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An open letter to Mike Arrington: Please stop investing in startups

117 points by danshapiro 15y ago

vipivip 15y ago
Probably this is why some startups get so much coverage from TC while others hit the wall.
ares2012 15y ago
Now that he's sold TechCrunch to AOL, I'm not clear why anyone would expect that he would not invest in start up companies. TechCrunch is no longer just him or him and a few bloggers, it's part of a major media organization. If their rules allow him to invest in the companies he covers then that is a problem with their journalistic policies, not with him acting in his own best interest.
- benologist 15y ago
  Their rules don't, they made an exception for him after the fact according to allthingsd.
- hullo 15y ago
  As a self-described loyal reader of TechCrunch, I think it's reasonable to believe that the author of the post does not "expect" Arrington to do anything based on his open letter. He'd just prefer him not to invest in start-ups because he doesn't think it's good for TechCrunch and the quality of journalism that appears there. I agree completely.
prpon 15y ago
TechCrunch had never been an impartial reporter of startup or tech news. Their coverage of startups even before Mike Arrington started investing is based on how connected the startup is with VCs/angels. The users don't necessarily see all startups in that space covered equally. For TC, it works well since it guarantees access to other news stories before anyone else.
- albedoa 15y ago
  It's really awful sometimes, and it's unfair to worthy startups that deserve the attention. Compare the coverage of Quora versus StackExchange, for example. There was a period when there were two Quora articles per day on TC. StackExchange is lucky to be mentioned once every few months, and even then it's usually only brought up as a comparison to "Quora and other Q&A sites".
  - IgorPartola 15y ago
    I am asking an honest question here as I have no idea as to what the answer might be: What good does it do for a startup to be featured on TC? I suspect it may have to do with getting funding if you are doing a round, but is that it? I would assume that most startups don't derive many paying/staying customers from a TC post, unless the startup itself is narrowly targeted at entrepreneurs/other startups.
    - benologist 15y ago
      Echo chamber benefits ... if people keep hearing your name they're going to start saying it too, some will be investors, some will be users, some will be disheartened competitors who can't get a major update written about while your minor layout tweak got 300 words.
  - zem 15y ago
    why is there any onus upon techcrunch to be "fair"? the way i see it, arrington has never even pretended to be anything other than a blowhard; he's just a blowhard who has managed to interest a lot of people in what he has to say. you could argue the whole "with great power comes great responsibility" thing, but from what i've seen of most techcrunch-style blog-journalism, it really doesn't work that way.
    - albedoa 15y ago
      You're right. That's actually one of the things I admire about TC. When I spoke of fairness, what I meant was my personal perception and preference. He isn't required to be fair by any means, but I require fairness to not get fed up and stop reading. I should have clarified that in my post.
nextparadigms 15y ago
Does anyone know if he has stock in Facebook? Or MG? I've watched them post about every single increase in Facebook valuation from $20 billion to $80 billion. "Facebook now at $20 bn..." "Facebook now at $25 bn..." ......... "Facebook now at $75 bn..." "Facebook now at $80 bn..." I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say they made a post every time Facebook's valuation jumped 5 bn. I thought it was pretty excessive and dubious. I was wondering if it wasn't actually their posts which lead to the next $5 bn increment every other week. It gave investors the idea that Facebook's valuation will keep rising. It created a loop. I think $80 bn valuation (or $70 as it is now) is way too inflated for the kind of revenues Facebook is making, and I think some of the investors are realizing this and are starting to cash out now before all the others figure it out.
- daniel1980fl 15y ago
  makes a lot of sense. here are points for plausible: - Mike is an asole. By that, I mean he built his fame out of being a bad boy of tech. Its not that he just play it low, like Lady Gaga or Diddy; he actually HAS an opinion of not trustworthy person; most Silicon Valley insiders avoid him, plus TechCrunch has never been good at keeping news to themselves before a company that they plan to write about asked them to stay silent for a day or two more in order to break the news louder. Further, he must have not been a good lawyer as well -- remember hot JooJoo broke down when Arrington cried over spilled milk when he realized he had not secured his business side in accordance to law or with etiquette of any businessman. - he sold to AOL. I think the main reason was publicity of TC, not money. But I think he knew by selling and getting more ears/eyeballs to read his stuff, he can tube out about companies he invests in. - given his personality, I personally think it makes sense for him to use TC tube to make as much money as possible. One thing is being on AOL payroll, other is to use that tube to overreact about companies (read: stocks) you in: facebook, twitter, quora -- all has had huge TC coverage while plenty of other companies similar to quora never seen a single line. Who knows, maybe he may be the last one to do that; I am sure sooner or later FTC will tap in. I dont see a difference, monetarily-wise, between buying penny stock and batch-calling thousand of random phone number leaving voicemail with "secret message of stock thats going to soar soon", and actually owning a second-market stock and applauding it through a tech-blog tube.
- 15y ago
jjm 15y ago
TechCrunch is not some 'outstanding' reporting venue with a long history of righteousness. This is the internet, this is capitalism. Start your own 'Techcrunch' if you want fairness, no one is stopping you.
- nostromo 15y ago
  No one is stopping us from asking TC to be a better source of unbiased journalism either -- which is what this post is about.
  - jjm 15y ago
    Look, I do understand your point and that you want TC to be a "better source of unbiased journalism". But TC doesn't want that. They just want to make money. While once in a while you'll see a good article over there, they'll never be a NYTimes, Tribune, WSJ, or TW. It is just not something they care about. It is almost like asking TC to pivot.
raganwald 15y ago
Hi Paul Graham, I’m one of your customers. We don’t really know each other. We’ve chatted at a few events, Hacker News features some of my posts, but I’m mostly just a guy who reads Hacker News a lot. I find it’s a pretty good place to see what’s important in the industry. I am software guy, not a media critic. But I’m a big believer that economic incentives shape behaviors in subtle and unmeasurable ways. And I think your decision to make investments in startups is going to make Hacker News a worse product. I can’t tell you exactly how. Are you going to be a little more likely to flag stories about competitors to your companies? Upvote them, even when they’re not newsworthy, to show you’re not biased? I don’t know. But I think it’s going to happen, it’ll be subtle, and it’ll make Hacker News worse. I’m not making demands or threatening to leave. Just making a request, from one software guy to another: moderator independence is a great feature. Please don’t cut it. Best wishes, Reg Braithwaite
- meterplech 15y ago
  I think that's not a fair analogy. PG isn't the curator for content on HN, and while you could argue he could algorithmically alter stories about YC companies, or manually remove stories, this isn't an editorial blog. It's a collection, and the users vote stories up and down. PG's goal from HN is to get a pulse of the tech community, see smart people who may be interesting to invest with in the future. Arrington theoretically runs a journalistic operation, and he brings up journalistic integrity when it suits him. This is a much stronger conflict of interest for something that perceives itself as journalistic. While the blog didn't bring up great examples of how this will hurt TC, I don't think it's an even analogy.
  - raganwald 15y ago
    It's fast and loose, but to be honest I neither agree nor disagree with the post's premise, it just seemed like a good point to bring up to spark some discussion. As for journalistic integrity, my feeling is that conflict of interest in journalism is between a journalist and his employer, not between a journalist and his readership. Media properties all have strong biases fueled by the self-interest of their owners, the market they are attempting to serve with their product, or other factors. In the era of Wikileaks, Twitter, and blogs, journalistic integrity seems like a quaint notion, more unusual when it is present than when it is absent. I live in Toronto. None of my daily newspapers are unbiased. How about your town?
pauldisneyiv 15y ago
This is interesting to me. I wonder if we - to a certain degree - might receive better reporting since he is more active on a day-to-day basis in the actual investing. I really have no idea if this would be the case, but it's entirely possible that he might be privy to additional info than he would otherwise. As for as the open letter...Mike appears to be open about who he's investing with and I would doubt he would want to harm his reputation - or TechCrunch's - by appearing to be biased towards those he has a vested interest in. Well written letter but perhaps wait until you have examples of the downsides before you write the next. It will carry far more weight.
- schmittz 15y ago
  I hadn't thought of that before reading your post, but I agree. Mike getting into investing may actually improve TC because he now is getting involved with startups on a more fundamental level. It might open him up to reporting on startups that would have otherwise been missed because they aren't buzz companies. In any event, it will prove to be an interesting case study in journalistic integrity.
staunch 15y ago
TechCrunch has always been Arrington's blog above all else. He uses it to help his friends and defeat his enemies. Ask Jason Calacanis what it's like when he's your friend (lots of easy coverage) and what it's like when he's your enemy (LAUNCH conf boycott). Any additional bias he may have because of investments won't be detectable in the mass of existing ones he already exhibits.
- alain94040 15y ago
  Exactly. Once you have watched how the insider game is played in Silicon Valley, being an investor is the least of your conflicts. There are so many weird relationships going on, it's almost like real life. I'm friends with X, Z owes me a favor, etc. None of that stuff is disclosed, because it's just how the world works. Don't get upset about the 5% of cases where MA has a direct conflict or interest, use your own judgment and filters 100% of the time. One of the key values of reading TC is that it offers strong opinions. If you just want to read bland press releases, I can point you elsewhere.
- shareme 15y ago
  Not defend either JC or MA..but when you are sued by someone you probably are told my your own lawyer not to go to events held by the person suing you..
geoffw8 15y ago
He's always had "companies", i.e. Edgio. I'm fed up of hearing peoples whiney opinions.
- veb 15y ago
  Then don't come to a PUBLIC message board.
dterra 15y ago
Only time will tell, and startups or established business es that will suffer it or not, will let us all know. I dont agree with the letter, and even the analogy with PG. You can still build and launch. and be successful not depending on MA or PG. Let them do what they do, because they do it amazing. Again, time will tell if MA is doing it all wrong. I dont think so.
- raganwald 15y ago
  The analogy with Hacker News was not meant as a criticism. I personally think that Paul's interest in investing in startups--which may be more about passion than pecuniarum for all I know--actually makes Hacker News a better forum than if it were moderated (or meta-moderated) by someone with an interest in page views or the size of the community, to give two examples. I had expected people to follow that reasoning and reply "Actually, HN is better because Paul Graham is more interested in nurturing startups than in selling advertising." I was mistaken and have learned that sometimes a simple, direct argument is going to get the job done while an indirect argument may just come across as noise. Mea Culpa.
cletus 15y ago
File this in the category of "questions I never would've thought to ask". There is a fine line between being a blog and being a journalistic organization. Some argue the former is a case of the latter. In the latter, there is clearly an ethical obligation to disclose any conflicts of interest. Many journalists are either required to or choose not to voluntary (to avoid the appearance of impropriety) invest in anything they're covering. So while bloggers may not fall under the same umbrella, ethical bloggers I believe would either avoid such potential conflicts of interest or at least disclose them. It's a real problem here because the issue isn't simply the coverage itself but what companies get coverage and what don't. There's nothing to disclose on for a story that isn't written. For startups this is a huge problem. What's more, I think AOL views itself as a journalistic organization. As such, I'd be surprised if Arrington's angel investments didn't run afoul of AOL's ethics policies. Basically it looks to me like Arrington has gotten his big payout and he's not so much interested in his earnout. Basically, I think he wants AOL to fire him. He'd no doubt get some kind of acceleration on any vested stock or earn out and I think he'd be happy with that. Whatever the case, I think for TechCrunch to survive and be taken seriously (as seriously as it ever was at least) it needs someone at the helm who, well, gives a shit. That isn't Arrington.
- dotBen 15y ago
  As such, I'd be surprised if Arrington's angel investments didn't run afoul of AOL's ethics policies. ... Basically, I think he wants AOL to fire him. Nah, I believe him when he says he wants to stick around, esp because "they pay [him] good money" (his words). When it comes to contracts and policies, everything is negotiable and open to exceptions if you have the clout. So much in business strategy is about identifying and using leverage. I've had some fairly public interactions with Mike in the comments of his "disclosure" piece, and my guess is he'll just keep on doing both and aol will maintain the status quo so long as TC continues to get the traffic and make the numbers.
- knowtheory 15y ago
  I think you're asking the wrong question. The correct question is who is Arrington's constituency? It's not the general public. He doesn't care about ethical investing standards and bias. Motherfucker is biased. Very biased. He represents the Silicon Valley bubble. But he's okay with that. And he wants to know what's going on within the bubble. I agree that we should do away with the pretense that TechCrunch is some how journalism, but i think that investor advocacy isn't a bad thing. It's just not journalism. In a way though, it doesn't matter. We live in the era of Fox News, "Caveat Investor", and advocacy journalism as a business tactic. AOL ultimately cares about eyeballs, not journalism. Do you think Arianna cares about ethics and journalistic standards? I think she cares about eyeballs, and getting a certain set of POVs out.
lotusleaf1987 15y ago
TechCrunch has already gone downhill. Arrington covers himself more than any other subject. Him investing startups will only exacerbate this.
edw 15y ago
I've never really expected—nor do I know anyone who expects—a lack of bias from Arrington. People have been accusing him of playing favorites for a long time. I would be less upset—though it's not like I'm upset about this anyway—if he hadn't sold to AOL, because this lessens his incentive to nurture TechCrunch. If I were him, I'd be staring at the countdown clock that keeps me in my golden handcuffs. One of the things I learned about starting a company is to know when to disengage emotionally. And I'm guessing Arrington's is way disengaged. And if he's disengaged, it probably doesn't matter whether he invests in companies or not. If he doesn't, it doesn't mean he's going to give attention to the companies he considers boring or losers or whatever. This basically allows him to place bets on the companies that he probably would have have been a cheerleader for anyway. Yeah, it's hard to get too worked up over this.
blantonl 15y ago
What journalistic organization doesn't play favorites? It is role of the reader and other journalistic organizations to balance out any inconsistencies in one organization's proclamations over another's. They do this by: * writing counterpoints that refute a proclamation * walking with their feet It may take time and a lot of effort to counteract a journalistic organization that strays too far off the path, but that time and effort always results in the truth.
stretchwithme 15y ago
Blogs are written by subject matter experts that know their topic better than any generalist. They are, by definition going to have their hands in the pie. So if you want coverage from people that are unbiased (or less biased) but who don't quite get it, stick with mainstream media. If you want expertise with potentially an axe to grind, go with blogs. Better to look at both and always question what you read from both angles of competence and integrity.

117 points by danshapiro 15y ago

Probably this is why some startups get so much coverage from TC while others hit the wall.

ares2012 15y ago

Now that he's sold TechCrunch to AOL, I'm not clear why anyone would expect that he would not invest in start up companies. TechCrunch is no longer just him or him and a few bloggers, it's part of a major media organization. If their rules allow him to invest in the companies he covers then that is a problem with their journalistic policies, not with him acting in his own best interest.

benologist 15y ago
Their rules don't, they made an exception for him after the fact according to allthingsd.
hullo 15y ago
As a self-described loyal reader of TechCrunch, I think it's reasonable to believe that the author of the post does not "expect" Arrington to do anything based on his open letter. He'd just prefer him not to invest in start-ups because he doesn't think it's good for TechCrunch and the quality of journalism that appears there. I agree completely.

prpon 15y ago

TechCrunch had never been an impartial reporter of startup or tech news. Their coverage of startups even before Mike Arrington started investing is based on how connected the startup is with VCs/angels. The users don't necessarily see all startups in that space covered equally. For TC, it works well since it guarantees access to other news stories before anyone else.

albedoa 15y ago
It's really awful sometimes, and it's unfair to worthy startups that deserve the attention. Compare the coverage of Quora versus StackExchange, for example. There was a period when there were two Quora articles per day on TC. StackExchange is lucky to be mentioned once every few months, and even then it's usually only brought up as a comparison to "Quora and other Q&A sites".
- IgorPartola 15y ago
  I am asking an honest question here as I have no idea as to what the answer might be: What good does it do for a startup to be featured on TC? I suspect it may have to do with getting funding if you are doing a round, but is that it? I would assume that most startups don't derive many paying/staying customers from a TC post, unless the startup itself is narrowly targeted at entrepreneurs/other startups.
  - benologist 15y ago
    Echo chamber benefits ... if people keep hearing your name they're going to start saying it too, some will be investors, some will be users, some will be disheartened competitors who can't get a major update written about while your minor layout tweak got 300 words.
- zem 15y ago
  why is there any onus upon techcrunch to be "fair"? the way i see it, arrington has never even pretended to be anything other than a blowhard; he's just a blowhard who has managed to interest a lot of people in what he has to say. you could argue the whole "with great power comes great responsibility" thing, but from what i've seen of most techcrunch-style blog-journalism, it really doesn't work that way.
  - albedoa 15y ago
    You're right. That's actually one of the things I admire about TC. When I spoke of fairness, what I meant was my personal perception and preference. He isn't required to be fair by any means, but I require fairness to not get fed up and stop reading. I should have clarified that in my post.

nextparadigms 15y ago

Does anyone know if he has stock in Facebook? Or MG? I've watched them post about every single increase in Facebook valuation from $20 billion to $80 billion. "Facebook now at $20 bn..." "Facebook now at $25 bn..." ......... "Facebook now at $75 bn..." "Facebook now at $80 bn..." I don't think I'm exaggerating when I say they made a post every time Facebook's valuation jumped 5 bn. I thought it was pretty excessive and dubious. I was wondering if it wasn't actually their posts which lead to the next $5 bn increment every other week. It gave investors the idea that Facebook's valuation will keep rising. It created a loop. I think $80 bn valuation (or $70 as it is now) is way too inflated for the kind of revenues Facebook is making, and I think some of the investors are realizing this and are starting to cash out now before all the others figure it out.

daniel1980fl 15y ago
makes a lot of sense. here are points for plausible: - Mike is an asole. By that, I mean he built his fame out of being a bad boy of tech. Its not that he just play it low, like Lady Gaga or Diddy; he actually HAS an opinion of not trustworthy person; most Silicon Valley insiders avoid him, plus TechCrunch has never been good at keeping news to themselves before a company that they plan to write about asked them to stay silent for a day or two more in order to break the news louder. Further, he must have not been a good lawyer as well -- remember hot JooJoo broke down when Arrington cried over spilled milk when he realized he had not secured his business side in accordance to law or with etiquette of any businessman. - he sold to AOL. I think the main reason was publicity of TC, not money. But I think he knew by selling and getting more ears/eyeballs to read his stuff, he can tube out about companies he invests in. - given his personality, I personally think it makes sense for him to use TC tube to make as much money as possible. One thing is being on AOL payroll, other is to use that tube to overreact about companies (read: stocks) you in: facebook, twitter, quora -- all has had huge TC coverage while plenty of other companies similar to quora never seen a single line. Who knows, maybe he may be the last one to do that; I am sure sooner or later FTC will tap in. I dont see a difference, monetarily-wise, between buying penny stock and batch-calling thousand of random phone number leaving voicemail with "secret message of stock thats going to soar soon", and actually owning a second-market stock and applauding it through a tech-blog tube.
15y ago

jjm 15y ago

TechCrunch is not some 'outstanding' reporting venue with a long history of righteousness. This is the internet, this is capitalism. Start your own 'Techcrunch' if you want fairness, no one is stopping you.

nostromo 15y ago
No one is stopping us from asking TC to be a better source of unbiased journalism either -- which is what this post is about.
- jjm 15y ago
  Look, I do understand your point and that you want TC to be a "better source of unbiased journalism". But TC doesn't want that. They just want to make money. While once in a while you'll see a good article over there, they'll never be a NYTimes, Tribune, WSJ, or TW. It is just not something they care about. It is almost like asking TC to pivot.

raganwald 15y ago

Hi Paul Graham, I’m one of your customers. We don’t really know each other. We’ve chatted at a few events, Hacker News features some of my posts, but I’m mostly just a guy who reads Hacker News a lot. I find it’s a pretty good place to see what’s important in the industry. I am software guy, not a media critic. But I’m a big believer that economic incentives shape behaviors in subtle and unmeasurable ways. And I think your decision to make investments in startups is going to make Hacker News a worse product. I can’t tell you exactly how. Are you going to be a little more likely to flag stories about competitors to your companies? Upvote them, even when they’re not newsworthy, to show you’re not biased? I don’t know. But I think it’s going to happen, it’ll be subtle, and it’ll make Hacker News worse. I’m not making demands or threatening to leave. Just making a request, from one software guy to another: moderator independence is a great feature. Please don’t cut it. Best wishes, Reg Braithwaite

meterplech 15y ago
I think that's not a fair analogy. PG isn't the curator for content on HN, and while you could argue he could algorithmically alter stories about YC companies, or manually remove stories, this isn't an editorial blog. It's a collection, and the users vote stories up and down. PG's goal from HN is to get a pulse of the tech community, see smart people who may be interesting to invest with in the future. Arrington theoretically runs a journalistic operation, and he brings up journalistic integrity when it suits him. This is a much stronger conflict of interest for something that perceives itself as journalistic. While the blog didn't bring up great examples of how this will hurt TC, I don't think it's an even analogy.
- raganwald 15y ago
  It's fast and loose, but to be honest I neither agree nor disagree with the post's premise, it just seemed like a good point to bring up to spark some discussion. As for journalistic integrity, my feeling is that conflict of interest in journalism is between a journalist and his employer, not between a journalist and his readership. Media properties all have strong biases fueled by the self-interest of their owners, the market they are attempting to serve with their product, or other factors. In the era of Wikileaks, Twitter, and blogs, journalistic integrity seems like a quaint notion, more unusual when it is present than when it is absent. I live in Toronto. None of my daily newspapers are unbiased. How about your town?

pauldisneyiv 15y ago

This is interesting to me. I wonder if we - to a certain degree - might receive better reporting since he is more active on a day-to-day basis in the actual investing. I really have no idea if this would be the case, but it's entirely possible that he might be privy to additional info than he would otherwise. As for as the open letter...Mike appears to be open about who he's investing with and I would doubt he would want to harm his reputation - or TechCrunch's - by appearing to be biased towards those he has a vested interest in. Well written letter but perhaps wait until you have examples of the downsides before you write the next. It will carry far more weight.

schmittz 15y ago
I hadn't thought of that before reading your post, but I agree. Mike getting into investing may actually improve TC because he now is getting involved with startups on a more fundamental level. It might open him up to reporting on startups that would have otherwise been missed because they aren't buzz companies. In any event, it will prove to be an interesting case study in journalistic integrity.

staunch 15y ago

TechCrunch has always been Arrington's blog above all else. He uses it to help his friends and defeat his enemies. Ask Jason Calacanis what it's like when he's your friend (lots of easy coverage) and what it's like when he's your enemy (LAUNCH conf boycott). Any additional bias he may have because of investments won't be detectable in the mass of existing ones he already exhibits.

alain94040 15y ago
Exactly. Once you have watched how the insider game is played in Silicon Valley, being an investor is the least of your conflicts. There are so many weird relationships going on, it's almost like real life. I'm friends with X, Z owes me a favor, etc. None of that stuff is disclosed, because it's just how the world works. Don't get upset about the 5% of cases where MA has a direct conflict or interest, use your own judgment and filters 100% of the time. One of the key values of reading TC is that it offers strong opinions. If you just want to read bland press releases, I can point you elsewhere.
shareme 15y ago
Not defend either JC or MA..but when you are sued by someone you probably are told my your own lawyer not to go to events held by the person suing you..

geoffw8 15y ago

He's always had "companies", i.e. Edgio. I'm fed up of hearing peoples whiney opinions.

veb 15y ago
Then don't come to a PUBLIC message board.

dterra 15y ago

Only time will tell, and startups or established business es that will suffer it or not, will let us all know. I dont agree with the letter, and even the analogy with PG. You can still build and launch. and be successful not depending on MA or PG. Let them do what they do, because they do it amazing. Again, time will tell if MA is doing it all wrong. I dont think so.

raganwald 15y ago
The analogy with Hacker News was not meant as a criticism. I personally think that Paul's interest in investing in startups--which may be more about passion than pecuniarum for all I know--actually makes Hacker News a better forum than if it were moderated (or meta-moderated) by someone with an interest in page views or the size of the community, to give two examples. I had expected people to follow that reasoning and reply "Actually, HN is better because Paul Graham is more interested in nurturing startups than in selling advertising." I was mistaken and have learned that sometimes a simple, direct argument is going to get the job done while an indirect argument may just come across as noise. Mea Culpa.

cletus 15y ago

File this in the category of "questions I never would've thought to ask". There is a fine line between being a blog and being a journalistic organization. Some argue the former is a case of the latter. In the latter, there is clearly an ethical obligation to disclose any conflicts of interest. Many journalists are either required to or choose not to voluntary (to avoid the appearance of impropriety) invest in anything they're covering. So while bloggers may not fall under the same umbrella, ethical bloggers I believe would either avoid such potential conflicts of interest or at least disclose them. It's a real problem here because the issue isn't simply the coverage itself but what companies get coverage and what don't. There's nothing to disclose on for a story that isn't written. For startups this is a huge problem. What's more, I think AOL views itself as a journalistic organization. As such, I'd be surprised if Arrington's angel investments didn't run afoul of AOL's ethics policies. Basically it looks to me like Arrington has gotten his big payout and he's not so much interested in his earnout. Basically, I think he wants AOL to fire him. He'd no doubt get some kind of acceleration on any vested stock or earn out and I think he'd be happy with that. Whatever the case, I think for TechCrunch to survive and be taken seriously (as seriously as it ever was at least) it needs someone at the helm who, well, gives a shit. That isn't Arrington.

dotBen 15y ago
As such, I'd be surprised if Arrington's angel investments didn't run afoul of AOL's ethics policies. ... Basically, I think he wants AOL to fire him. Nah, I believe him when he says he wants to stick around, esp because "they pay [him] good money" (his words). When it comes to contracts and policies, everything is negotiable and open to exceptions if you have the clout. So much in business strategy is about identifying and using leverage. I've had some fairly public interactions with Mike in the comments of his "disclosure" piece, and my guess is he'll just keep on doing both and aol will maintain the status quo so long as TC continues to get the traffic and make the numbers.
knowtheory 15y ago
I think you're asking the wrong question. The correct question is who is Arrington's constituency? It's not the general public. He doesn't care about ethical investing standards and bias. Motherfucker is biased. Very biased. He represents the Silicon Valley bubble. But he's okay with that. And he wants to know what's going on within the bubble. I agree that we should do away with the pretense that TechCrunch is some how journalism, but i think that investor advocacy isn't a bad thing. It's just not journalism. In a way though, it doesn't matter. We live in the era of Fox News, "Caveat Investor", and advocacy journalism as a business tactic. AOL ultimately cares about eyeballs, not journalism. Do you think Arianna cares about ethics and journalistic standards? I think she cares about eyeballs, and getting a certain set of POVs out.

lotusleaf1987 15y ago

TechCrunch has already gone downhill. Arrington covers himself more than any other subject. Him investing startups will only exacerbate this.

edw 15y ago

I've never really expected—nor do I know anyone who expects—a lack of bias from Arrington. People have been accusing him of playing favorites for a long time. I would be less upset—though it's not like I'm upset about this anyway—if he hadn't sold to AOL, because this lessens his incentive to nurture TechCrunch. If I were him, I'd be staring at the countdown clock that keeps me in my golden handcuffs. One of the things I learned about starting a company is to know when to disengage emotionally. And I'm guessing Arrington's is way disengaged. And if he's disengaged, it probably doesn't matter whether he invests in companies or not. If he doesn't, it doesn't mean he's going to give attention to the companies he considers boring or losers or whatever. This basically allows him to place bets on the companies that he probably would have have been a cheerleader for anyway. Yeah, it's hard to get too worked up over this.

blantonl 15y ago

What journalistic organization doesn't play favorites? It is role of the reader and other journalistic organizations to balance out any inconsistencies in one organization's proclamations over another's. They do this by: * writing counterpoints that refute a proclamation * walking with their feet It may take time and a lot of effort to counteract a journalistic organization that strays too far off the path, but that time and effort always results in the truth.

stretchwithme 15y ago

Blogs are written by subject matter experts that know their topic better than any generalist. They are, by definition going to have their hands in the pie. So if you want coverage from people that are unbiased (or less biased) but who don't quite get it, stick with mainstream media. If you want expertise with potentially an axe to grind, go with blogs. Better to look at both and always question what you read from both angles of competence and integrity.