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Here’s SWEETROCK, the 24 hour comic I drew this year!

PS: if you liked this, there’s a whole book of these comics available now!

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Here’s SWEETROCK, the 24 hour comic I drew this year!

PS: if you liked this, there’s a whole book of these comics available now!

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Simone de Rochefort shared the email she sent to Jim Bankoff, the CEO of Vox Media who sold Polygon, on bluesky. The text of the email is transcribed below:

"Hi Jim,

I'm writing to let you know how incredibly disappointed I am about the decision to sell Polygon to Valnet. Even though I'm one of the fortunate few to still be employed, I'm still furious and heartbroken.

I was in Europe when the sale went public. A few days later, a reader recognized me at a cafe in Paris. He couldn't believe what had happened, and asked me how it was possible, in the United States, that a workforce like ours could just be disposed of. He also added, completely unprompted, that American workers should "choose violence." I just thought I'd mention that! It was cool to be recognized halfway around the world for my work. The readers have always appreciated it, even if you don't. But I'm going to tell you about it anyway.

At Polygon, we wrote stories and made videos that were unique in entertainment media - they were weird and well-researched and funny. We also got awards for our reporting (including myself and my now-laid-off colleague Clayton Ashley - we were nominated for an ASME and we won a New York Videogame Critics Circle award).

We attracted brand sponsorships, some of which my team was in the middle of working on when my colleagues were laid off. My understanding is that Vox will be doing make-good sponsorships for the businesses that had contracted with Polygon. I wonder if they will seek out Vox Media again, once that process is finished.

My colleagues who were laid off spent years building connections and trust with sources in our industry. On the video team, subjects gave us hours of their time and resources for interviews. People trusted us to tell their stories. You can't do good journalism without that trust, and that's been at minimum bruised by this sale and the dismantling of the team.

Our readers and viewers are wonderful. I applied to work at Polygon because I read a comment chain on the site that I expected to be full of sexism and vitriol. Instead I found thoughtful people having a civil and intelligent discussion. What a rarity on the internet!

Did you know that Polygon's YouTube comments have always been overwhelmingly positive? My games journalist colleagues at other sites marveled at the fact that at Polygon, I never got hate mail. Was never harassed. That I could scroll freely through the comments of any video that I or my colleagues made and see people appreciating our work. That is so, so rare.

I worked at Vox Media for 9 years. The week before the sale, as I was preparing to go on vacation, I stayed up till 5 AM so that I could finish my next video. No one asked me to do that! That was frankly stupid, considering how little you and the company valued our work. This doesn't make me look very good or very smart, but I'm including it anyway.

The truth is I like working and the feeling of productivity, and I liked what I was making. I felt like that made it worth it.

It didn't! I suppose what I am saying is that Polygon's employees did everything possible to make the site a success. We built a profitable, respected publication.

You, and Vox Media's leadership, didn't know what to do with it. You failed to make a good thing work for you. That's quite sad, and quite an indictment on Vox Media as a whole.

I used to have a lot of faith in the company's longevity. I don't anymore, because of your poor decision-making, and your failure to listen to the people who were telling you what Polygon needed.

I had always said that Vox Media is an amazing employer. That out of all the media companies, it was the best. I encouraged people who are bright and hard-working and talented to apply for work there. I felt so lucky to have my job. I don't think you know yet how many bridges you've burned with people like me who would've jumped at the chance to work for you, and let themselves be exploited along the way.

A couple years ago, a former employee told me that digital media would never love me back, and that I should leave Vox. They said I wouldn't understand how much the company takes from its employees until I tried working somewhere else.

Well, now I work for Valnet! Thank you for the push out the door!

Meanwhile, if you couldn't make a profitable website like Polygon work, then what hope is there for my colleagues at other Vox outlets?

How many unprofitable ventures will be propped up with profits from the Polygon sale, and for how long? Before you and the folks with a head for business (or so I'm told!) have to hit the ledgers again and find something to sell, or someone to let go. Or will the company just enjoy a tax write-off for 2025 and then … what?

Polygon was special, and it was valuable, and it was profitable, and you sold it, at a time when the economy was at a low point - and when Polygon, against all odds, was still making money.

This does not make sense to me. Please feel free to respond and convince me.

Sincerely, Simone de Rochefort"

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Today in niche genres of joke that I can never get enough of and will probably still be secretly thinking about four years later

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happy Thursday the 20th

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Me returning to my hometown to destroy my two oldest friends otherwise happy marriage.

m1=78.8 m2=42.5 m3=34.2 (solar masses) v1x=-4.614 v1y=6.633 v2x=3.943 v2y=1.164 v3x=3.801 v3y=-5.647 (km/s) x1=-3.0 y1=26.0 x2=10.0 y2=-4.0 x3=16.0 y3=15.0 (AU from center) Music: Nocturne in C-Sharp Minor (Posthumous) – Chopin

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it seems to me like every online transfem friend group also has one singular cis guy who’s hanging onto their gender by a fucking thread while all the girls wave scissors in their direction.

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Hebden Bridge, Calderdale, West Yorkshire (England)

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Not to be a lesbian but holy fucking shit

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Our Connection

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being self aware suuuucks like yeah this thought pattern/behavior is stupid and pointless and a symptom. i know this. [does it anyways

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Throwing dirt at my mirrors then turning to the camera and waggling my eyebrows like a cartoon dog

The hottest girls have the dirtiest mirrors

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The "Get Loud" TTRPG Bundle

About a month ago Charlie Hall, editor of tabletop games over at Polygon wrote an odd opinion piece. The gist of it was that since Wizards of the Coast is fumbling the bag with the release of the new edition of Dungeons & Dragons, now would be a great time for indie TTRPG makers to step up.

Above all, I feel it is imperative that indie designers realize that their window is rapidly closing. Rather than sitting in their own little corners of the internet and wringing their hands, creatives who want to thrive in the TTRPG space need to come together and fight for the recognition that they deserve. The dragon is knocked out for now, but it won’t be at rest forever. Only by building out a solid party, filled with individual contributors each possessing powerful skills, can they hope to one day face that dragon — or at least earn a place in the lair beside them.

This pissed off a lot of people. Including me. We aren't wringing our fucking hands out here, Chuck. We are loud about our games every hour of the goddamn day, and each time we encourage big media outlets like you to help, we see you wringing your hands about reader retention and clicks and all that horseshit.

We are not the cowards in this arrangement.

So as is my habit these days, I did some organizing about it.

I went through my list of games I've bought off itch and found my favourites, and my favourite designers. I contacted the ones I could (some of them didn't respond, said no, or I couldn't find ways to contact them) and put them together in a bundle. My friend Em did some art. I launched it on the 1st of February.

So far it has raised over $6,000. That's about $300 for each designer, depending on how they divvy up their cuts to itch, taxes, etc. That's money in the hands of indie TTRPG makers who aren't Wizards of the Coast. That's people being able to pay their bills and keep making games.

And not to mention it's 36 of my favourite games and 20 of my favourite game makers all in one place for the low low price of $20.

Being an indie creator is hard and thankless. We make things because we cannot help but be artists, and we are met largely with silence. We are expected to compete with companies who pay salaries to public relations people, who have marketing budgets and teams of artists, when all we have is a social media account, a mailing list, and the occasional crowdfunding campaign. 

We are not saved by these companies, but by other small indie groups. By sites like Rascal who make game announcements easy, and the people who make YouTube channels and podcasts who play and read our games and let their fans know we exist. We are saved by people, not companies.

So if you buy the bundle, if you post about it on social media, or your work’s Slack channel, or write the link on the wall of the bathroom in that cool queer dive bar you like, thank you.

We can’t keep doing this without you. 

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Overwhelming urge to make a TTRPG about surviving a nuclear blast and constantly referring to it as "ghibliesque"

I am also getting into it about TTRPG design and anime over on my bluesky btw