Time for another internet story. Today’s topic is paranoid delusional bloggers and the short attention spans of their readers.
In case you haven’t heard of it, TechCrunch is a blog that covers important companies like Rmbr, Skribit, and Gruml while also finding time to promote weight loss products.
Since there really aren’t that many tech or colonic products to blog about every day this leaves room for the occasional insane rant or photo essay from TechCrunch’s Blogger-In-Chief Michael Arrington:
- “Whenever I do shake a hand I’m completely aware of it, can’t stop thinking about it, until I can wash my hands. Sometimes in a meeting I’ll shake hands all around, then excuse myself to the bathroom to wash my hands, then return.”
Now if you actually leave the house to go to work every day and don’t spend all your waking hours in front of the internet, you might be asking yourself right now:
“How exactly does this guy go from being Time Magazine’s #100 most important person to Time Magazine’s #1 most overrated?”
Well, maybe not.
Perhaps it started when Mr. Arrington and TechCrunch invented a magical and revolutionary device that was to be made available at an unbelievable price called the CrunchPad. And by invented, I mean “wrote a bunch of blog posts about how cool it could be.” And by “unbelievable price” let’s just say that the owner’s manual is not available for download however the lawsuits are.
Time Magazine might have been onto something in the second paragraph which starts “A self-described ‘exceptionally average attorney’” because it sure seems like Arrington runs things pretty loose over there. Maybe when Time Magazine saw themselves mentioned in a lawsuit over a gizmo so goofy even gadget blogs couldn’t keep a straight face they decided to cut their losses?
Personally for me it was Mike’s claim that he had secured a “major multi-billion dollar retailer” who offered to sell the device at “zero margin.” Sorry, the world just doesn’t work like that. Even if you’re featured in a magazine in either the hero or dope sections. Delusional.
I know many eyebrows were raised based on Mr. Arrington’s behavior in public. He built quite a reputation for committing to events and either not showing up or making a scene when he does.
For others the last straw was when TechCrunch attacked Twitter, a company TechCrunch hilariously considered to be the future of journalism and I guess a threat in the race to hit bottom first. Since the web has such a short attention span allow me to remind you of this debacle:
Twitter’s founder and respected entrepreneur Evan Williams was vulnerable. Growth was booming, Twitter was getting attention from everywhere, and Evan’s wife was nine months pregnant with their first child. Mysteriously a pile of confidential Twitter documents appeared on Arrington’s doorstep. Mr. Arrington pulled this package into his home and devoured the documents as if they were young, tender flesh; punishing Twitter over and over with a series of short strokes and tiny posts where he revealed almost as many facts as he alluded to.
No investigation was made as to the source of these documents. Somebody muttered something about obstruction of justice. Questions of ethics and integrity were raised, but quickly forgotten.
The web sure is funny like that.
But hey, it’s all okay I guess. TechCrunch has a bunch of people who really care about technology and startups and so we should cut them some slack because they do such a great job keeping us informed of the people who really, really want to change the status-quo. Right?
Oh Yeah, CrunchGate
A few weeks ago one of TechCrunch’s writers, a 17 year old kid who had unsupervised access to publish whatever he wanted, got busted asking for kickbacks in return for writing about companies. Mr. Arrington, Blogger-In-Chief, wrote a surprisingly brief apology (compared to lets say his “Avatar” review) and stated it wasn’t a big deal because “the frequency of posts was light.” He also mentioned that he was “fairly certain that most of the posts weren’t tainted.”
And with that weasel word disclosure cross-posted to the Washington Post, the controversy was settled. Bloggers worldwide turned their attention to the next shiny thing. Man I love that Chatroulette. They should get a Crunchie.
The web sure is funny like that.
Once More With Feeling
As the result of unethical and possibly illegal behavior by a TechCrunch writer who editor-in-chief Mike Arrington claims didn’t write that much, mentions of over 100 companies or services were deleted from TechCrunch.
Until this gets fully cleared up and aired out, every one of these companies, many irrelevant but others you might not suspect, has a shadow over them. And TechCrunch’s behavior in this remains inexcusable. Editors at much larger publications have stepped down over far less.
Why do I even have to bother with this nonsense? Because someone should at least for a little while and it seems most of you are too busy checking into Foursquare to be worried about little things like integrity, after all you are the Mayor of your local Friday’s.
If you are a company there are three options the way I see it.
1. Come clean before you get outed, and I promise, you will get outed. I personally know of 3 that did deals, and I’m very low on the web food chain so others must know as well I’d bet.
2. Use this opportunity to come forward and tell the world what a kick ass company you are and why you would never need to do such a bush league move. I know all of you guys are horrible with marketing and PR, but this is a great time to tell the world you rock.
3. Do nothing and once again settle. Settle for being shit on. Settle for being lumped in with the uninspired and the mediocre. Settle for fading away into obscurity. Settle for not caring enough about your life’s work to do nothing. Settle.
Now I know I’m just some pretty face with a strong puppet hand, but I get the sense this stuff about journalism and news matters.
These are the companies Daniel Brusilovsky wrote about while at TechCrunch. All of these posts were deleted.
The CrunchGate 100
37Signals
3Crowd Technologies
99Games Online
AdNectar
Adobe
Amazon.com
Animoto
AnyClip
App of the Day – Not involved. See comments.
AppsFire (2 mentions)
Assetize – Not involved. See comments.
Atomplan – Not involved. See comments.
Automattic (WordPress)
Avecora (2 mentions) – Not involved. See comments.
BeamMe
Bit.ly
Blunder Move
Branchr Advertising (2 mentions)
Browse for a Cause
Build It With Me
Central Atomics
Chartbeat
Cloud Engines
Command Guru
CoTweet
CrashCorp (2 mentions)
CubeTree
Divvyshot
Dropbox (3 mentions)
Envato
EventVue
Facebook
Flickr
Foursquare
Freeverse
FriendFeed
GeekBrief.TV – Paid for his lunch and dinner a couple of times. See comments.
Graphic.ly
Gruml
iMindi
Incsub
Indinero
Intel
internshipIN.com
isocket
Jeff Stieler (developer)
Joe Stump (developer)
Justin.tv
Kinkarso Network
LinkedIn
Little Red Bike Media
LittleSnapper
Livestream
MacStories
Microsoft
myMobileApps
Myriad Group
Nambu Networks
Next Big Sound
Ning
Notable
Odeo
OnLive
Palaran – Not involved. See comments.
PBworks – Not involved. See comments.
Personera
Pitchie
Plancast
Posterous (2 mentions)
Ramamia – Not involved. See comments.
ReelSurfer
Republic Project
rmbr
Rocketbox
Seesmic
Simplify Media
Six Apart
Skitch
skribit – Not involved. See comments.
SocialCast (2 mentions) – Not involved. See comments.
SocialThing!
Square
Squarespace
Startup Digest
StopAutoDM
SupportSpace
Taptivate
Tatango
TinyGrab
TokBox
Tomorrow’s Web
Tumblr
Tweet Scenes
TwitPic
Twitter (2 mentions)
TwitVid
Twtbase.com
Upcoming.com
Ustream
Vanilla Forums
Vokle
WhateverLife
Woopra
WooThemes
Xumii
Yahoo!
Yazzem (2 mentions)
YCombinator
YouNoodle
Youtego
Zappos
ZURB
you sir, have guts and salute you on that. happy birthday and keep this coming. the web certainly needs it…
Thanks Terry for the birthday wishes.
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This post was mentioned on Twitter by FamilyMatters01: The CrunchGate 100 – 1938 Media http://bit.ly/bPdHPN...
Damn this is good! Fuck the puppets. This is better than 60 minutes. Nice work (and writing) Feldman.
I salute you sir. You hit the nail on the head with the web being funny like that. Personally I am amazed that the whole thing died with a whimper.
Mikey Arrignton the Jim Crammer of the Tech World of Journalism..
What to say …. finally someone who comes out and questions the being/existence of the big Internet bullshitters, not just writes a post on some scruffy little minimally frequented blog-site, but has balls to take the biggest by the balls and leaves nothing to anyones imagination. Stupid? Brave? Self destructive? I don’t know, but certainly very interesting and to the point. Personally I always thought TC was a bit of a scam-site, along with many other of course, but TC certainly being the biggest one of them all I totally agree with-, and respect Feldman for the energy he puts into exposing, Feldman’ writing capabilities, his whit and his insight. I hope Feldman will continue his quest into world-wide-web bullshit and go for the next bunch of hyena’s out there for there are are many to chose from. And Feldman I you’re probably as grumpy as Dvorak, egocentrical as Laporte and more entertaining than Ihnatko and Hodgman combined this is why you have this “thing” going and have the ability to continue this longterm (judging by you’re puppet thing) … don’t ever stop ….
A very compelling read Loren. I appreciate the time and effort that went into writing this post.
I’d like to put forward a few general questions about working towards better ethical standards in Web journalism. It’s something I alluded to in a previous comment.
If we are increasingly aware and dissatisfied with the ethical limitations of new media journalism, then who and what can we turn to for guidelines, for a new infrastructure and a way forward?
Secondly, what measures can be taken to hold those in positions of relative authority in this space, and who make frequent ethical transgressions, accountable for their actions? Here, I’m obviously referring to transgressions that fall within the law.
Last point, more of a suggestion really, would there be any merit in drawing up a code of conduct, somewhat akin to the GPL software licensing or Creative Commons intellectual property licensing initiatives pertaining to independent Web journalism? Not a top-down regulatory authority, but more of a philosophy, an ethical framework developed and maintained as a ‘wemedia’ initiative, something that new and existing publications could refer to for guidance on standards.
You cannot regulate character. A site is a reflection of it’s Editor. It is what it is.
[...] @1938media: CrunchGate 100 – http://www.1938media.com/the-crunchgate-100/ RT @dahowlett: YouTube video — The shared services business case – Unit 4 [...]
What self indulgent holier then thou B.S. – go back to puppets.
First post I’ve read from you and I must say your post is even better than your tweets, which also add years to my life with some good laughter from time to time. Great informative read.
Thanks for that.
Thanks, and yeah I’ll try.
Loren,
It’s good that you’re holding publications accountable for potential conflicts of interest. Certainly I’ve heard rumors about a lot of things during my time in the Valley.
I can only speak for PBworks, but I can assure you that we would never compensate any journalist in exchange for coverage. We do give some bloggers free licenses so that they can review our product, but the licenses are granted prior to the review, and do not depend on whether the review is positive or negative.
Duly noted and will update post. Good on you for standing up.
I’ve been waiting for such a post since the last 2 months…
even if you piss me off sometimes, your blog, vids and tweets bring me dealy truth in a fucked up Web 2.0 world.
keep the awesome work sir
Loren,
I’m the founder of App of the Day, and I can guaranty that App of the Day was not involved, and has never, and will never compensate journalists for writing.
Feel free to contact me if you have any questions at all. My email is jordan (at) appoftheday (dot) com.
Regards,
Jordan Satok
Updating post. Way to step up Jordan.
Loren, I’m the founder of the following: Atomplan, Avecora, and Ramamia. I can certify that no company I am associated with, including these three, was involved in this situation, and I can assure you no company of mine has or will offer or accept payola in any situation. Let me know if you have any questions — mark@markbao.com.
Mark
Hey Loren,
Ramamia.com wasn’t involved. It was a small piece of an article that was about my co-founder Mark. We don’t cater to the techie audience, and don’t pay people for coverage. Hope this helps. If you have any questions you can email Mark + Myself directly (founders@ramamia.com).
-jlb
Jason updated the post to refelect your statement.
Udated Mark.
On the money post by the Lenny Bruce of 2.0 world
Ill try Charles.
Gruml, Rmbr, Skribit… attorneys at law… and the CrunchGate 100
Cruml, Rmbr and Skribit attorneys at law…. http://www.1938media.com/the-crunchgate-100/#more-9068 and the CrunchGate 100
[...] called for TechCrunch to come clean on which company paid for press. Now, Loren Feldman of 1938 Media joins us in the hunt. His method is rather [...]
[...] Feldman, the publisher of 1938Media, a New York city based web site, has published the names of the companies that were the subject of 100 posts written by former TechCrunch writer Daniel Brusilovsky. [Unpaid [...]