Another Ryan Clark thread...feat. R. Piper

[Tom Guycott]

Originally Posted by Savior Everyone who bitches about Ryan stealing news from other sites probably weren't here when TPWW didn't have anyone to post news on this site. Also I'm quite sure some of them steal streams

I don't partake in the sport of Ryan Clark bashing much, mostly because it's in the realm of "the thing to do" like bitch about Cena not going heel or fellating any quote from Kevin Nash as Jesus-like in terms of the world of wrestling, but in this case...

The "story" and then ZOMG! HOTLINK TO WHATEVER!! MUST SEE!!!>>> is funny because it's a meme that's been done to death and has been around for at least a solid decade. And I can even look the other way when he gives his "review" on something, like summarizing a PPV and peppering it with nonsencical "Op-Ed personal observations",such as asking why AW's mic was still on during a PTP match- as if it were an error of the sound truck- after weeks of him doing the same thing where it's obvious it's part of his "new age Jimmy Hart" gimmick. As if he's unaware of the product he's commenting on. Or making some unfunny joke that seems like the type of thing somone tries to say to get a reaction out of "the cool kids" to get them to chuckle and accept him (like his whole *fuck the police, AMIRITE!?* thing). Only, in this case, "cool kids" takes an ironic twist as being the IWC. This is more "pat on the head and go *awww*" sypmathetic.

My issue isn't so much the "stealing stories" part either. Gone are the days of CompuServe or Prodigy or AOL being on the fringes of this new digital frontier and all your wrestling news being scattered to whatever basement-dwelling corners of the web needing to be dredged and consolidated into a central hub for processing at a central area with infinitely more webtraffic. In this day and age where the internet is as prevalant as drinking water, there are only so many stories to go around, and they're pretty instantanious. Hell, half the time, the wrestlers themselves break a story before it's "official" from WWE or TNA thanks to the magic of social media. You get what you get and you relay it. The problem is that he makes it sound like HE broke the fucking story; like he was standing in the room interviewing someone or talking to someone directly in the know himself... unless it's proven false, then his "source(s)" will be thrown under the bus.

It's the fact that shit like this will happen, and he'll be the equivalent of the gossiping bitty at the fence, waiting to dish all the latest half-assed "hot news" (read: wildly speculated rumor) even if it is proven to be farfetched tripe and pass it off as "journalism", like he did the legwork as opposed to random copypasta that happens to mention a wrestler.

Then, when it's out there that whatever it was he swiped from somewhere, seemingly without any hint of corroboration or fact checking, and he gets called on it, it's not so much "hey, I fucked up, sorry" it's "my source was wrong". Passing the buck to shift the blame on the place he stole the story from instead of owning up to shit.

He presents himself as a smug asshole who gets by on the work of others and passing the blame (or hiding behind "well, I said it was a rumor in there somewhere to cover my ass...") when it's wrong. If his personal touch on his writing didn't reflect such unwarranted self-importance, I would think he wouldn't get crapped on nearly as much as he does. And what he would get would be more light hearted like "doooohh, that Ryan Clark " and less "man, that Ryal Clark is such a douchenozzle!"

Which comes back to this: clamming the fuck up with Hot Rod called him on whatever trivial six degrees info he may have regurgitated so people faping to the next sliver of dirtsheet nonsense can fill in the blanks as fucked up as they want to, OR turning around and saying "look, I just reported with blind faith on what I had- my source screwed you over!" instead of just simply going: look, "Roddy, I'm sorry. Got a story, thought it may have been legit, or I didn't check my facts, or I honestly just stole this from somewhere and looked not further into it. My bad."

And, if hypothetically this were true, Clark wouldn't hesitate down the line of personal degredation like "what a slimy ass crade robber" and such, and topping it off with a "remember, you heard it here first!!! Join the Ryal Clark fanclub today, Mac!!!"

In summary, I'm not bothered by him being a "bad journalist". That appears to be a given. I'm bothered that he's such a dick about it.