GayCities Welcomes You to the New Queerty

Here at GayCities HQ in San Francisco, we follow blogs religiously. There are many fine ones. But one consistently stands out, sparking the most water-cooler (if we could afford one) conversation: the one and only Queerty. Whether the topic is an originally reported article about a gay teen hoping to attend the prom, a critique of a pompous leader or organization or a laugh out-loud-post about the latest gay Internet sensation, Queerty’s talented stable of writers and editors managed to be lacerating, serious and hilarious, often within the same post. Even when it failed to live up to its own standards, it was never boring, not least because the Queerty community would light up with criticism.

Ah, how we love the Queerty community. Readers from around the globe passionately engage with Queerty’s unique voice and eccentric headlines, creating debate, adding their own insights and twists to breaking news. Sure it can be shrill and rough around the edges, but the Queerty community is never afraid to tell Queerty–or anyone else–what they are full of. Since we already run GayCities, where users review and share about the best places in 200 cities worldwide, we knew the power of real people’s feedback for finding great experiences. The Queerty community added the same kind of value to the issues of the day, sharing comments about all gay life has to offer, from political breakthroughs to erotic adventures, but also insights for overcoming obstacles and bringing down the villains who would do us harm or at least slow us down.

So when Queerty owner David Hauslaib offered GayCities the opportunity to acquire the blog he founded six years ago, we were hooked. After fixing some technical glitches, we are relaunching today. We’re bringing back key Queerty writers including Daniel Villareal, who will post daily from Dallas, while adding a bunch of our own stars such as Matt Baume, Dan Tracer, Oscar Raymundo, Dan Renzi, Scott Wallis, Jeff Katz and GayCities New York City editor Jeffrey James Keyes.

I myself am a veteran of two decades in gay media, starting as The Advocate with stops at PlanetOut and in book writing. Bringing GayCities and Queerty together is for me, as co-founder of this company, a kind of content dream come to life, a rare chance to be both politically provocative and entertaining in a way that few media companies have achieved this side of Comedy Central and Gawker.

While we are committed to maintaining the best of Queerty, we also recognize that you have demanded change. In recent months the Queerty patented wit devolved into predictable snark, eviscerating everyone and everything in its path. Some of the comments simply piled on. We will maintain the independent voice at all cost, going with a vengeance after the powerful, the hypocritical and the just plain foolish. But now we’ll also strive for a better sense of journalistic balance and fairness.

In other words we’re going to keep afflicting the comfortable; only now we’ll take care to comfort the afflicted as well.

As always, let us know exactly what’s on your mind…