Cracked.com sells to Scripps for $39 million

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I know some of us still read it, some of us have written for it, and some of us still do:

In an effort to court millennials and invest further in key content categories, The E.W. Scripps Co. has acquired the iconic humor brand Cracked from Demand Media. The purchase price was $39 million.

"We always look for brands that have an eye toward high quality," said Scripps Chief Digital Officer Adam Symson. "So Cracked really fit the bill for us."

So, will shit change and get super-shitty, loyal Cracked visitors?

The plan, Mr. Symson said, is to accelerate Cracked's development of video and audio content that can be consumed through over-the-top services, which is in line with how Scripps is generally operating in the digital space...

Cracked already produces 10 digital video shows, and Mr. Symson said the company's low-hanging fruit is the "large on-demand opportunity" presented by those programs.

There are no plans to bring back a print edition of Cracked, Mr. Symson said, and Scripps plans to keep Cracked's leadership team in place ("Everybody is staying on").

So if you like their podcasts/video stuff, expect more of that. I'm not sure if the fan-written filler will continue, as I think that was more of a Demand Media kinda thing, but it sounds like they basically wanna keep it as is, but have more videos & podcasts spinning out of it.

Then again, it's a whole lot of media acquisitions that begin with the buyers saying something like "we don't wanna change this at all," which lasts juuuuust long enough for people to forget that they ever said such a thing, and then the changes start rolling in.
 
The Cracked Podcast is one of my favorite podcasts and, I think, the best of all of their media.

I still read most of their list articles, too.

I was actually just thinking this morning, while listening to the podcast, about how much they'd be worth.
 
cracked.png


I know some of us still read it, some of us have written for it, and some of us still do:



So, will shit change and get super-shitty, loyal Cracked visitors?



So if you like their podcasts/video stuff, expect more of that. I'm not sure if the fan-written filler will continue, as I think that was more of a Demand Media kinda thing, but it sounds like they basically wanna keep it as is, but have more videos & podcasts spinning out of it.

Then again, it's a whole lot of media acquisitions that begin with the buyers saying something like "we don't wanna change this at all," which lasts juuuuust long enough for people to forget that they ever said such a thing, and then the changes start rolling in.
Cracked is the Maddox of this generation
 
They'll start writing all clickbait, all the time. Scripps is all about clickbait right now. See SimpleMost. I'll be your local Scripps media outlet posts SimpleMost clockbait on FB, mine sure does.
 
I stopped reading the articles regularly a couple of years ago. The podcast is pretty great though so I'm glad that's not being affected, at least for now anyway.
 
I really only care about a couple of the cracked video series these days anyway, so I think it's a good move. As long as they keep the main video actors on, I'm good.
 
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