Why would any writer do something like that? Because it’s awesome, that’s why.

Skirt the edge between sarcasm and sincerity, so you could be construed either way.
It’s no good to clearly express your opinion. Oh, no. Better to safely retreat behind a constant sly smirk. That’ll keep them guessing, and set things up so that you can never be wrong. Yeah.

Strikethrough is your friend.
It’s a clever typographical device that opens up a whole new way to be a knee-jerk smartass express your thoughts.

So is italic.
I mean, duh.

Sprinkle in useless metaphors and orthogonal pop-cultural references.
That makes the writing more spicy— like a taco lovingly slathered with Tapatío brand hot sauce. ¡Muy Salsa!

And above all… never forget to exaggerate.
Because hyperbole is the essence of wit, and what makes this all-too-short life worth living.

Comments

[Michael]

I once linked to one of your articles in a comment on Joystiq, I don't remember which one or why, but one of their staff sent me an e-mail assuming I was you and asked for a "mini bio". I didn't reply, because that's pretty embarrassing, so Joystiq probably already thinks you're some kind of jerk.

[jcm]

Don't forget the frequent exclamation points. You can just stick one after any old sentence! It makes the post so much more exciting. Ashcraft and Plunkett use them the most!

[jcm]

PS. Right now there are 15 exclamation marks on the front page of Kotaku! Must be an exciting day over there!

[Rossignol]

Painfully true. And absolutely ruining my writing style.

[Scott]

Hopefully one of the Gawker sites will pick this up. Although if they do, applying their writing quirks to a story about their writing quirks might cause some kind of rift in the space-time continuum.

[Jesse]

Don't forget referencing popular memes (insert lolcat here) or "nerdy" punctuation for extra Internet street cred!11!111!!!

To be fair, that type of writing lives more in the comments section.

[basscomm]

And with that you've pretty succinctly summed up why I kind of quit going to Gawker's family of sites.

Thanks!

[Andrew]

This made me really chuckle, yet it is so, so true (and a few of many reasons why I avoid gawker sites). jcm has a great point on exclamation marks too :)

[Michael]

I just realized I confused Joystiq with Kotaku in my post earlier, though Joystiq were the ones who e-mailed me.

I started reading Kotaku again recently, becuase they do find news incredibly fast. Though the obnoxiousness outlined in your post as well as the blustering waves of absolute bullshit stories and borderline pedophelia will probably put me off again.

[C.B.G. Spender]

Jesus christ, Kotaku, especially that Luke Plunkett guy. You could easily just program some sort of random Kotaku article generator instead of having that guy ever write again. Every one of his articles is the same god damned thing, annoying as hell. The others aren't all that much better either.

So, this one game you thought was going to turn out bad? (with link back to an old article of Luke talking shit on said game) Nah, it's going to turn out great! (that's where the sarcasm/no discernable opinion of their own bit comes in)

That's it, good job, you've just read every Kotaku article now.

[Eli]

Ah, the text of the modern public. Genius.

[fundogmo]

Hit the jump for (freshness, hotness, the final answer, etc)!