Both Nick Denton and Arianna Huffington fully understand the niche-ification of media, and they both approach their enterprises not out of a particular passion for a subject, but because they saw an opening for a new kind of product. Or, perhaps more important, they both recognized the emergence of a new way to deliver a new product. In addition to them both evincing distaste for traditional media, they also know that the fastest way to get covered by the mainstream media is to be a critic of the mainstream media, since all journalists are self-hating and will believe that any bad thing you say about them has a hint of truth. Also, neither has much shame about going tabloid when a story—or the need for eyeballs—demands it. The Huffington Post puts sensationalistic headlines on stories they didn’t write, and Denton has been known to assign stories based on what’s trending on Twitter. Where they differ is that Gawker runs on institutionalized snark, while HuffPo works on institutionalized earnestness. (When you get celebrities writing about politics, they’re going to put on their serious pants.) Now, as a culture, we speak both languages. Mainstream outlets attempting to follow Denton and Huffington fail because they think snark is an ingredient they can sprinkle into the batter, here and there, to make it hipper. Nick and Arianna both know that their respective voices have to be a constant everywhere within those publications.
source: newsweek
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