You should consider investigating ltctalk and all of the big players over there too (Sy, TheMage, Sukarti). They all seem in on it in some way. They aren't stupid like Gaw but you can see how invested they are in the ltcgear site. (for example, they are literally designing features for the practically defunct site
https://litecointalk.org/index.php?topic=24202.0 in the middle of the collapse). There's also significant censorship happening there. Not as bad as Gaw, but still it exists. I can no longer post on there without my comments being reviewed by a moderator.
There's shadiness going on over there as they defend ltcgear and try to keep the pieces from completely falling apart, but it feels like an undercurrent when compared to something like hashtalk and Gaw, carefully calculated and disguised. In retrospect, it seems like ltcgear was the "killer app" for LTC that gave the coin some relevance, purpose and attention. Someone should definitely look in to see what the links really are at some point.
Now that the shit's outta control, it will be interesting to see if they finally distance themselves from it. It looks like they are hell bent on going down with the ship.
