Mr.Complex: Meet Complex Media's Asshole-ish CEO Rich Antoniello

Rich Antoniello for the most part has been building his digital media empire quietly. Anchored by the flagship complex.com, Complex Media's stable of sites range from music, to sneakers to gaming to entertainment and sports. Mr. Antoniello has managed to build his company organically without the splashy overvalued investments enjoyed by companies like Buzzfeed, Vox Media and Vice. Speaking of which, Mr. Antoniello, who is known for his bluntness and using the word "Fuck" in every sentence, doesn't pull punches when talking about those companies. For example, he thinks Buzzfeed's revenue trails behind its influence. He believes Vice is overrated and Vox Media lacks focus.

Such honesty, while rare among media executives today, feels at home at Complex Media, which has since 2002 built its brand on authenticity, youth and “realness.” Antoniello, the company’s head since 2003, is both a product and the origin of that outlook. Raised in the blue-collar Canarsie, Brooklyn, neither his father, a UPS deliveryman, nor his mother, who raised him full time, went to college. Antoniello said he had to claw his way to the top without a blueprint for how to do it, leaving him with a deep-seated appreciation for scrappiness and an affinity for people “who have a bit of a chip on their shoulder.”

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