As editor-in-chief Brianna Royce writes in an article, the MMO gaming site massively is closing its doors. The reason is budget cuts at AOL.
The rumors have been circulating online for a few days and it was clear from the beginning: There is unfortunately some truth to this. The corporation AOL decides to withdraw from the “blog” business and is closing the gaming site Joystiq. It is also certain that this will affect the MMO gaming site massively. What will happen to WoW Insider is still unclear at the moment.
Now the editor-in-chief of the site addresses the readers of massively, reflecting on the past years and finding no kind words for AOL and their situation. They should have seen this coming. This happens when a vice president, whose name they don’t even know and who has never read their site, decides to reward a forty percent growth in the year with a halving of the budget.
You can sense from the letter how disappointed the authors of massively are with their treatment by the gentlemen in suits.
Bill Murphy, the editor-in-chief of massively’s biggest competitor in the US market, mmorpg.com, also has harsh words. One could now say: Yes, that was inevitable; the MMO market is shrinking, after all. But that is nonsense. Massively has functioned well over the last years and has posted good numbers. It is about people at the top who cut others down so their numbers look better at a shareholder meeting.
The authors of massively have posted their Twitter accounts so that readers can follow them in their future jobs and adventures. The site will shut down on Tuesday, February 3rd.
AOL has probably also “officially” informed the team of Joystiq that it is over.
Mein MMO says: We also wish the authors of massively all the best. For us, many German MMO fans, and surely also for some other German MMO sites, with massively not only a valuable source of information is falling silent, but also one of the beloved voices in the MMO market.
