

The tech world deserves better than TechCrunch - waderoush
http://www.xconomy.com/national/2011/09/09/the-tech-world-deserves-better-than-techcrunch/

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pg
"TechCrunch used its influence to gain a virtual chokehold on news about new
startups from Y Combinator"

Hardly. The reason most of the startups announce on TechCrunch is simply that
arranging a launch in multiple publications is a huge time sink. So we advise
they pick one and give them an exclusive. Most pick TechCrunch.

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budu3
PG don't you think granting TechCrunch exclusive rights to all YC launches is
a bit unfair to the other publications? Why don't you let the founders decide
which publication they want to talk to regarding their launch? I'm sure you
have a broad range of personalities within YC and some founders might not have
been comfortable with Arrington's style.

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oldstrangers
"Why don't you let the founders decide which publication they want to talk to
regarding their launch?"

... "So we advise they pick one and give them an exclusive. Most pick
TechCrunch."

You must not like reading.

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tatsuke95
>"My hat is off to TechCrunch for energetically filling the void in startup
coverage that had opened up by the mid-2000s, after the collapse of dot-com-
era biztech publications such as the Industry Standard, Business 2.0, and Red
Herring"

And that's exactly what TechCrunch is/was: the next-in-line tech media player
that filled the vacuum and rode the next bubble to the peak. Then fell apart.

The tech media and tech industry aren't really separate entities. They're part
of the same machine.

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rubeng
The whole thing about TechCrunch being perceived as being so influential to
the success of a startup is strange to me. TechCrunch doesn't make or break
your startup. How you grow your business after the initial launch traffic dies
down is what matters.

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SODaniel
I wish Techcrunch would have spent more time investigating, following up and
seeking out interesting start-up companies then they did posting just to
create buzz and pageviews.

At least 25% of all posts on Techcrunch were 'in the know' pissing contests or
insult articles, designed only to create social buzz and spread from only the
'gossip value'.

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pspeter3
It concerns me how much influence TechCrunch has and how willing it is to use
the influence to coerce start ups. Do sources like Mashable and Read Write Web
do the same thing?

~~~
ramjam3
Agreed. I can't even take TechCrunch seriously. They continuously lace every
other story with opinions. I want real reporters, not blowhards.

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dpcan
Boring ;)

I think there's a good reason many people watch The Daily Show instead of the
evening news. Or TMZ over Entertainment Tonight.

Or TechCrunch instead of NY Times Bits Blog (<http://bits.blogs.nytimes.com/>)

What you want is out there, it's just not interesting enough to keep going
back to in my opinion.

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bmcmanus
The tech world deserves to read a post on one page too.

~~~
sp332
"SINGLE-PAGE VIEW" in all-caps at the bottom
[http://www.xconomy.com/national/2011/09/09/the-tech-world-
de...](http://www.xconomy.com/national/2011/09/09/the-tech-world-deserves-
better-than-techcrunch/?single_page=true)

~~~
nikcub
If you have to click to get a single page you might as well click next-page on
a two-page article

~~~
monkeypizza
not with autopager, best extension ever.

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jameswilsterman
I think there is a lot of value in having one go-to site for exclusive news
about start ups and tech companies. TechCrunch's chokehold on tech news does
not bother me. They are the master of breaking tech news and that makes it
easy for me to find breaking tech news. Plus they have great bloggers who are
actually good writers and story tellers. I disagree with Fred Wilson though
that their value stems from their 'fuck you attitude'. Conversely, I think
this attitude has proven bad for the site. Too much bickering, anger,
pettiness, and one-upsmanship pervades the site these days. Maybe this passion
and emotion is what propels their bloggers to break stories and get the story
right, but why does it need to spillover into a bunch of personal sniping and
blog posts which are incoherent or lacking in context?

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nikcub
"Techcrunch would do anything to get more pageviews! Click here to read the
rest of this article"

