G/O Media, a network that owns websites but also knows nothing about running websites, has made further cuts at the already-beleaguered Kotaku, with a number of writers announcing today that they had been laid off.
Willa Rowe and Moises Taveras, two writers who only joined the site earlier this year, were abruptly laid off by management this afternoon. Also announcing their departure from Kotaku today, albeit on their own terms, was Senior Editor Alyssa Mercante, who posted that after two years at the site she was moving on.
The layoffs and the departure of Mercante leave Kotaku with just six full-time staff, including an Editor-in-Chief who only joined a few months ago after his predecessor resigned in protest over G/O Media's management of the site. They follow several rounds of layoffs to have already taken place in 2024, affecting both editorial staff and writers.
"G/O Media’s management is once again punishing workers for its own bad decisions", Managing Editor Carolyn Petit wrote on Bluesky. "Management mandated that some writers stick to ‘service’ posts, and now that the numbers aren’t panning out (surprise, surprise!), two of those writers have been laid off. Cruel and misguided."
Kotaku is one of the last remaining websites in G/O Media's portfolio, following the recent sale of everything from The Onion to Jalopnik to whatever was left of Deadspin. Its masthead is now down to just a handful of writers and editors, with much of the site's service work now being handed off to freelancers.
