4 ms·

TuneCore Tells Us Where We Can Shove It

29 points by quilby 18y ago

extantproject 18y ago
This story reinforces what Tech Crunch is to me, as I commented a few days ago: "Yes, TC is a click generator fueled by drama." (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=205986 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=205986) ... I'm even happier now to have unsubscribed from their useless, noisy little RSS feed.
- josefresco 18y ago
  Speaking of RSS, when is Feedburner going to adjust their dramatically inflated "subscriber" count that is featured prominently on sites like TC? 785K looks good and all, and at least the numbers from site to site are relative, but I'd rather see accurate numbers (not a number akin to 'hits')
gaius 18y ago
Did Price actually tell them to "f*ck themselves" or was that just made up for sensationalism?
- josefresco 18y ago
  You get one guess, keep in mind that Arrington authored the post.
- KirinDave 18y ago
  This is the same kind of sensationalist drama-laden "inference" reporting that Arrington got criticized for with the Yang "We're Done" article. It's really ridiculous, but I guess we have to remember that TC isn't a news outlet, it's a blog. Sometimes, MA is going to blog about what he's eating for lunch.
edw519 18y ago
Why blog when a tweet will do? "Emailed tunecore. They said fu. Boo hoo." 100 characters to spare.
- josefresco 18y ago
  Maybe because Twitter was down? /thank you folks, I'll be here all week
- Xichekolas 18y ago
  The brilliance was that TuneCore got all this publicity from rebuking Arrington. Maybe that is the key to making the front page of TC: be politely rude to them.
nkohari 18y ago
I love how Arrington continually says that the email was sent to press@tunecore.com, except that it would be pretty damn rare for a startup to have an actual PR department. And anyway, if a company doesn't want to release information to the press, they aren't required to do so, no matter if it's TechCrunch or the f'n Times asking. Arrington getting offended when the request was rebuked just comes off as pugilistic.
- ComputerGuru 18y ago
  Four years since starting my organization, Press@NeoSmart.net still redirects to my email address (as the founder & Director). As if TechCrunch doesn't know that's what small companies & organizations do!
mnemonicsloth 18y ago
Interesting. Neither of the TC intern's emails are quoted. We get to take Arrington's word for it that "Peter responded politely." The CEO's email looks curt and impolite, but we have no way of knowing whether that's because the CEO is a jerk, or because there's a mollifying second half to that email that Arrington didn't feel like publishing. In the past I've basically ignored TC because I thought they were kind of silly. Question for anybody who follows this more closely than I do -- is Tech Crunch making the transition from "waste of time" to "unambiguous parasite" ?
- jsjenkins168 18y ago
  The interns emails are posted in the comments. They really aren't that bad, and definitely dont warrant such a response from a CEO in my opinion
  - tjr 18y ago
    No, the intern's emails aren't that bad. Frankly, I don't think that Price's emails are that bad either. None of this warrants being made public.
    - fourlittlebees 18y ago
      The intern replied with the TIME 100 article when asked about TechCrunch. I thought that was a bit over the top, and a dig at the CEO for DARING to not know who Mike Arrington is.
      - olefoo 18y ago
        That sense of entitlement on the part of TechCrunch and the people associated with it is why it's losing value so rapidly. The balloon has popped, the shark has been jumped, the welcome has been overstayed;
babul 18y ago
Arrington seems to have ego issues? Lots of melodrama lately.
babul 18y ago
There are plenty of people/startups/companies who have never heard of TC. Seems these are people who generally just get on with things in thier own way in thier own markets, free from hype.
jpeterson 18y ago
Sigh. Can we have a ban of techcrunch? Pretty please?
- extantproject 18y ago
  I'll second that.
  - fizx 18y ago
    They occasionally have good content... Maybe a way to aggressively bury TC content would be nice?
  - helveticaman 18y ago
    Just to venture a guess, I think the problem with HN isn't only signal/noise ratio, but the amount of signal--there might not be enough.
- hobbs 18y ago
  And yet we have a sensationalist article about brain surgeons' cell phones shoot to the top spot? Good luck getting people to be picky.
- Xichekolas 18y ago
  http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/25039 http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/25039
macgyver1 18y ago
Talk about sensational headlines, read the title at the top of this page. I don't think he wrote it because they'd never heard of techcrunch, he wrote it because of the bizarre response from what was supposed to be the PR e-mail address of their company. Also, read the comments of the techcrunch posts and he provides their own e-mails. Arrington may be a douche, but this thread is very sensationalist
sabat 18y ago
Maybe I just buy into Arrington's BS, but the tunescore guy comes off like a jackass. Maybe Techcrunch doesn't deserve extra special treatment, but it is the primary startup news site. "Who are you?" is a clueless response, especially from a tiny company that needs all the coverage it can get.
- axod 18y ago
  I agree it was a pretty bad reply. It doesn't take a couple of seconds to go to google, see who you're dealing, and notice that they could be potentially useful to you as a business.. However, maybe it was a stressful day and they had a heap of spam or irritating emails trying to sell them stuff.
ssharp 18y ago
Arrington is such a drama queen.
scooter53080 18y ago
To me the interesting part of this story is the advice to 'not cold contact the CEO'. If you have multiple email addresses coming into one box you'd better keep track which one a message is from and respond appropriately. There's nothing wrong about cold contact at a press@ address. As far as him not know what TechCrunch is...that part is pleasing. ;-)
colortone 18y ago
(Disclosure: I’ve been a user since [almost] day one and have contributed to the Tunecore blog) Here's my comment (#209) on the original thread: I would love it if we could start hearing about more businesses that are growing out of existing industries that are leveraging the Net (rather than SV startups leveraging the Net to get into existing industries). Another example in the music domain would be SonicBids. Concentrating so much on SV just leads to too much irony: TuneCore is probably THE most revolutionary music-focused web service (esp in terms of business model innovation) and they’ve been pulling in real revenue with a real, sustainable revenue stream that solves extreme problems for its customers for years. To top it off, they have probably THE most intelligent strategic partnership (w/ Guitar Center) of any web-based business. I agree that a) there’s only so many hours in the day, b) the Valley is the most important place in the world for software innovation, and c) much of the work TechCrunch does is very valuable, but it would be nice to see more “worldly” coverage [for lack of a better term].
- colortone 18y ago
  Can anyone explain why this comment was downmodded? Is it because I syndicated something that was posted elsewhere? I feel like what I wrote here brought a lot of context to this story, especially given my background as a musician and record label manager. TIA for any insight
adnam 18y ago
Slow news day

29 points by quilby 18y ago

This story reinforces what Tech Crunch is to me, as I commented a few days ago: "Yes, TC is a click generator fueled by drama." (http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=205986 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=205986) ... I'm even happier now to have unsubscribed from their useless, noisy little RSS feed.

josefresco 18y ago
Speaking of RSS, when is Feedburner going to adjust their dramatically inflated "subscriber" count that is featured prominently on sites like TC? 785K looks good and all, and at least the numbers from site to site are relative, but I'd rather see accurate numbers (not a number akin to 'hits')

gaius 18y ago

Did Price actually tell them to "f*ck themselves" or was that just made up for sensationalism?

josefresco 18y ago
You get one guess, keep in mind that Arrington authored the post.
KirinDave 18y ago
This is the same kind of sensationalist drama-laden "inference" reporting that Arrington got criticized for with the Yang "We're Done" article. It's really ridiculous, but I guess we have to remember that TC isn't a news outlet, it's a blog. Sometimes, MA is going to blog about what he's eating for lunch.

edw519 18y ago

Why blog when a tweet will do? "Emailed tunecore. They said fu. Boo hoo." 100 characters to spare.

josefresco 18y ago
Maybe because Twitter was down? /thank you folks, I'll be here all week
Xichekolas 18y ago
The brilliance was that TuneCore got all this publicity from rebuking Arrington. Maybe that is the key to making the front page of TC: be politely rude to them.

nkohari 18y ago

I love how Arrington continually says that the email was sent to press@tunecore.com, except that it would be pretty damn rare for a startup to have an actual PR department. And anyway, if a company doesn't want to release information to the press, they aren't required to do so, no matter if it's TechCrunch or the f'n Times asking. Arrington getting offended when the request was rebuked just comes off as pugilistic.

ComputerGuru 18y ago
Four years since starting my organization, Press@NeoSmart.net still redirects to my email address (as the founder & Director). As if TechCrunch doesn't know that's what small companies & organizations do!

mnemonicsloth 18y ago

Interesting. Neither of the TC intern's emails are quoted. We get to take Arrington's word for it that "Peter responded politely." The CEO's email looks curt and impolite, but we have no way of knowing whether that's because the CEO is a jerk, or because there's a mollifying second half to that email that Arrington didn't feel like publishing. In the past I've basically ignored TC because I thought they were kind of silly. Question for anybody who follows this more closely than I do -- is Tech Crunch making the transition from "waste of time" to "unambiguous parasite" ?

jsjenkins168 18y ago
The interns emails are posted in the comments. They really aren't that bad, and definitely dont warrant such a response from a CEO in my opinion
- tjr 18y ago
  No, the intern's emails aren't that bad. Frankly, I don't think that Price's emails are that bad either. None of this warrants being made public.
  - fourlittlebees 18y ago
    The intern replied with the TIME 100 article when asked about TechCrunch. I thought that was a bit over the top, and a dig at the CEO for DARING to not know who Mike Arrington is.
    - olefoo 18y ago
      That sense of entitlement on the part of TechCrunch and the people associated with it is why it's losing value so rapidly. The balloon has popped, the shark has been jumped, the welcome has been overstayed;

babul 18y ago

Arrington seems to have ego issues? Lots of melodrama lately.

babul 18y ago

There are plenty of people/startups/companies who have never heard of TC. Seems these are people who generally just get on with things in thier own way in thier own markets, free from hype.

jpeterson 18y ago

Sigh. Can we have a ban of techcrunch? Pretty please?

extantproject 18y ago
I'll second that.
- fizx 18y ago
  They occasionally have good content... Maybe a way to aggressively bury TC content would be nice?
- helveticaman 18y ago
  Just to venture a guess, I think the problem with HN isn't only signal/noise ratio, but the amount of signal--there might not be enough.
hobbs 18y ago
And yet we have a sensationalist article about brain surgeons' cell phones shoot to the top spot? Good luck getting people to be picky.
Xichekolas 18y ago
http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/25039 http://userscripts.org/scripts/show/25039

macgyver1 18y ago

Talk about sensational headlines, read the title at the top of this page. I don't think he wrote it because they'd never heard of techcrunch, he wrote it because of the bizarre response from what was supposed to be the PR e-mail address of their company. Also, read the comments of the techcrunch posts and he provides their own e-mails. Arrington may be a douche, but this thread is very sensationalist

sabat 18y ago

Maybe I just buy into Arrington's BS, but the tunescore guy comes off like a jackass. Maybe Techcrunch doesn't deserve extra special treatment, but it is the primary startup news site. "Who are you?" is a clueless response, especially from a tiny company that needs all the coverage it can get.

axod 18y ago
I agree it was a pretty bad reply. It doesn't take a couple of seconds to go to google, see who you're dealing, and notice that they could be potentially useful to you as a business.. However, maybe it was a stressful day and they had a heap of spam or irritating emails trying to sell them stuff.

ssharp 18y ago

Arrington is such a drama queen.

scooter53080 18y ago

To me the interesting part of this story is the advice to 'not cold contact the CEO'. If you have multiple email addresses coming into one box you'd better keep track which one a message is from and respond appropriately. There's nothing wrong about cold contact at a press@ address. As far as him not know what TechCrunch is...that part is pleasing. ;-)

colortone 18y ago

(Disclosure: I’ve been a user since [almost] day one and have contributed to the Tunecore blog) Here's my comment (#209) on the original thread: I would love it if we could start hearing about more businesses that are growing out of existing industries that are leveraging the Net (rather than SV startups leveraging the Net to get into existing industries). Another example in the music domain would be SonicBids. Concentrating so much on SV just leads to too much irony: TuneCore is probably THE most revolutionary music-focused web service (esp in terms of business model innovation) and they’ve been pulling in real revenue with a real, sustainable revenue stream that solves extreme problems for its customers for years. To top it off, they have probably THE most intelligent strategic partnership (w/ Guitar Center) of any web-based business. I agree that a) there’s only so many hours in the day, b) the Valley is the most important place in the world for software innovation, and c) much of the work TechCrunch does is very valuable, but it would be nice to see more “worldly” coverage [for lack of a better term].

colortone 18y ago
Can anyone explain why this comment was downmodded? Is it because I syndicated something that was posted elsewhere? I feel like what I wrote here brought a lot of context to this story, especially given my background as a musician and record label manager. TIA for any insight

adnam 18y ago

Slow news day