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I get why AOL - the cash, their focus on content, etc. But the right fit? Some of the stuff Arrington writes would probably be struck by a sales / publicly tr

by aresant 16y ago

I get why AOL - the cash, their focus on content, etc. But the right fit? Some of the stuff Arrington writes would probably be struck by a sales / publicly traded editing bay yah? Beyond that I would love to see a list of TechCrunch's most visited articles over the past year. It might just be the HN bubble but I feel like 2/3 of the non-fluff stuff comes from arrington's deep connections. And it doesn't just seem like Arrington playing "founder" rolling out the big news, it seems like genuinely developing from his passion for the tech space. After his extended vacation a few years ago, and the thoughts he expressed on loving / hating / being exhausted w/TechCrunch I can't imagine he's going to stick around. Examples of other blogs built on a founders passion that made it through an aquistion (EG discluding Weblogs topical gossip rags)?

ig1 16y ago
Another issue is embargo breaking which TC does frequently. A lot of companies have the policy that if a news outlet breaks an embargo, than that outlet _and_ it's parent & sister companies are banned from future embargoed releases. So I'd imagine AOL would have to put a stop to that.
- wikyd 16y ago
  That's very far from the truth. If TC was frequently accepting and then breaking embargos, then very quickly their sources of embargos would dry up. TC very clearly announced to everyone that they no longer were going to accept unsolicited embargos. Their motive was that many of their competitors were breaking embargos by a few hours and then claiming it was accidental. The competitors that were breaking the embargo weren't being reprimanded by the PR firms, etc. at all. There was a clear advantage to breaking the embargo (more traffic, better ranking on news aggregators, etc.) and those who played fairly, like TC, were essentially being punished for it.

by aresant 16y ago

ig1 16y ago

Another issue is embargo breaking which TC does frequently. A lot of companies have the policy that if a news outlet breaks an embargo, than that outlet _and_ it's parent & sister companies are banned from future embargoed releases. So I'd imagine AOL would have to put a stop to that.

wikyd 16y ago
That's very far from the truth. If TC was frequently accepting and then breaking embargos, then very quickly their sources of embargos would dry up. TC very clearly announced to everyone that they no longer were going to accept unsolicited embargos. Their motive was that many of their competitors were breaking embargos by a few hours and then claiming it was accidental. The competitors that were breaking the embargo weren't being reprimanded by the PR firms, etc. at all. There was a clear advantage to breaking the embargo (more traffic, better ranking on news aggregators, etc.) and those who played fairly, like TC, were essentially being punished for it.