—timoni.org

I completely disagree with the suggestion that TechCrunch is “doing the best it can to be open”. Michael Arrington is doing exactly the same he always does. To explain that, what follows is a fairly complete explanation of how I interpret the TechCrunch operation, and Arrington’s writing style. I want to get across why I feel it’s important to vocally call him out, oppose him and his blog, and why I’m seriously asking that people shun TechCrunch and drive their vile negativity out of this industry.

What follows is an analysis of how TechCrunch works

So, people absolutely do hate on TechCrunch. Some people actually, passionately hate Michael Arrington. At all levels of severity, Michael Arrington has earned every syllable of criticism. TechCrunch is a host for his personal attacks, vendetta, and bi-monthly essays playing a victim in ridiculous publicity stunts, yet all presented under the guise of being influential ‘Technology News’, even syndicated into the Washington Post. It deserves ridicule, and after years and years of Arrington’s egotistical behaviour, I’m pleased to see more people speak out vocally when incidents like this flare up. Sooner or later, I can only hope that it makes a difference and causes TechCrunch a permanent decline.

John Gruber has it fundamentally right: When you acquire information that you know to be stolen, there is no ethical dilemma. A decent, right thinking human-being does not publish it, end of. Arrington however does not just elect to publish, but is setting up to milk the episode for everything he can get.

As has been demonstrated today, a decent number of people who don’t actually read TechCrunch anyway are vocally appalled by the ethical vacuum that Michael Arrington operates in. But we don’t matter.

Arrington’s playing up of this situation serves a small number of very specific purpose. This faux ‘open ethical dilemma’ he’s playing is nothing but an important strategic requirement for him to drag the report out. It’s about increasing the drama, and it’s completely insincere.

1. Making TechCrunch a core part of the incident

Although the stolen documents are apparently going to be made public, it’s very important that TechCrunch capitalize on getting exclusive first access. Having done so, the scenario is no-longer reported as ‘documents were stolen from Twitter’, but as ‘documents were leaked to TechCrunch’. Now this is a story about TechCrunch, too.

2. Publishing the documents crosses simple ethical lines. But…

… With a tale of personal dilemma and highlighting that some ‘embarrassing’ content will be graciously withheld, Arrington adopts a false air of decency to deflect from the crux, that is publishing anything is repulsively indecent.

A few self-indulgent paragraphs about how considered and responsible Michael Arrington is being with these stolen documents provides fuel for an import half of the active TechCrunch community: The fanboys. The fanboys are those who blindly following Arrington’s lead for any of the following reasons: He’s a good, manipulative writer; he’s famous; they’re desperate for positive coverage for their start-up.

The fan boys jump on this self-professed demonstration of ethical decency with complements and applause in the comments pages. In doing so, they provide important pivots for Arrington’s follow-up posturing; citable support for continuing the stories; and they dilute from the torrent of abuse that will be posted by TechCrunch’s other faction; the trolls.

The trolls are self explanatory, although the breeding of TechCrunch trolls is a little bit interesting. Trolls exist in all communities, but TechCrunch hosts a concentrated, especially bitter kind of troll. The TechCrunch blog itself is a massive trolling operation. Stories like these, the Last.FM pieces, and the personal attacks on Blaine Cook are based on abuse, negativity and scandal. These are the only kinds of story that get TechCrunch special attention. The people that involve themselves in the TechCrunch community are those that get a kick out of abuse and negativity. It’s no surprise that they dish it out themselves, hoping they can imitate the cutting cruelty of Arrington’s own writing, and they simply don’t care whether they’re trolling with TechCrunch, or at TechCrunch. It’s just an exercise in juvenile bullying.

So

Michael Arrington’s talent as a writer is that of manipulation. His cynical passages in this story and others exists only to distract, deceive around contentious, immoral aspects of his reporting, and to associate himself and his brand with the breaking story.

In the Last.FM coverage vast passages of text and a completely meaningless screenshot of an email were used to disguise the fact they had no real evidence. In this instance, his ethics posturing is an attempt to make the subsequent publication of some stolen material seem acceptable on the grounds that it isn’t the publication of some other stolen material.

An open door at TechCrunch leads only to a hall of mirrors.

(via benw)