January 26, 2003

Never explain a joke

Christian Crumlish

The usually impeccable attitude on display at The Gawker shows a slight crack today when editor/writer Elizabeth Spiers responds to an illiterate slam from some Tim Goodman groupie.

The main response on the Gawker home page is just perfect, but the extended entry tries too hard:

I was merely challenging his assumption that American audiences like the crap they're fed by network TV. Mr. Goodman's analysis implies that while he has perfectly good taste, network programming can be explained by demand created by other Americans who actually enjoy it. Who are these hypothetical people, we ask?

Elizabeth, never stoop to explaining your jokes. Even "fisking" the all-caps slam seems like a little too much effort for the payoff. Just running the email in all its glory probably did the trick.

Never let them see you sweat!

Posted by xian at January 26, 2003 2:18 PM
Other incoming links (via Technorati)

Hosted by Mediajunkie.

Sponsors
On this day in 2007
Breaching the barrier: Blogger versus Traditional Media on C-SPAN: Witness yet another breach in the barrier between blogging and traditional media as our intrepid Emptywheel goes up against Byron York on C-SPAN's Washington Journal this moring.  You can watch for a replay on C-SPAN, or catch a video here: C-SPAN Washington Journal 26-JAN-07 Description: Marcy Wheeler & Byron York, National... ()
On this day in 2005
Convert or die: Frank Bajak's memo to journalists reminds me of my belief that editors should play a roll in organizing posts among many writers but not on the level of the words themselves, as Frank mentions in his conclusion. The old media which can understand this and respond appropriately and quickly will gain... (Journalism)
On this day in 2004
Wanted: personal social network coordinator: Wanted: personal social network coordinator... (People Power)
The mountain goes to Mohamet: Looks like there's forward motion on some client-side applications of the feed validator, spurred on by some recent posts by Brent Simmons, Mark Pilgrim, and others.... (Syndication)
Proposal for comment spammers: Why not just buy some Google AdSense AdWords or whatever they're called? Use the same search terms you found my old post with. That's what the ads are for. Then we all get paid, man.... (Blogosphere)