Would-be UK blog publishing super-house Shiny Media went in to administration on Friday due to growing debts, but a new ownership structure could see it rise again.
The company laid off half of its 17 staff in February, citing a tech advertising downturn. But Shiny has also been fighting worsening conditions since then. According to a memo sent by co-founder Chris Price to freelancers, and seen by paidContent:UK: “The truth is that trading was extremely difficult and the position of the bank with regards to renewing the overdraft were very unfavourable.
“The assets – including all websites with the exception of Bag Lady and Shoewawa – have been bought by a new company, Shiny Digital, of which I am a shareholder,” Price wrote. According to Companies House, the new company counts as equal shareholders Shiny Trends (an outfit incorporated by Shiny co-founders Price, Ashley Norris and Katie Lee last year) and Cansas Digital Ventures (a new registered name for Shiny Media’s venture funder Brightstation since August 2007).
But the transition may not be easy – systems including Price’s email and mobile were “switched off by one of the minority shareholders in the business”, Price said, suggesting a disagreement over the new company’s configuration. Some freelancers haven’t been paid, but it seems administrators are trying to do so. Many Shiny blogs have not been updated since Friday, though one or two were still publishing news Monday and Tuesday.
Started in 2004, Shiny led the pack in the effort to build a UK counterpart to Gawker’s independent publishing empire, and is best known for its Shiny Shiny (girly gadgets), Tech Digest (technology) and Shoewawa (footwear) blogs, but had grown to publish blogs in several verticals and in the US.
In January 2007, it said it got $4.5 million from Brightstation, but it’s now thought that amount could have been far less. Norris, the original CEO, left in August 2008 to start his own publishing efforts, and had become CEO of male-centric publisher Anorak Media. Lee left in February at the same time as Shiny’s layoffs, which also involved content cutbacks and which Price said were ” about hunkering down and trying to survive”.
Only recently, Anorak, under Norris, acquired acquired his old football blog WhoAteAllThePies from Shiny, which had put it on hiatus. But Norris has also resumed blogging with Shiny itself recently.
Big lifestyle media brands still reign supreme with mainstream media consumers and independent blog publishers have struggled to replicate the success of Gawker, WeblogsInc or b5media…
Please will someone look beyond the hype and praise heaped on Shiny Media by industry reporters to date and ask serious questions about how this was run as a business?
Want to email, Reader?
Good piece Rob – very informative and well balanced. Just to make it clear the business received under a million pounds in venture capital, not the $4.5 million often reported. Also every effort was made to continue trading, including selling of assets, redundancies, downsizing offices and, in the case of the directors, substantial pay cuts. Creditors should call the administrator Wilson Field on 0114 235 6780.
'Just to make it clear' No.2: As editor of Who Ate All the Pies, I currently have no access to the site. I am locked out effectively because of the dispute between Shiny and the "minority shareholder", which is incredibly frustrating â not to mention costly â as Pies is not involved in said dispute. (Not Chris Price's fault, I might add.)
Ollie Irish
Editor, whoateallthepies.tv
Nice one Chris. Thanks for letting all the freelancers (me included) who are owed hundreds ( if not thousands) of pounds by Shiny who to ring for financial recompense via a comment on a news post. Although let's face it – if you've sold all your 'assets' to your shinier new company then there will be pretty much no financial recompense for anyone who worked so hard to make your sites some of the most read and most talked about in their respective industries. Let me repeat – nice one.
I doubt this "new" company will have many friends after the appalling way it's treated its staff over this.
Finding out you've been made redundant via a blog post? Finding out the company has gone bust via TWITTER?!
Very new media, but not a classy way to conduct business. I'd also like to hear a response from someone at Bright Station regarding this, as they must be held responsible in some way.
Unless they're happily registering new domain names to rip-off lots of people in the same way again at this very moment, which is what this off-the-shelf "administration" deal sounds like.
Hey Chris, mind pinging me? You should have my skype/twitter/email/cell :)
Interested to see if we can pick up where things left off, or start something new together.
"independent blog publishers have struggled to replicate the success of Gawker, WeblogsInc or b5media"
Success like b5media?? Thats laughable!! b5media can not be compared to weblogsinc or gawker. Please. b5media is another train wreck much like Shiny that took vc money and pissed it all away.
I'm sorry I did not see your request to email until now. I think Paul and Colin have gone some way to highlighting what needs looking into.
Too often now the question is being asked whether the mess Shiny Media finds itself in is some representation of the fact that blogging in the UK is on the way out.
Really the more mundane truth is evident – these particular 'bosses' couldn't organise a piss up in a brewery.
As I understand it the company has admitted publicly that the amount of investment trumpeted in the media wasn't correct, but they were advised not to put it right. I find this appalling. They obviously welcomed the publicity but should have had a much tighter rein on cashflow.
Though when you consider how hard people have had to chase for their money over the years from this shower, I suppose it makes more sense. The thought of the sum really being as much as was reported, and people being treated the way they were was too depressing for words.
Some bloggers – some of whom are embroiled in court cases going back months for money owed for posts written that built this company's reputation, have now started to blog and tweet about how they have been treated. That's got to be encouraging. I hope more do and the scales will fall away from the eyes of the media who reported these characters as such innovators.
moving forward, katie lee who blogs on the telegraphs blog platform is reported by that newspaper to be giving no comment on minoriry shareholder action named by the telegraph as dan wagner. it was lee who twittered news of shinys collapse earlier this week. she is now promoting skimlinks. given her track record and failure to be honest over press reports of the finances of her previous company i think buyer beware is in order