IGN

IGN is a part-free and part-subscription general gaming website. It was founded in 1995, starting as N64.com, SaturnWorld and PSX Power. It is controlled by 92.3% shareholder News Corporation, a company chaired by Rupert Murdoch. It was bought for $650 million on the 8 September 2005.

As of June 2005, it claims 23 million unique visitors a month, with 5 million users registered through all departments of the site, including reviews, previews, walkthroughs, codes, and other media. IGN is a highly profitable business, and each single page often has at least 3 advertisements, complete with tracking cookies from both IGN and partners such as DoubleClick, Overture, TribalFusion and Gator. One of it s most notable parts is GameSpy, which was originally a separate company. The GameSpy suite of programs have been source of much controversy due to bundled Adware and Spyware.

IGN s core site -- [http://www.ign.com IGN] -- is comprised of a several specialty sites, each occupying a subdomain on IGN. This has given rise to such IGN sites (sometimes referred to as channels ) such as Xbox 360, Xbox, Playstation 3 (PS3), Playstation 2, GameCube, PC Games, Playstation Portable, Game Boy, Nintendo DS, Cheats, Guides, FAQs, DVD, Music, Comics, Sports, Cars, and Babes.

IGN is ranked among the top 300 most visited websites according to Alexa Internet, and the IGN forums have been considered to be among the most popular Internet forums.

==Corporate Details==

*IGN runs on a combination of advertising and subscriptions. IGN Insider is IGN s premium subscription service for approximately $20 a year, although it has been known to fluctuate. Subscribers, who re also known as Insiders get special benefits, such as higher resolution videos, no ads, and full access to the message boards. *IGN Entertainment was the only gaming website in the stock market, however its stock is no longer publicly traded. *IGN originally stood for Imagine Games Network, although now, it is no longer an acronym -- it means absolutely nothing. *While still known as Snowball, IGN acquired the Vault Network and its message boards in 1999. *In March 2004, IGN Entertainment and GameSpy Industries merged, and was briefly known for 3 months as IGN/GameSpy), before formalizing their corporate name as IGN Entertainment. *In June 2004, IGN bought the popular movie review site Rotten Tomatoes *In February 2005 they acquired the popular download site, 3D Gamers. *In June 2005, IGN bought male lifestyle website [http://www.askmen.com AskMen.com]. *On September 8, 2005, it was announced that News Corporation had acquired IGN for $650 million.

==Site Managers==

*Aaron Boulding - Executive Editor, Special Projects *Chris Carle - Editorial Manager, IGN Entertainment *Fran Mirabella III - Chief Video Producer *Peer Schneider - Vice President Site Content *Steven Horn - Producer *Talmadge Blevins - Editorial Director, IGN Games

==Editors-in-Chief==

*Brian Zoromski - Editor-in-Chief, IGN FilmForce *Craig Harris - Editor-in-Chief, IGN Game Boy, DS *Dan Adams - Editor-in-Chief, IGN PC *Douglass C. Perry - Editor-in-Chief, IGN Xbox, Xbox 360 *Jeremy Dunham - Editor-in-Chief, IGN PS2, PSP, PS3 *Mark Ryan Sallee - Editor-in-Chief, IGN Guides, Cheats, FAQs *Matt Casamassina - Editor-in-Chief, IGN GameCube *Spencer A. Abbott - Editor-in-Chief, IGN Music

==Site Editors and Staff==

*Brennan Ieyoub - Video Production *Brian Linder - IGN FilmForce *Charles Onyett - IGN Xbox, Xbox 360 *Chris Beridon - IGN Insider *Chris Roper - IGN PS2, PSP, PS3 *David Adams - IGN News Wire *David Clayman - IGN Insider *Erik Brudvig - IGN Guides *Erik Harte - Video Production *Hilary Goldstein - IGN Comics *Ivan Sulic - IGN PS2, PSP, PS3 *Jason Allen - IGN Cheats *Jon Robinson - IGN Sports *Juan Castro - IGN PSP *Justin Kaehler - IGN Cars *Levi Buchanan - IGN Wireless/Mobile *Marc Nix - Gamestats.com *Stephen Ng - IGN FAQs *Steve Butts - IGN PC *Todd Gilchrist - IGN DVD *Tom McNamara - IGN PC

==IGN Message Boards==

IGN is also known for its active [http://boards.ign.com message boards], which were created in late June 2000, which were originally for video game discussion, but now, they have deviated from just that subject, to cars, movies, politics, photography, and various other things.

Known as The Vestibule, or to members, as the Vesti. The Vestibule is a forum that is a part of IGN.com. The Vestibule was created on March 8 2002 as a means to experience the IGN community without having to purchase IGN Insider - the boards were previously made completely subscription-only on February 20 2002, much to the appal of long-time members.

The Vestibule has no set topic - anything goes as long as it falls within IGN s Terms_of_service. The discussions tend to be of a frivilous nature, but current events are largely discussed; from politics to sport, television and videogames. Viewing shock sites such as Goatse.cx, tubgirl and lemon party are almost considered a rite of passage on The Vestibule. Recently there has been a tendency towards shock videos - by far the most talked about being what is known only as The Video , which consists soley of penis mutilation.

One of the features of the board system is WULs (watched user list), which is essentially a Buddy List to keep track of your favorite users posts. However, users of the Vestibule especially feel a need to be on as many users lists as they can, raising their WUL count. The system is now effectively a currency of its own - people offer WULs for information and favors.

Another large part of The Vestibule is adoptions - someone can buy another user an IGN Insider subscription as a gift. Adoptions are almost like WULs insofar as they are used to barter with, but of course these are worth far more. You may see adoption contests from time to time and some people will even adopt purely because they find the user to be a good part of the community. Members of the Vestibule are particularly prone to rioting, which consists of users flooding the forum in a short amount of time with similar topics and posts. Those participating in a riot receive a temporary suspension of their user accounts.

Most in the Vestibule claim that other forums are too rigidly defined to doctrine and topic and prefer the freedom The Vestibule offers. As of 2005, the Vestibule has 20 million posts and is one of the fastest boards on the internet.

The IGNCB, or IGN Community Board, opened on September 11 2000, for non-video game related content that was beginning to appear on the video game discussion boards. The board is particularly renowned for its high-brow wit and perceived elitism, although this is less true now than it was in the board s heyday in 2000-2003, now it is more akin to a slower version of The Vestibule. The ratio of moderators to normal users is the highest of any board, this is because the users of the IGNCB have generally been around longer than others. According to Big-boards.com, the IGN Boards are ranked number three in terms of activity, behind Face the Jury, and Gaia Online.

==Other Details==

*IGN retains a site for its unofficial videogame guides. While most of IGN s newer guides are for subscribers or IGN Insiders, the majority of the guides are actually free *In 2002, IGN launched a dedicated videogame FAQs site specifically designed to host user-submitted guides. Stephen Ng currently manages IGN FAQs. *IGN purchased [http://www.gamesages.com GameSages.com] to augment its growing codes and cheats database. Jason Allen currently manages IGN Cheats. This deal caused mass unrest among members of the large bulletin board community established at GameSages, and led to rival sites X-Sages (disbanded to allow the webmaster to pursue other projects ) and TheSagesNetwork (eventually changed format to [http://www.conacopia.com Conacopia.com], distanced from GameSages) being established. A plurality of the more distinguished characters remain active on [http://www.cheap-beer.com/forums/ Cody s Awesome Super Friends Forum] established by noteworthy GameSages player Cody Ace Morrison. *In 2004, IGN launched [http://www.gamestats.com Gamestats.com] which serves as an more unbiased rating network, as it takes in every corporately owned game rating site, and averages it all into one score to give a general idea of the games quality. *In 2005, IGN launched their comics site. It is devoted to not just the staple Marvel and DC titles, but also manga, graphic novels, statues, and toys. *Largely dead since 2002, this section of the site included movie news, comic book reviews, and other associated items. It has since fallen into disuse. It still exists at [http://scifi.ign.com scifi.ign.com], where its front page offers, among other things, the latest news on Terminator 3. Recently, IGN has created SciFiBrain.ign.com which covers some of the content of the old SciFi site. *This section closed down officially on October 2, 2001 soon after the announcement that Leah was moving on. It can be found at [http://formen.ign.com formen.ign.com] but is no longer updated. IGN has sites such as Babes.IGN.com and Askmen.com that fulfill much of the function of the old IGN ForMen site. Jeff Hall currently manages IGN Babes. *IGN Wrestling met its end in early 2002, when many of the staff departed. Interviews with professional wrestling personalities and coverage of wrestling games has been folded into IGN Sports, currently headed by Jon Robinson.

*On IGN, members have celebrations for personal milestones in posting, such as 5,000 posts.

==References==

# http://www.big-boards.com # http://www.ign.com # http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/business/4226170.stm

==Official Sites==

*[http://www.IGN.com/ IGN.com] *[http://www.gamestats.com Gamestats]