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| Founded | 2012; 13 years ago (2012) |
|---|---|
| Founder | Ouissam "Sam" Youssef |
| Parent | Valsef Group[1] |
| Subsidiaries |
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| Website | valnetinc.com |
Valnet, Inc. is a Canadian media company established inMontreal,Quebec, in 2012.[2] It operates primarily in the entertainment media industry.[3] It is the parent company of several internet media publications includingTheGamer,Collider,Comic Book Resources,MovieWeb,Screen Rant,Game Rant, XDA Developers, and MakeUseOf.[4]
The company started aYouTube channel in January 2016 called "Little Angel", which provides animated content aimed at toddlers.[5] By April 6, 2016, the company acquiredComic Book Resources, with Valnet CEO Hassan Youssef retaining the editorial team and taking over their offices.[6] On November 17, 2020, Valnet announced that it had acquiredCollider.[7] Valnet acquired XDA along with four other websites—Pocketnow, AppAdvice, BackyardBoss and Hook&Bullet—from Busy Pixel Media in February 2022.[8] Also that month, the company sold Little Angel toMoonbug, the owner ofCocomelon. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.[9]
In May 2023, it was reported that Valnet had laid off several key figures at subsidiaryComic Book Resources (CBR), including editor-in-chief Adam Swiderski, senior new editor Stephen Gerding, and senior features editor Christopher Baggett.[10] In June, it was reported thatCBR's employees had been finding difficulty in keeping up with Valnet's content demand. The company was reportedly "seemingly firing those who try and stand up for writers" in its bid to attempt to improve itswork culture and performance.[11] Many fired staff vocalized discontent for these firings onTwitter, due to what was allegedly the full shutdown of the website news section, which the company refuted.[12]
Valnet acquiredOpenCritic by August 2024 in an attempt to integrate the aggregator into its other businesses in the gaming sector. It announced plans to turn the site into asocial media platform.[13][14] The company signed a lease for the 740 Broadway building inNew York City by October 2024, being the company's first offices in the city.[15]
In December 2024, a reporter for the competing websiteGiant Freakin Robot posted acease-and-desist letter from Valnet in which Valnet demanded the removal of social media posts asserted to disparage the company's subsidiaries.[16][non-primary source needed]
Collider is an online entertainment publication, with a focus on thefilm industry and television series.Collider focuses on entertainment news, analysis, and commentary, along with original features, complementary film and television reviews, editorials, and interviews.
Collider was founded in 2005 by editor-in-chief Steven Weintraub as ablog. In 2015, Weintraub soldCollider toComplex Media, who would manage the business and advertisements on the website and offer editing support.[17] On November 17, 2020, Valnet announced that it had acquiredCollider.[7]
CBR, formerlyComic Book Resources, is a news website covering movies, television, anime, video games andcomic book–related news and discussion.
Comic Book Resources (CBR) was founded by Jonah Weiland in 1995 as a development of the Kingdom Come Message Board, a message forum that Weiland created to discussDC Comics' then-newmini-series of the same name.[18][19]
CBR has featured columns by industry professionals such asRobert Kirkman,Gail Simone, andMark Millar.[18] Other columns were published by comic book historians and critics such asGeorge Khoury and Timothy Callahan.[20][21]
By April 4, 2016,CBR was sold to Valnet,[22][23] after which the site was relaunched as CBR.com on August 23, 2016, with the blogs integrated into the site.[24][25]Popverse reported that following the acquisition by Valnet "comics were increasingly sidelined for coverage [...], as were both reviews and columns as focuses for publishing; instead, the site refocused on shorter news pieces and reactions to news stories".[25] Valnet Inc. is a subsidiary ofValsef Group, which is also headquartered in Montreal.[26]
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GiveMeSport was founded in 2014 and acquired by Valnet, Inc in 2022.[27] The collaborators and editors at GMS includeFabrizio Romano,Ben Jacobs, Dean Jones, and Tom Bogert.[28][29]
MovieWeb is an entertainmentnews website and video brand that reports onentertainment news through its website. The site also maintains a searchable database of films.[30][31][32]
MovieWeb first launched in 1995; by 1997 it was reported to be in operation supported by a 4-person team publishing movie information that, while not 'slick', had a 'certain charm'.[33][34][self-published source?][unreliable source][35] In 2012, MovieWeb produced a video which was an '80s-themedparody mashup ofThe Walking Dead series accompanied by music fromGrowing Pains that wentviral.[36][37]
Previously, MovieWeb was owned by WatchR Media, Inc., a privately held Las Vegas company.[38][self-published source?][unreliable source] In 2021, it was estimated the MovieWeb website had 8 million unique visits for the month of July. MovieWeb has been owned and operated by online publisher Valnet Inc. since September 2021 upon completion of the acquisition from WatchR.[39][unreliable source]
In August 2000, MovieWeb announced a collaboration with video rental chain Video Update and video retail software provider Unique Business Systems Inc.[40][unreliable source]
MovieWeb acts as a distribution partner ofHulu.[clarification needed][41] MovieWeb also produces video content forIMDb.com.[42][unreliable source]
OpenCritic is areview aggregationwebsite forvideo games. OpenCritic lists reviews from critics across multiple video game publications for the games listed on the site. The website then generates a numeric score by averaging all of the numeric reviews. Several other metrics are also available, such as the percentage of critics that recommend the game and its relative ranking across all games on OpenCritic. OpenCritic was launched in 2015 to avoid some of the controversies thatMetacritic has gained in the video game industry. A game's Metacritic score has become strongly attached to the financial performance of a game and subsequent efforts of the development studio and publisher, such as affecting post-release studio bonuses. However, Metacritic provides limited details of how it calculates its review scores, and uses weighted averaging that favors some publications over others, leading many to criticize the heavy weight that the industry puts on the site.[43] Valnet's acquisition ofOpenCritic was announced on July 31, 2024.[44]
Screen Rant is an entertainment website that offers news in the fields oftelevision,films,Video games, and film theories. It was launched by Vic Holtreman in 2003,[45] and originally had its primary office inOgden, Utah.[46][47]Screen Rant has expanded its coverage withred-carpet events in Los Angeles,New York Film Festivals andSan Diego Comic-Con panels.[48][49] The associatedYouTube channel was created on August 19, 2008, and has 8.62M subscribers and 5.4K videos as of June 21, 2023.[50]
In February 2015,Screen Rant was acquired by Valnet,[51][52] and was reunited with its sister site,Game Rant, in 2019, when Valnet acquired the other publication.[53]Screen Rant features a video series calledPitch Meetings by YouTube comedian Ryan George. By September 2020, the series included over 200 videos, garnering a combined 250 million views. In the series, George plays both ascreenwriter and afilm producer in apitch for a film or television series, describing its plot in a way that highlights various inconsistencies.[54]
XDA (formerly known asXDA Developers) is a mobile software development community launched on December 20, 2002.[55][56] Although discussion primarily revolves around theAndroid operating system, members also talk about other operating systems and mobile software development topics.
XDA-Developers.com was created by Dutch company NAH6 Crypto Products BV and launched on December 20, 2002. In January 2011, XDA Developers was bought by the US based company JB Online Media, LLC. and subsequently by Canada-based Valnet Inc. in February 2022. The nameXDA Developers is originally derived from theO2 XDA, which was marketed as apersonal digital assistant (PDA) with extra features.[56][57]
In 2013, XDA partnered withSwappa to become its official marketplace where users can buy or sell devices.[58]
Valnet acquired XDA along with four other websites—Pocketnow, AppAdvice, BackyardBoss and Hook&Bullet—from Busy Pixel Media in February 2022. In 2023,FeedSpot listed XDA (with 11 million members) as the largest mobile software development forum and among the top 70 technology forums to follow.[59]
Many software and hardware hacks,Android rooting methods,Android custom ROMs and other phone- and tablet-specific tweaks originate from the members of the XDA Forum. XDA also hosts the XDA Portal, a source for tech news, products, guides, and features which launched in 2010.[60]
Their forum site underwent major redesigns in 2010, 2013, late 2014 (namedXDA 2015) and late 2020 (namedXDA 2021). The 2013 layout distinctively indicated the number of active and total registered users at the top right, and the 2015 layout supportedresponsive web design and was available with adark-on-light color scheme option.
As of 2020, the website features 3 themes, namely XDA, XDA Dark and XDA Classic. The older layout options for XDA 2013 and XDA 2015 were removed in XDA 2021. The website transitioned fromvBulletin toXenForo on December 1, 2020, along with a major layout redesign, namedXDA 2021.[61]
In February 2007, when the Microsoft Windows Mobile OS was widely used on mobile phones,Microsoft asked XDA Developers to remove all ROMs created byOEMs.[62][63]
In 2008,CNET Asia suggested that XDA Developers offers potential solutions to problems with many Android-based mobile devices. In othermobile phone reviews, testers at CNET preferred using XDA Developers' ROMs when carrying out detailed reviews.[64]
