Short answers, pulled from the story.
Mark Surfas founded GameSpy in 1995 to solve server discovery issues for id Software's Quake. The company officially became GameSpy Industries by 1997 after licensing technology from Spy Software.
GameSpy solved the difficulty of finding online servers without manually sharing IP addresses. Spy Software created QSpy to list and search for available Quake servers across the global network.
IGN Entertainment acquired GameSpy Industries in August 2012 before transferring ownership to Glu Mobile. News Corporation owned IGN at that time until Ziff Davis took control in February 2013.
Glu announced on April 2014 that GameSpy servers would cease operations on the 31st of May 2014. Electronic Arts listed 24 PC games including Battlefield 2 among those affected by the closure.
The GameSpy Debriefings operated as a party-style discussion between editors from GameSpy and IGN Entertainment about weekly gaming news. By the 1st of May 2011, it ranked as the twenty-fifth most popular podcast under the Games and Hobbies category on iTunes.