5 ms·

I think the key news bit here is that Ariana Huffington will be in charge of all of AOL's blog/news properties.

by jarin 16y ago

arepb 16y ago
Also leaves David Eun (AOL media boss) in an odd spot.
bvi 16y ago
That would make her Arrington's boss, among others, wouldn't it?
- zacharycohn 16y ago
  Correct. Paul Carr's words: "I have no idea how any of this will affect TechCrunch. So far AOL has kept true to its promise not to interfere with our editorial and there’s no reason to suppose that will change under Huffington. That said, it would be idiotic to think that our parents’ content strategy – particularly the SEO stuff – won’t have annoying trickle-down consequences for all of us in the long term." [edit- Corrected source of the quote.]
  - deleted 16y ago
    [deleted]
  - Samuel_Michon 16y ago
    For those who haven't read it yet, AOL's "Master Plan" for its blogs and news sites: http://www.businessinsider.com/the-aol-way http://www.businessinsider.com/the-aol-way AOL tells its editors to decide what topics to cover based on four considerations: traffic potential, revenue potential, edit quality and turn-around time. AOL asks its editors to decide whether to produce content based on "the profitability consideration." The documents reveal that AOL is, when the story calls for it, willing to boost traffic by 5 to 10% with search ads and other "paid media." AOL site leaders are expected to have eight ideas for packages that could generate at least $1 million in revenue on hand at all times. In-house AOL staffers are expected to write five to 10 stories per day. Every time AOL buys another site, I mourn.
    - pavs 16y ago
      In other words "content farm". But since it will be done by "leading" blogs it will be considered an ok thing to do. Makes perfect sense, huffpo and TC was never too far from being a content farm. These sites are rarely about quality but quantity. They often rewrite news they find in their rss feed.
      - patio11 16y ago
        I said it before and I'll say it again: take TechCrunch as it currently exists, bolt-on a section for high-end electronics reviews, and you'd goose their revenues without any actual human who reads TechCrunch noticing. (The reviews rank based on on-page optimization plus the earned trust of TechCrunch, and the eCPM would be out of this world relative to any article TechCrunch publishes.) http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1734020 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1734020 Traditional publishers are cottoning to this tactic, too. http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/c/credit_and_money_cards/index.html http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects... Think like that, but 100x more aggressive. Will it degrade the NYT brand a little bit? Meh, it is the NYT: they'll still be the world's preeminent newspaper, they'll still make money from advertisements, and they'll still be able to credibly threaten Google with PRmageddon if Big Daddy G gets uppity about it.
        mrkurt 16y ago
        Two things here! 1) Tech Crunch doesn't really operate in an eCPM world, they operate in a "real" CPM world with advertisers that are largely paying for branding rather than conversions. 2) The CPMs on electronics reviews (high end or otherwise) are significantly lower than the CPMs on "content a CTO would want to read". SEO for a publisher really only serves the purpose of getting organic traffic to more premium ad campaigns, much like paid traffic (where a publisher buys CPC ads). The catch with this is that inbound search engine traffic needs to roughly match the demographics you've sold ads for or you end up shooting yourself in the foot. You can do short term traffic buys to inflate ad views with otherwise shitty traffic, but only rarely and it's still dangerous.
    - 16y ago
- slantyyz 16y ago
  I predict that Arrington will create another faux controversy (Angelgate, Engadget blogfight) with Huffington before TechCrunch's next major event. That's become his modus operandi. Lame, but seems quite effective in generating eyeballs.
mtw 16y ago
Breaking News: TechCrunch announces new name HuffPostTECH, fires staff, annonces columnists instead, and a new focus on curated links from blogosphere.
teamonkey 16y ago
It reminds me a little of the time when Pixar bought Disney for -$7bn.
- IdeaHamster 16y ago
  Or when NeXT bought Apple. I only see good things from this.
- lacerus 16y ago
  Disney bought Pixar. Not the other way around.
  - stanleydrew 16y ago
    Note the negative sign in front of $7bn.
  - vinutheraj 16y ago
    Hence the - in the -$7bn

I think the key news bit here is that Ariana Huffington will be in charge of all of AOL's blog/news properties.

by jarin 16y ago

I think the key news bit here is that Ariana Huffington will be in charge of all of AOL's blog/news properties.

arepb 16y ago

Also leaves David Eun (AOL media boss) in an odd spot.

bvi 16y ago

That would make her Arrington's boss, among others, wouldn't it?

zacharycohn 16y ago
Correct. Paul Carr's words: "I have no idea how any of this will affect TechCrunch. So far AOL has kept true to its promise not to interfere with our editorial and there’s no reason to suppose that will change under Huffington. That said, it would be idiotic to think that our parents’ content strategy – particularly the SEO stuff – won’t have annoying trickle-down consequences for all of us in the long term." [edit- Corrected source of the quote.]
- deleted 16y ago
  [deleted]
- Samuel_Michon 16y ago
  For those who haven't read it yet, AOL's "Master Plan" for its blogs and news sites: http://www.businessinsider.com/the-aol-way http://www.businessinsider.com/the-aol-way AOL tells its editors to decide what topics to cover based on four considerations: traffic potential, revenue potential, edit quality and turn-around time. AOL asks its editors to decide whether to produce content based on "the profitability consideration." The documents reveal that AOL is, when the story calls for it, willing to boost traffic by 5 to 10% with search ads and other "paid media." AOL site leaders are expected to have eight ideas for packages that could generate at least $1 million in revenue on hand at all times. In-house AOL staffers are expected to write five to 10 stories per day. Every time AOL buys another site, I mourn.
  - pavs 16y ago
    In other words "content farm". But since it will be done by "leading" blogs it will be considered an ok thing to do. Makes perfect sense, huffpo and TC was never too far from being a content farm. These sites are rarely about quality but quantity. They often rewrite news they find in their rss feed.
    - patio11 16y ago
      I said it before and I'll say it again: take TechCrunch as it currently exists, bolt-on a section for high-end electronics reviews, and you'd goose their revenues without any actual human who reads TechCrunch noticing. (The reviews rank based on on-page optimization plus the earned trust of TechCrunch, and the eCPM would be out of this world relative to any article TechCrunch publishes.) http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1734020 http://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=1734020 Traditional publishers are cottoning to this tactic, too. http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects/c/credit_and_money_cards/index.html http://topics.nytimes.com/top/reference/timestopics/subjects... Think like that, but 100x more aggressive. Will it degrade the NYT brand a little bit? Meh, it is the NYT: they'll still be the world's preeminent newspaper, they'll still make money from advertisements, and they'll still be able to credibly threaten Google with PRmageddon if Big Daddy G gets uppity about it.
      - mrkurt 16y ago
        Two things here! 1) Tech Crunch doesn't really operate in an eCPM world, they operate in a "real" CPM world with advertisers that are largely paying for branding rather than conversions. 2) The CPMs on electronics reviews (high end or otherwise) are significantly lower than the CPMs on "content a CTO would want to read". SEO for a publisher really only serves the purpose of getting organic traffic to more premium ad campaigns, much like paid traffic (where a publisher buys CPC ads). The catch with this is that inbound search engine traffic needs to roughly match the demographics you've sold ads for or you end up shooting yourself in the foot. You can do short term traffic buys to inflate ad views with otherwise shitty traffic, but only rarely and it's still dangerous.
  - 16y ago
slantyyz 16y ago
I predict that Arrington will create another faux controversy (Angelgate, Engadget blogfight) with Huffington before TechCrunch's next major event. That's become his modus operandi. Lame, but seems quite effective in generating eyeballs.

mtw 16y ago

Breaking News: TechCrunch announces new name HuffPostTECH, fires staff, annonces columnists instead, and a new focus on curated links from blogosphere.

teamonkey 16y ago

It reminds me a little of the time when Pixar bought Disney for -$7bn.

IdeaHamster 16y ago
Or when NeXT bought Apple. I only see good things from this.
lacerus 16y ago
Disney bought Pixar. Not the other way around.
- stanleydrew 16y ago
  Note the negative sign in front of $7bn.
- vinutheraj 16y ago
  Hence the - in the -$7bn