GawkerTV Launches With Intern Workforce, Optimistic About Ad Sales

Today’s launch of Gawker.TV is the product of Richard Blakeley‘s three years as Nick Denton‘s video editor. Now the This Is Why You’re Fat co-author is manning his own satellite site, which will be posting videos throughout the day, with the help of the 16 or so interns currently working under Blakeley.

The fact that so much (unpaid) manpower is going into this spin-off site isn’t exactly a surprise. Gawker‘s largest-generating posts have almost always been candid videos: Tom Cruise ranting about Scientology, the Eric Dane/Rebecca Gayheart/Kari Ann Peniche sex tape, and the video shot by Blakeley of Heath Ledger’s body being wheeled out of the apartment he was staying in Soho when he died in 2008.

Denton has also admitted that it will be easier to sell ads on a site that is not as specifically themed as some of his other off-shoots like Jezebel (for women) or Fleshbot (Gawker’s sex Web site). Sales of Gawker’s other sites — Wonkette, Idolator, and Gridskipper — were similarly explained to be the result of poor ad revenue.

Gawker.TV currently has a tip box at the top of the site for users to submit videos. We have yet to hear back from Gawker Media if the tip box will automatically filter into the new open forums, as they do on Gawker’s main site.

See More: Gawker.TV

Create a social media strategy, launch your campaign, and track the results in our Social Media Marketing Boot Camp starting February 16. The online event and workshop will feature speakers including The Onion‘s Baratunde Thurston (left), Facebook’s Morin Oluwole, and bitly’s Tim Devane. Register now.