Denton, who operates 15 sites, including Fleshbot, Wonkette and Gizmodo through his Gawker Media empire, recently made old media-style staffing cuts in the face of an industry seemingly expanding without limits.
Announcing the sale of Screenhead, a video clip aggregator site and Sploid, a tabloid page, Denton commented on the decision at a blog mixer hosted by PaidContent.org, saying that it was “better to sober up now, before the end of the party.”
Denton also made personnel changes, moving or firing editors at Wonkette, Gizmodo, Gridskipper and Gawker.
Denton, who many industry watchers put at the epicenter of the blog revolution, began his career as a correspondent for the Financial Times. He made his money — reportedly $50 million — by building and selling social networking site First Tuesday. But having made his money flying in the face of traditional media, Denton isn’t so sure that the old model is dead.
"We are becoming a lot more like a traditional media company," Denton said. “You launch a site, you have great hopes for it, and it does not grow as much as you wanted. You have to have the discipline to recognize what isn't working and put your money and efforts into those sites that are."
Denton’s decision to reorganize his blogosphere holdings comes in the face of growing blog competition. If you count all the MySpace pages, Denton said, there is one reader for every blog out there.
“The world does not need more blogs,” Denton said. “There is no doubt that there is a bubble right now.”
A CNET News blog by Ben Charny claimed to be the first blog to declare that there is a blog bubble. A search for “blog” on Google yields 67 million results, Charny said.
While Denton hasn't abandoned the blog concept, he is quick to point out that success in cyberspace is akin to success in the offline world.
"The barrier to entry in Internet media is low," Denton said. "The barrier to success is high."