Ha! Almost everyone that immediately comes to mind when I think of great games journalism (Tom, Matt, Erik, myself) gets left off, and Chris effing Buffa makes the list. And Penny Arcade. I’m trying to decide if this is a better or worse list than the ten hottest guys in gaming list.
The criteria openly said that they had quotas by publication/market.
It’s not really a “top 50 journos” article, its a “meet the industry faculty that we like” article.
You might not be on the list because “There are already a lot of people on the list from your organization” and because “this list favors web journos because that’s where it’s at.”
And the solution is getting into their list is to go freelance, which makes you more “top 50.” I’m not sure I understand the reasoning behind that part.
The thing I hate about top lists is not that they are arbitrary, but that the writers often attempt to make it appear otherwise. The claimed criteria are just so idiotic (“You are stuck in the wretchedness that is print publications”) that it would just have been better not to bother with the pretense of having criteria.
Editors are still considered journalists? Is that right?
I think that Campbell’s coda is an attempt at humor. None of the advice is to be taken seriously. The whole “print is dead thing” has to be a joke.
Troy
Most editors also write.
Damn it.
First I fail to make the Sexy Gaming People list…now this.
Thanks for pissing in my #1 ranking corn flakes, Gallant.
God, I hope so. It reads like it was being funny-but-serious to me! “Print is wretched” sounds like a joke, but when it goes on to hammer that home over the course of a paragraph that ends with “This list favors web journos because that’s where it’s at,” well, it’s hardly stand-up material.
I like top lists, it just drives me preemptively nuts when the writer starts explaining their decisions :)
THIS LIST IS TOTALLY CREDIBLE BECAUSE I’M ON IT.
During his tenure at Game Informer, the magazine has grown into the largest videogame publication in the world with over two million readers monthly.
I weep for games journalism.
Also: “N’gai Croal, general editor, Newsweek”? They totally forgot Katie Couric for last month’s totally rad piece in the evening news about how games can help kids learn.
I resubscribed to Game Informer, because I got a huge trade-in bonus at EB for doing so. I pretty much shuffle the issues directly into the trash with my junk mail, but I did appreciate the extra trade-in credit.
Didn’t GI buy its top spot through EB/Gamestop giveaways?
There were others on the list? After I saw you at the top, the next 11 and 1/2 pages became the internet equivalent of Charlie Brown’s teacher.
I can’t believe Dave Halverson is on the list. His major contribution to the print industry seems to be driving people out of it.
Also:
You are stuck in the wretchedness that is print publications, and we just figured that since you’ll be unemployed within a year, we’ll start ignoring you early. This list favors web journos because that’s where it’s at.
…uh-huh.
Tom would have been on my list and he’d have stars by his name and everything.
I’ve already got my friends MSNing me and saying I’m a cunt. Bally Kyle Orland.
KG
Hadn’t thought of that, but yeah, I guess that’d help explain it. It’s how they got their 6th-grade level, ass-kissing rag through my door.
It also amuses me that only Brendan Sheffield and me are trying to pose like twats.
KG
twelve seperate pages? fuck you, I CAN scroll, it isnt paper.
The list looks to me 3/4ths of it is just taking the top 20 gaming magazines and websites and putting their Ed in Chief or Editorial Director in there.
Erik’s not in the racket anymore and as soon as I can muster the strength to polish off a Mage Knight: Apocalypse review, neither am I. But I sincerely appreciate your appreciation.
You did mean me, right?