How They Play Is Gone

1. 93

   Kenna McHughposted 5 months ago

   How They Play niche is gone, and I never received an email.

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      EricDockettposted 5 months agoin reply to this

      It was moved over a week ago. I didn't get any emails either.

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         Kenna McHughposted 5 months agoin reply to this

         How can we trust HP if they don't keep their agreements?

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2. 97

   CYong74posted 5 months ago

   This is disgusting. What we are told is basically worthless.

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      Kenna McHughposted 5 months agoin reply to this

      Yes. So frustrating.

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      Solarasposted 5 months agoin reply to this

      You are not alone.  I found this gem on an investment recommendation site. It says a lot about management, and none of it is encouraging.
      
      "We have a hard time making an investment case for AREN until the merger with Bridge Media closes and the company provides clarity on its financial operating model. We started out optimistic about the deal, and as is customary for large holders in public companies, we agreed to sign a voting agreement at the request of Bridge Media and its parent company, Simplify Investments. To be perfectly honest, the team at Simplify hasn’t listened to any of our suggestions, and the arrogance under which they have operated has exposed false assumptions and complete naivety with regards to the public markets and AREN's partners. While we think the business can be run more efficiently and profitably than in years past, it is incumbent on the new team to get its act together and understand AREN is a public company with stockholders other than Simplify, and is not some pet private business where public market rules do not apply."

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3. 93

   Thomas Swanposted 5 months ago

   They could have built niches like HowTheyPlay into proper websites that people bookmark and come back to, with proper navigation, relevant news, and new content organized properly, but the niches were always places to dump articles for search engine traffic. They were never about the home page and the structure of the site
   
   It was a quick way to satisfy the popularity of niche websites without building anything unique, sustainable, or brand-centric. And it was all part of their pump-and-dump strategy imo. It was also pumped up with too many ads to remain near the top of search results.
   
   Inevitably, traffic declined and along came the dump. They are cutting costs. The niche domains are closing. Staff are probably being let go.
   
   Maybe HP will close or be sold. Maybe they are pulling down the shutters and waiting for AI to blow through town. Maybe there will be another pump cycle in a couple of years.

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   1. 97

      CYong74posted 5 months agoin reply to this

      The niche sites never had any real branding, identity, visual appeal, or even profiles. You can go to any and there’s barely a clue on how to write for it, or who the managers are, let alone what the site is about.
      
      Then came the ads. And all the layout issues. Doesn’t help most of the Niche sites had ludicrous names. I never knew Feltmagnet had a photography section.
      
      But somehow, they survived for a while. In the face of tremendously increased competition, through, traffic crumbles.
      
      I feel it’s time to move on.

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         Kenna McHughposted 5 months agoin reply to this

         Ced, I agree. It's hard to get motivated to write for HP.

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   2. 93

      Kenna McHughposted 5 months agoin reply to this

      Thomas, it appears so. Management is responsible for this mess.

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      Solarasposted 5 months agoin reply to this

      Interestingly, I checked out the staff page in the wayback machine at the end of June and compared it to the end of July. There are 3 more staff members at the end of July vs June. Several members from June are gone now. This may be a temporary bump, while combining sites into discover.
      
      They missed an opportunity to thoughtfully combine the lifestyle,  music, gaming, health sites into a mega lifestyle site. It's hard to imagine how Paul is approving of what they are doing over here. This is clearly not a master plan. This is a mad dash for the door, grabbing whatever cash that can be had before the roof caves in. I hope they don't move pethelpful, but I  suspect it is inevitable.

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         Kenna McHughposted 5 months agoin reply to this

         Barbara, it does appear as a mad dash for the door. That's because they post one thing and do another. Crazy.

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            Solarasposted 5 months agoin reply to this

            If we look at it from management perspective, they are looking to make more money for themselves.  Dumping sites on Discover pumps up the authority of Discover, and TAG is making more money as a whole than it did on the individual niche sites and discover.  They probably need more financing which will be hard to come by given the very public loss of Sports Illustrated and Energy guy's merger with TAG has yet to complete.  So this is an attempt to get something looking like it is on an upswing for the shareholder report and press releases.

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            1. 93

               Kenna McHughposted 5 months agoin reply to this

               Barbara, you're probably right.

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   CYong74posted 5 months ago

   LevelSkip and ReelRunDown are this week's casualties.

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      WriterJanisposted 5 months agoin reply to this

      I just looked and I'm still seeing both of them.

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         CYong74posted 5 months agoin reply to this

         The sites are still up, just like Feltmagnet. My content on them are transferred to Discover.
         
         I still have a handful on Reel that's yet to be transferred. Probably in the dump queue.

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            WriterJanisposted 5 months agoin reply to this

            Just wondering how you found out about this. I still have articles on ReelRunDown.

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               CYong74posted 5 months agoin reply to this

               Use the filter function in your article list. Select Discover and see which of your hubs are there.
               
               I have 4 that are still on Reel. LevelSkip is gone from my drop down menu.

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               1. 89

                  WriterJanisposted 5 months agoin reply to this

                  I'm feeling so lame right now. I tried this, but didn't find that anything has changed so far. Thank you for the information. I'll check back on this. I really wish the staff would give us announcements about these kind of things. Sigh.......

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                  1. 97

                     CYong74posted 5 months agoin reply to this

                     I don't think the transfer is completed for Reel, but all my Levelskip hubs are on Discover now.
                     
                     I've given up on any reliable announcements from the staff. We were told there is no transfer schedule but one after another niche site gets snuffed like clockwork. Could be they are deciding on the spot. But if so, that's worse, isn't it?

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                        WriterJanisposted 5 months agoin reply to this

                        I guess in time we'll find out. Thank you for all of the information you have shared.

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                        1. 97

                           CYong74posted 5 months agoin reply to this

                           

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                           1. 93

                              Kenna McHughposted 5 months agoin reply to this

                              Yup, all my Reels are on Discover now.

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5. 93

   Thomas Swanposted 5 months ago

   Owlcation is still there. I always thought that had the most potential as an encyclopedic educational site that offers a personal perspective from experts in multiple fields. I thought it was horrible how the content was presented alongside spam and filled with ads. I had hoped that one day it would become a serious site. But, I suspect they're just leaving it for last. Especially if it's the biggest site.

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      Kenna McHughposted 5 months agoin reply to this

      Pethelpful, fingers crossed, is still holding on.

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         Thomas Swanposted 5 months agoin reply to this

         Looks better than Owlcation. You've got "ask a vet" although you've still got that "news" section (i.e., spam). It looked worse on Owlcation though because it didn't fit the more serious content. No-one wants a 300-word blurb about "boy steals candy from his sister and learns a lesson!" on an educational site. But I've just noticed they removed that spam/news from Owlcation. So maybe they took my advice, or they waited until traffic died off and they figured it out. Maybe there's hope for these sites yet.

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   Kenna McHughposted 5 months ago

   We can only hope. CPMs today are dismal.

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      Solarasposted 5 months agoin reply to this

      Pageviews and CPM blow. I am wondering if shutting down niche sites is affecting the remaining niche sites, like ripping a hole in a spider web.

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7. 93

   Kenna McHughposted 5 months ago

   The stats speak for themselves.

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8. 97

   CYong74posted 5 months ago

   The management is dumping so many categories into Discover, but after a month, no one is bothering to update the navigation structure. There is no visible link to a video game section; at least I couldn't find it after 10 minutes.
   
   That means all the LevelSkip articles are completely buried.

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9. 92

   EricDockettposted 5 months ago

   There is, but you have to use the hamburger menu on the top left. Games, Toys, and Hobbies > Computer and Video Games.
   
   We really are going back to olden days of HP. I would welcome a return to subdomains at this point.

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   1. 97

      CYong74posted 5 months agoin reply to this

      Found it. But now I discovered another problem. Part of thee menu gets cut off on my phone and I can't resize. Only way seems to shrink what's in the browser.

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      DrMark1961posted 5 months agoin reply to this

      I did well on subdomains and I think you would probably do even better. I would like to see them come back.

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      1. 92

         EricDockettposted 5 months agoin reply to this

         Back when we had subdomains, I ran a separate account for each topic I wrote about. I treated them like little websites. It did work very well.
         
         The 60/40 split always seemed like a good deal compared to running a site. I would even pay for hosting for a setup like the old HP.
         
         Makes me wonder if Blogger is worth it as an emergency exit strategy.

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            eugbugposted 5 months agoin reply to this

            I can't even get Google to index my Blogger science and engineering blog after 5 months and Facebook banned it because it it's against their community guidelines. That's with 75 articles that Google call "thin content".

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               PaulGoodman67posted 5 months agoin reply to this

               I agree, Blogger did okay ten or more years ago. However, Google lost interest in it and it fell into neglect.
               
               I made an attempt last year to revive some of my best-performing blogs but it was futile. I'm sure Google sees blogs as yesterday's news.
               
               Subdomains aren't going to be revived either.
               
               I suspect that the way forward will come from current and future developments but I've not found it yet!

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10. 82

    Solarasposted 5 months ago

    None of this is being done with the intent to benefit the writers.  This is being done as a quick, cut costs, increase revenue, temporarily for TAG.  It smells of desperation.

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    Venkatachari Mposted 5 months ago

    At Blogger, you can own a site for free and then create 10's of subdomains within that platform. I have 7 sub-domains there.

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    FatFreddysCatposted 5 months ago

    So it looks like ReelRundown has been sent to a nice farm upstate since the last time I checked in. That sucks. I had quite a few pieces on there that were doing relatively well.
    
    I don't know about anyone else, but so far the "move back" to Discover has not resulted in any kind of improvement in views for me. Things are just as comatose as they've ever been.
    
    I suppose they will be coming for Spinditty eventually, which is where the majority of my articles reside. If and when that happens, I will have no reason whatsoever to continue with HP.
    
    Sooooo ... yeah, it's been real, y'all. Peace out. (waves)

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       Solarasposted 5 months agoin reply to this

       This is actually insane.  No one in their right mind would just dump website after website into another one without actually finding out what happens to the articles dumped long term.  It feels like being trapped on a runaway train.

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          Kenna McHughposted 5 months agoin reply to this

          A runaway train? How about a train to the death camps?

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             Solarasposted 5 months agoin reply to this

             You are correct.  Presumably, on a runaway train, there is an engineer and a conductor, concerned about the fate of their train, the passengers, the townsfolk where they may derail, as well as themselves.
             
             Versus the cattle car, with everyone being squashed together by order of some sinister, disconnected overlord, one bucket for offal, to be shared by all.  No clue where we are heading, but it doesn't feel like we are going anywhere good, long term.

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             1. 93

                Kenna McHughposted 5 months agoin reply to this

                Yes. Whatever we're told is a fallacy.

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