Evo Media loses main advertiser after circulation questions and staff payment problems
Gay news network Evo Media has lost its main advertiser after questions about whether staff were being properly paid and the veracity of circulation claims about its weekly newspaper SX.
Health promotion agency ACON told Mumbrella that it has pulled the plug on advertising with the group.
Evo bought SameSame from Junkee Media 18 months ago. But since then a number of staff and freelancers working on both website SameSame and magazine SX have complained about not being paid.
After the concerns first came to light ACON, which is mainly government funded , initially told Mumbrella the ads were on hold. But last week it said that it had now ceased advertising.
In a statement issued to Mumbrella, ACON said: “We met with Evo Media on 10 April 2017. During this meeting, we sought further information and responses to the allegations that have been raised against Evo Media.
“We were not satisfied with the response we received and following on from this meeting, there was a request for further documentation. We also advised Evo Media that until we receive these documents, we will not make any further financial arrangements with the company. This includes advertising.
“The reach and circulation of our HIV prevention, other sexual health and community messages in print media is one part of our comprehensive approach to our education efforts. We need to be confident that our promotional spend reaches our community, and whoever we undertake spends with are honest about their distribution figures and practices.
“We also have concerns about employees of any ACON supplier not being paid appropriately,” said the spokesperson.
SameSame does not appear to have been updated for more than a month, while the website linked to SX – gaynewsnetwork.com.au – has been “down for scheduled maintenance” for a similar amount of time”.
Evo Media was created in 2013 and bought the assets of Evolution Publishing, a company that went into liquidation in 2013.
Evolution Publishing licensed the titles to a new company, Evo Media, in a bid to try and maintain the gay and lesbian titles.
Evo Media was presented as an entirely new company and separate entity to Evolution Publishing, although it published the same titles and employed the same staff.
At the time, Evo Media said all staff and contributors who worked at Evolution Publishing and its publications had been offered employment with Evo Media.
Evo Media has not responded to several calls and emails from Mumbrella inviting comment.
What an absolute disgrace, (Edited by Mumbrella for legal reasons)
Quote “Evo Media was presented as an entirely new company and separate entity to Evolution Publishing, although it published the same titles and employed the same staff.”
Tax payer hit multiple times here, good on ACON for showing some spine.
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ACON also now has a rival publication – http://www.emen8.com.au . A key fact missing from this story.
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To whom this may concern,
I’ve read about this previously as part of an investigation done by True Crimes weekly.
Link as below:
https://truecrimenewsweekly.com/tag/evo-media/
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This is a fluff piece! C’mon Mumbrella! There is a much more comprehensive and hard hitting report on this site for those interested…
https://truecrimenewsweekly.com/2017/04/08/special-investigation-scams-frauds-crimes-employees-lift-lid-on-gay-publisher-evo-media-and-queer-power-games/
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From a story by Serkan Ozturk https://www.facebook.com/TrueCrimeNewsWeekly/
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It’s excellent and necessary that this report / investigation is getting more publicity as this is absolutely shocking, but I originally read a deeper investigation about here also:
https://truecrimenewsweekly.com/2017/04/08/special-investigation-scams-frauds-crimes-employees-lift-lid-on-gay-publisher-evo-media-and-queer-power-games/
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Thanks to Serkan Ozturk from True Crimes Weekly for the investigation of this matter.
Link as below:
https://truecrimenewsweekly.com/tag/evo-media/
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Can the person spruiking True Crime Weekly (who the hell are they?) pretending to be lots of different people, stop doing that now?
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True crime news weekly had the scoop on this!! https://www.facebook.com/TrueCrimeNewsWeekly/
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It’s not spruking ‘some website’. Serkan put months into breaking this story and goes into a lot more depth.
https://truecrimenewsweekly.com/tag/evo-media/
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It’s not spruking ‘some website’. Serkan put months into breaking this story and goes into a lot more depth.
truecrimenewsweekly.com/tag/evo-media/
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This story was investigated, for months, then published originally by Serkan Ozturk at TrueCrimeWeeklyNews. Give credit where it is due thanks.
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Serkan, please. Stop.
You’re beginning to embarrass yourself. Everyone gets it – you wrote about it too.
Do you want this to be about Evo or about you?
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For anybody who is confused by the sudden outbreak of links to a website they may not have previously come across, I fear we may have brought this upon ourselves.
Mumbrella has been writing about the adventures of Evo Media and its predecessor Evolution Publishing for the last four years now –
https://mumbrella.com.au/liquidator-appointed-for-gay-publisher-152912 – (including touching upon the acrimonious departure of Serkan Ozturk, who now publishes something called True Crime Weekly News.
We received a tip off about the above story, making a number of allegations and pointing to TCWN, as I’ll call it for brevity, as one source of recently published information.
Over the last few weeks Abby has been interviewing sources and getting ACON on the record.
All of the facts above are from primary sources, directly obtained by Abby. We have been unable to verify to our legal satisfaction all of the allegations made by TCWN, so have chosen not to publish them here.
Where I may have brought it upon myself though is that I had a note from Serkan (copying in the three pillars of the media estaboishment, the Walkleys, Media Watch and The Guardian) asking that TCWN should be cited as the source of the story. I did explain that this story was separately sourced and verified, but he was welcome to add a link in the comment thread. A few minutes later, the deluge began…
I suspect he got a bit carried away.
Cheers,
Tim – Mumbrella
To whom it may concern – I have already read a deeper investigation on https://truecrimenewsweekly.com/2017/04/08/special-investigation-scams-frauds-crimes-employees-lift-lid-on-gay-publisher-evo-media-and-queer-power-games/
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What are you talking about Tim? The people commenting on here are people in the LGBTIQ community and others who have been following the real story, not some watered down ACON puff piece. Is it also me making all the comments on your Facebook page?
I haven’t made one comment on your website Mumbrella until now on any article ever. But keep up the public character assassination if it makes you feel like a big man. Let’s see if you even publish this comment. The community respects real journalists like me. I couldn’t care less about what you or organisations such as yours think of me.
Enjoy your night,
Serkan
True Crime News Weekly
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Sorry, I missed it. Did another website also report on this?
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Can anybody help me? I’m wondering if there might be other news sites available where I can read more?
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Re-lead this piece with the comments … that will bring the crowds back! #stink #brouhaha
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(Edited by Mumbrella for legal reasons) so lets remember what these stories have in common it is shining a light on these two recalcitrants and the companys that were funding there publishing business which lets face it is finished, they dont have a website, dont publish any papers and have not updated the samesame website for a month!
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This story has already been cobered on the below link
https://truecrimenewsweekly.com/tag/evo-media/
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Thanks for reporting the facts and nothing but the facts (apart from the fact that Acon would not be Evo’s main advertiser), rather than the conspiracy laden, off tap stream of consciousness by a vexatious former employee of Evo at https://truecrimenewsweekly.com/tag/evo-media/
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It would be nice if there was another small paper like sx. However acons as a major sponsor resulted in the publication becoming increasing like a health pamphlet. Which contributed to its fall. Very sad for persons seeking a little light to brighten up there week with abit of local gay news.
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