| ▲ | incomingpain 5 hours ago |
| You want to be associated with toxic waste IP? Why? You're not going to attract any of the audience. You likely could have just chose a new name and built whatever you want to do with this. |
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| ▲ | nimih 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] |
| It may be helpful context to understand that The Onion is a satirical publication, and that them taking over InfoWars may itself be part of the joke. |
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| ▲ | OgsyedIE 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| The Onion and Mr Beast are the highbrow and lowbrow versions of the same niche: absurdism, spectacle and indifference without staying power. Since there's such low retention, the content must be weighted to constant new conversions and new reconversions. Edit: if you have the time, watch their youtube series Sex House, Helcomb County Municipal Lake Dredge Appraisals and Dr. Good (approx 75 minutes each). There's no nudity, gore or cursing, just some very clever themes about the parallels between television and hell that are still relevant right now, if not more so. |
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| ▲ | mattkrause 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | The Onion has been around since 1988, so...decent staying power. | | |
| ▲ | busterarm 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | And hasn't had any cultural relevance aside from this stunt for just about the last decade. It's like saying that National Lampoon is still relevant. | | |
| ▲ | onychomys 4 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | They have a larger audience for their print version than the Boston Globe. It's the 12th largest paper by circulation in the country! https://www.fastcompany.com/91502944/the-onion-most-innovati... | |
| ▲ | CobrastanJorji 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | This is likely because The Onion was purchased by Univision in 2016 and then bounced around in a couple more acquisitions over the next decade. Ben Collins got the helm in 2024 and has been doing, in my opinion, a fantastic job with the brand. | |
| ▲ | gegtik 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | do you have a rubric to share for qualifying for cultural relevance? | | |
| ▲ | mattkrause 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | 65,000 print subscribers (on par with the Boston Globe!) and 300% revenue growth last year suggests they're doing okay. https://www.fastcompany.com/91502944/the-onion-most-innovati... | | |
| ▲ | busterarm 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | When I worked at an ISP we had a lot of landline phone customers too and I'm sure they will continue to for a long time. At least as long as their current customers keep breathing. You can run a business off inertia/nostalgia for quite a long time. People are confused about what I said. Success and Relevance are not the same thing. National Lampoon still has a business too, but I doubt that any of you have seen a new movie of theirs since Van Wilder/Repli-Kate came out in 2002. A million dollars a year for a domain name is quite a lot. And I know what was paid for the sales of some big (in the keyword marketing/leadgen space) domain names...Sale, not lease. | | |
| ▲ | floren 3 hours ago | parent | next [-] | | > You can run a business off inertia/nostalgia for quite a long time. They only reintroduced print editions in 2024 after an 11 year break. Those 65,000 print subscribers are all people who decided they wanted to start paying money for The Onion in the last 2 years. | |
| ▲ | dougb5 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | If "people are confused" I think it's because you are rejecting empirical evidence that The Onion is relevant without offering any counter-evidence of your own. Is it possible it's just no longer relevant to you personally? (I myself am a proud print subscriber...) | | | |
| ▲ | mattkrause 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | Inertia doesn't really seem like it would lead to 300% YoY growth... OTOH, National Lampoon hasn't put out a magazine since 1998 or a film since 2015 (and that was a retrospective on the magazine). I guess I'd agree that, in absolute terms, The Onion might be less of a cultural force than it was in 2005 (say), but part of that has to be that culture is a lot more long-tailed: music, movies, and TV aren't dominated by a handful of works either. | |
| ▲ | shagie 3 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] | | The context for those print subscribers is that this isn't a "had the subscription since the 2010s" They discontinued their print edition in 2013. Those 65,000 subscriptions are all people who subscribed since 2024 when it was relaunched. It may be nostalgia, but it is not people who forgot that they had a subscription. It's people who signed up to pay money in the last two years. | |
| ▲ | evan_ 3 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | > People are confused about what I said. Because you're saying very confusing things. What does National Lampoon have to do with anything? |
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| ▲ | esseph 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | > And hasn't had any cultural relevance aside from this stunt for just about the last decade. You're right! Their own claim is that it's insane they're still around, because they find it hard to match the absurdity of the last 10 years. |
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| ▲ | saulpw 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] | | You say "without staying power" but I still remember and frequently cite these ancient Onion article headlines: - Drugs now legal if user is gainfully employed
- Top 10 Genocides of the 20th Century (Infographic)
- Cycle of Abuse Running Smoothly
I mean sure, it's a satirical news site and it's got a constant stream of new content, much of which is forgettable. But that's true of every other news site too. The gems make it stick. | | |
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| ▲ | nilamo 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| Stopping the current owner of infowars from continuing is a valid "why". What happens after doesn't matter. |
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| ▲ | minimaxir 5 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| That's the joke. |
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| ▲ | ravenstine 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| No offense, but the humor of it has gone right over your head. Building an InfoWars clone isn't nearly as funny as acquiring the real one just to mock it. |
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| ▲ | occamofsandwich 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | I guess.. But renting a 4th reich site seems far darker than they might be used to and likely to make them the butt of the joke when Hitler's testtube clone gets elected from it in 35 years. | | |
| ▲ | ashtonshears 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | If thats true, seems like it is 10000x more critical they purchase right to the infowars hiltler cloning facilities and features | | |
| ▲ | occamofsandwich 4 hours ago | parent [-] | | Exactly. Buying would at least mean you aren't revamping the value of the site for some next renter in a deeply cynical age where making fun of the orange pedo at a press club ball could cause WWIII. | | |
| ▲ | anon84873628 3 hours ago | parent [-] | | The money goes to Jones's judgment creditors from Sandy Hook. If not The Onion, it would be some actual right wing media organization... |
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| ▲ | mrhottakes 4 hours ago | parent | prev | next [-] |
| they should make a clone with a cooler theme and call it KnowledgeBattles.org |
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| ▲ | skywhopper 4 hours ago | parent | prev [-] |
| They’re taking advantage of the name recognition to raise money for the families victimized by the horrible people who used to own and run the site. |
