Polygon has obtained an email sent by Vivek Shah, the CEO of Ziff Davis (which recently acquired IGN), to all IGN employees in which it was announced that 1Up.com, GameSpy.com, and UGO.com are to be shuttered in the near future. A copy of the message sent by Shah is included after the break.
It hasn’t been made clear when the websites will be shut down definitively, though 1Up Editor-in-Chief Jeremy Parish confirmed that it wouldn’t be today. According to the report by Polygon, some editorial staff has been made redundant by the move, but a significant portion will be integrated into the IGN team.
Besides shutting down 1Up, GameSpy, and UGO, Ziff Davis will also be looking to sell off IGN’s proffesional gaming league IGL. The message from Shah did not specify any parties currently interested in acquiring it though.
Peer Schneider, one of the founders of IGN, will continue to oversee the content produced for IGN, but will now have a more focused sales and advertisement team to focus on bringing in revenue through the various IGN channels.
IGN and all affiliated sites were acquired by Ziff Davis earlier this month. The message that Shah sent to the IGN employees is included below:
From: Vivek Shah
Date: February 21, 2013
Subject: Staff AnnouncementToday, we took some difficult but important actions that will ensure the continued growth and health of IGN and AskMen. Before I go into more details about the changes, you should know that they resulted in the elimination of jobs at IGN. It’s always upsetting to say goodbye to colleagues and let’s do what we can to help these employees as they seek new opportunities.
It’s also important for you to know that we are absolutely confident that we now have the best structure and team to successfully move the company forward and that there are no further planned reductions.
The changes we made today are designed to allow us to Simplify and Focus. Our goal is to do fewer things and to do them exceptionally well. In that vein, we want to direct all of our energy and work behind our two flagship brands: IGN and AskMen. They are both category killers and share a vision of a multi-screen (PCs, tablets, smartphones, TV) and multi-format (text, photos and video) world.
As a result of our decision to focus on our core brands, we are:
· Winding down 1UP.com, UGO.com and GameSpy.com;
· No longer ad repping 3rd party sites such as GameStop.com and FamilyGuy.com;
· Actively engaged with parties interested in acquiring IPL. IGN’s role going forward will be to broadcast and cover a variety of eSports events;
· Dividing our ad sales team into two: one focused on IGN and the other focused on AskMen.On the IGN front, Peer Schneider will continue to oversee all of editorial and product, focusing those resources exclusively on IGN. The foundation of this entire company is its content and we will continue to have the best people in the industry producing it.
Charlie Barrett will oversee the monetization of IGN everywhere in the U.S. – PCs, tablets, smartphones, YouTube, consoles – and now be able to concentrate the sales and ad ops teams’ efforts where they can make the most impact.
Frank Puma will assume an exciting new role as executive director of programs and solutions, reporting to Charlie. The sales development, design and creative teams will report to Frank, whose charge is to deliver world-class advertising experiences.
A new head of engineering and technology for IGN will be recruited as quickly as possible. Tech has a monumental role to play in the growth of IGN and will be committed to working hand-in-glove with edit, product and sales.
On the AskMen front, Ric Poupada will continue to oversee all aspects of the AskMen organization and is excited to have a new VP of sales, Paul Chenier, reporting to him. Paul has been a longtime advocate of the AskMen brand and is one of the most talented sales executives in our organization. Having him build a dedicated AskMen ad sales team will do wonders for the business.
Ian Chambers will continue to run International out of the UK for both IGN and AskMen and we’re thrilled with the performance of our businesses overseas.
Mike Etheridge will be the VP of finance and operations for IGN and AskMen, working across all of the departments to ensure that we’re growing our business, expanding our margins and making metric-based decisions.
Rachelle Igoe will be the head of human resources for IGN and AskMen, ensuring that we continue to nurture, attract and retain the best talent in the industry.
I’m sure that there will be a number of questions in the days and weeks ahead but please know that we will be a better functioning and nimbler organization from this moment forward.
As I said on day one, openness and transparency are important, so please email me at [removed] if you have any questions, thoughts or ideas.