
Leo Laporte loses it with Mike Arrington on the Gillmor Gang - zeedotme
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IsV-lgnAjps&eurl=http%3A%2F%2Ffriendfeed%2Ecom%2Fzee&feature=player_embedded&fmt=18
======
htsh
The interruption was a bit rude. Arrington is a lawyer, and that's just what
legal folks do. Laporte felt it was a bit disrespectful, and though the level
of reaction was not warranted, a reaction was understandable. Laporte has been
around forever, and I think he's earned a pretty good reputation amongst
nerds. Also, have you seen crunchgear? These people do not know their tech --
that much is clear. They are in the business of selling tech, not creating it.
That being said, they're important.

I'm a recovering lawyer myself and I left because working with lawyers was
worse than anything I had experienced before (which was working mainly with
startups and non-profits in NY).

Its fascinating to me. There are a lot of bitter nerds out there who
passionately hate T/C, like fanatically so. It seems the slashdot/reddit crowd
has repeatedly criticized those guys for being marketers rather than geeks,
and they are right in that basic premise but I think the level of animosity is
unwarranted. Even if these guys aren't pedigreed nerds, they are fascinated by
and love technology and they are an important part of the industry.

Its one of the reasons I like HN -- it has a much more nuanced view of the
important role folks like Arrington and the VC community play in the bigger
world outside of nerdland.

~~~
quisxt
I think there are at least a few nerds who also hate TechCrunch because of
some pretty shoddy journalism like the whole Last.fm imbroglio.

~~~
htsh
Yeah, agreed. Though he tries his best to hide the fact, Arrington was a
lawyer at a big law firm, neither a nerd nor a journalist. And here he is
running a "news" site about technology.

To his credit, he filled a void. I wish there were folks like Arrington around
and things like the VC-funded "internet week" in NY this week back in 1999
during the first dot-com boom. Something is better than nothing. And he's on
the right side of a lot of things -- specifically on intellectual property
regulation.

And also to his credit, he's trying and he listens. He's been responding to
commenters on his site and there's something to be said about that.

------
darreld
Arrington is a complete hole and Leo does actually care about technology. I
was kind of puzzled why Leo started with the Gilmore Gang anyway. The show is
98% attitudes and is generally idea-free. It was good to see Leo blow up over
Arrington's trolling.

~~~
ahoyhere
He just couldn't let Dvorak have all the (inane, gasbag, technically
incorrect) fun?

------
malte
Leo Laporte comments on TC article:

"Thanks for the post, Mike. Apology accepted. Now that I know what was going
on in your mind, I apologize to you.

There seems to be something about the Gillmor Gang that just engenders over
the top passion. I’m embarrassed by my overreaction. Peace."

------
webology
Leo was justified to call Arrington out. What a douchebag thing to imply
honestly.

~~~
pg
While you fan the flames, the principals are apologizing to one another.

~~~
reitzensteinm
Of course they're apologizing, it would be crazy to let a vendetta form over
something like this. But that doesn't mean Leo wasn't justified here.

~~~
nailer
If he'd let Arrington, speak, Arrington would have mentioned that Palm seems
to have only been giving review units to reviewers who have previously given
the Palm Pre favorable coverage.

------
snprbob86
_sigh_ TechCrunch is a whole bunch of trolls, but there aren't enough startup
news sites. I read TechCrunch in my pile of feeds, but with a large grain of
salt. Is there a site which covers basically the same news, without the silly
Twitter love fest, and with less asshole-ish editors?

I'd really love to see real journalists who believe in "be good" doing a solid
site. If that were to happen, people could send their exclusives and firsts
there to slowly put TechCrunch out of business.

~~~
vyrotek
Oh if only such a site existed... I would love to drop TechCrunch completely.

~~~
snprbob86
I see a YC pitch in here somewhere...

~~~
Spyckie
Or an open source alternative?

------
dcurtis
It seemed like a slight overreaction here, but I have a feeling this was
built-up rage over something else.

~~~
jsz0
Probably. It's such trash journalism this Arrington guy deals in. He should
probably be covering celebrity gossip, not technology. Anyone can go try out a
Pre, many people have review units, and he didn't even let him answer the
question before suggesting bias.

~~~
qeorge
Here's what I don't understand:

I see anti-Arrington comments like this frequently, yet TechCrunch appears on
the frontpage every day (usually several times a day). Where's the disconnect?

(Full disclosure: I received a Mike Arrington review copy)

~~~
pg
TC is polarizing, but HN doesn't have downvotes.

~~~
qeorge
But isn't not upvoting a form of downvoting?

~~~
ynniv
No, if 100 people love something and 100 people hate it, it will show up on
the front page with +100. With downvoting, it would not show up on the front
page with a score of 0.

~~~
jballanc
Yes, but I actually sort of prefer the way this incentivizes sharing of
interesting links with the community. That is, the only way to get the stuff
you don't like off of the front page is to share something better!

~~~
GHFigs
Moreover, it indicates that getting the stuff you don't like off the front
page is not something to strive for. If you don't like it, ignore it. It is a
sign that at the moment, the community here has found nothing more interesting
to show you.

------
yan
Ha ha, I just noticed the Wikipedia page for Arrington:

    
    
      J. Michael Arrington (born March 13, 1970 in Orange, 
      California)[1] is a troll, entrepreneur and was the
      maintainer[2] of TechCrunch, a blog covering the Silicon
      Valley technology start-up communities and the wider
      technology field in USA and elsewhere. 
    

Wonder how long that'll stay up..

~~~
mahmud
A youtube comment says "Arrington is feared, Laporte is loved."

Feared? really?

~~~
wyday
YouTube commenters are known for their erudition.

------
quizbiz
The only thing this video did for me was remind me of TechTV. Never seen this
side of him but I really do miss TechTV.

~~~
treyp
You should catch up and starting watching the Gillmor Gang. Leo has some
respectable and well-informed opinions. He actually cares about technology,
not plugging himself.

------
jasonlbaptiste
If we're going to keep this on the frontpage, then Valleywag gets to come
back. Same kind of thing.

------
jneal
Thank god! I've been watching Leo Laporte on Twit Live for over a year, but I
recently stopped watching as much because every time I tuned in, I had to
watch the Gillmore Gang, and that guy always was such a douchebag and I could
not stand to here him belittle everyone and speak as if he was some god and
everyone else was just little peons. He was annoying, and made me even stop
watching Leo Laporte. Good riddance.

------
bbuffone
I usually listen to TWIT as a podcast, but this makes me want to tune into the
live feed to see if there is a follow up.

~~~
dennykmiu
I subscribe to TWIT and Macbreak Weekly. I enjoyed the panel members (which
are differently for the two shows, both the regular ones and the occasional).
But what I enjoy the most is Laporte himself. I like his style and the effort
that he puts in day in and day out to understand the technology. But mostly he
is a very generous person, never cut off his guests and always let them be the
experts. This is the first time that I have seen him standing up for himself
and I like it. Good going, Leo.

------
ivankirigin
This isn't important.

~~~
tptacek
Crazy weird to me that you think that. Some of the most respected institutions
in journalism are cratering --- when the NYT screws up, people make _movies_
about it --- and what we're left with are the agile, light-weight, utterly
unmoored web news outlets.

If we ran politics here, I'd be giving you the same rant about HuffPo and RCP.

But we run tech and entrepreneurship here, and if things break the wrong way
for us (and him, I guess), Michael Arrington could be the next Robert Moses.

~~~
mahmud
There goes the realest mofo on this forum.

People don't see this is what we're trading real journalism for. Diva bloggers
that have to be kissed up to.

------
pageman
755 comments and counting on Leo's ff:

[http://friendfeed.com/twit-conversations/1d37431c/live-
now-g...](http://friendfeed.com/twit-conversations/1d37431c/live-now-gillmor-
gang-with-steve-mike-arrington)

and it looks like Arrington's apology has been accepted:

"Thanks for the post, Mike. Apology accepted. Now that I know what was going
on in your mind, I apologize to you. There seems to be something about the
Gillmor Gang that just engenders over the top passion. I’m embarrassed by my
overreaction. Peace."

------
drawkbox
hrm, seems to me it could be a well played PR stunt. A Biggie vs. 2Pac or
Microsoft vs. Google type competition. Probably not but there is probability
that it is. If not they could use that for what it is worth.

~~~
drawkbox
Because the launch of a new phone, Techcrunch (Arrington) and Leo Laporte
(nice guy but still marketing) don't have anything in common with a PR
campaign or marketing campaign at all. Maybe Leo isn't guilty but Arrington
does try to get controversy going. Nothing wrong with that in the PR business
that he is in, TC does it well.

Judging by the reaction to this event and the response to my saying there is a
probability of a PR stunt, I would say stuff like this is easier to pull off
than you think.

