
Content Everywhere, But Not A Drop To Drink - ssclafani
http://parislemon.com/post/17527312140/content-everywhere-but-not-a-drop-to-drink
======
rsobers
MG loves calling bullshit on people, but someone needs to call bullshit on him
this time.

If this were Android instead of iOS, MG would be condemning Google for
exposing the API. And if this were some obscure startup he didn't have a stake
in, he'd be lambasting them for being irresponsible and calling for an app
store ban. I would expect nothing less from him.

Clearly there's a conflict of interest here since MG is an investor in Path.
Either way, his defense of Path's behavior is itself completely asinine; so
much so that I'm surprise he was able to physically type the words.

They needed the data to "ease the connection building process." Bullshit. The
whole point of Path is that it's the anti-Facebook. That is, you only share
your Path with intimately close friends and family. If I can’t pick them out
of my address book myself, I've got problems a social app can’t solve. And, by
the way, how the hell is Path going to look at my address book and distinguish
my best friend from my plumber?

SSL? Bullshit. Just because Path was using SSL doesn't make up for the fact
that they were storing a copy of the data without telling the user. A server
breach is far more damaging than a man-in-the-middle attack. At the very
least, they should have informed the users of the risk they were taking.

"Other apps do it, too." Bullshit. That doesn't make it okay. There are plenty
of developers who could copy all sorts of data without you knowing. I'm sure
some do, but lots don't. It's a choice. You can choose whether or not to be
creepy.

I love MG's writing and I usually agree with what he says, but I think he's
letting his loyalties get in the way here, so much so that he’s willing to be
hypocritical.

~~~
dfxm12
_At the very least, they should have informed the users of the risk they were
taking... There are plenty of developers who could copy all sorts of data
without you knowing._

I think this is the whole crux of this issue. Hardly anything is private
anymore. Today, people are willing to share data, but they demand control^
over it. If you just ask for the data, people will give it most of the time
(especially when they went through the process of downloading your app and/or
creating an account for your service). It's when you start doing things in the
background that people start to question your motives & they feel like they
have been conned into doing something they shouldn't have. A little
transparency goes a long way.

^This is, of course, the hard part.

------
tatsuke95
> _And yet, very few people call bullshit on the bullshit._

Interesting, coming from a guy who (in my humble opinion) writes as much
bullshit as anybody, and actually moved to a personal blog that doesn't allow
commenting. You know, so that people can call him on his bullshit.

Ironically, this is probably the best MG piece I've read, as it describes
nicely how I've always felt about his TechCrunch writing.

~~~
unimpressive
I love it when blog authors have comments and then turn them off for pieces
where they got slammed for bullshitting.

~~~
Joakal
Hi! Welcome to Hacker News, please add something more substantive than just
reaffirming the post above yours. Posters like me want to actually read posts
that are informative, insightful, etc. So we would unfortunately downvote
posts like yours for not adding to the discussion.

~~~
unimpressive
I was actually referring to more than just MG here. I see this on publications
as prestigious as the New York Times. In an age where everyone has a voice,
the roar of the crowd hurts when it's yelling at _you_.

~~~
tatsuke95
I'll clarify, since the fellow above sounded a bit terse, but was entirely
sincere:

Unlike...99% of forums out there, HackerNews frowns on the "I agree" and
"this" type comments. I don't think that was your intention, but since only
high reputation posters can actually downvote, you'll get buried if your
comment is breviloquent. This has pros and cons, but is a net positive.

Anyway, welcome to HackerNews.

~~~
unimpressive
I've been a lurker for a while. I understand this. When I first made the
comment all the other comments were on this "MG is a hypocrite" meme, which I
wanted to steer the discussion from to a broader point of "Well you know,
theres a lot more blog authors out there who do something pretty similar."

In MG's defense, he himself admitted that he'd done the exact things he talks
about in the article.

I probably could have made that first point with a lot less snark. But
changing it now probably won't do much good.

------
Kylekramer
So, now that MG is now on the business end of the tech blog echochamber and
allowed at the big boys table where "people/startups are willing to share
information with me that they never would have when I was a blogger", it is
all bullshit, facts be damned, and lazy. Also, conveniently as a blogger who
has devoted himself to one company, apparently good writers can really only
know one or two companies at a time.

If MG had a modicum of self awareness, I'd buy it, but this just reads like a
high school senior who _knows_ the real secret dope about how the world works
and is just dying to tell you. And also a great example of changing the topic
rather than dealing with your/your company's mistakes head on.

------
snowwrestler
MG is right that much of what gets written in blogs and the press is BS.
That's a truth that is not confined to technology. And of course to MG it
seems like "it's getting worse"--from his perspective it is, because he is
crossing over to the other side of the information asymmetry.

It is an asymmetry that is purposefully and carefully maintained by businesses
and investors. MG himself could help better "align the sides" by simply
publishing or sharing this new info he is privy to. But he won't.

So I hesitate to lay all the blame at the feet of bloggers and journalists.
They are doing the best they can with the info they scrounge up or are given.

Daniel Ellsberg's meditation on the limits of knowledge is applicable to this
type of situation IMO.

[http://motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2010/02/daniel-ellsberg-
li...](http://motherjones.com/kevin-drum/2010/02/daniel-ellsberg-limitations-
knowledge)

------
justinlau
I do agree with the main thrust of article, but also think he and Michael are
big hypocrites for complaining about it. TC _is_ and _was_ the Fox News of
tech - all controversy and sensationalism, zero real discourse or educated
insights.

They helped make this beast.

------
dbappdev
It's all well and good for MG and Arrington to say these things, VCs aren't
the ones who're going to be called up to face the FTC. In all my dealings with
VC-types, they've tended to be pretty cavalier when it comes to advising
founders how to treat users' private data, maybe because they themselves
aren't really on the firing line. Hockey-stick growth is more important to
them; if the money comes, the fines will be paid and all will be well. This is
business. Sony's still making money, after all. And Facebook, look at
Facebook! Just look at that S-1 glow! I'm blinded, that's for sure.

But founders and fellow entrepreneurs, we need to hash this out internally
(pardon the pun): Sure, harvesting address books can gain you explosive
growth, but at what eventual cost? Can you really sleep at night? George opted
in to address book sharing to find his friends in your shiny new app, but he
didn't really think that his CEO would get a push notification saying
"'GeorgeTheFurryStud' would like to talk to you!" when his CEO eventually
signed up. Even if you're using SSL, even if you're hashing addresses (which
isn't a cure-all, being able to intuit connections divulges _a lot_ of info),
are your servers really that secure? And what if you're not Facebook? It's
highly unlikely that you're even in the league (no offense, none of us are).

Either way, politics is afoot here. Would advise other founders and developers
to do what they believe is right & lawful, and not bow to pressure or any of
this "no one cares about privacy" stuff, 'cause while the money guys and gals
may lose a little investment, we're ultimately responsible for our companies'
actions. It's us (and our companies, and our users, and our team) on the line
here.

------
benologist
Now that MG quit TC it's just not cool to spew out garbage on your quest for
pageviews!

------
warmfuzzykitten
What are those dozens of apps that do the same thing? That would be a good
story!

------
brandnewlow
I went to journalism school and spent a little time afterwards writing for
money before taking an entrepreneurial tack.

A year or so into that, I realized it was really hard to take seriously any
business reporting that wasn't coming from someone who had actually run a
business or startup reporting from someone who had actually started a company.
My journalist friends would cry foul, but unless you've been the person faced
with the daunting task of "finding a market" for a new product or "scaling a
sales channel" after one's been discovered, I'm not going to pay too much heed
to your criticisms of others efforts to do so.

I think that's what Mr. Siegler is getting at when he says he now realizes all
the tech writing out there is full of crap. Some of the bloggers out there own
their operations and have built real businesses out of it and so have a lot of
authority when it comes to writing about other companies. This does not
describe many of the contributors I see on major blogs though, so I take their
posts with a grain of salt.

~~~
puppybeard
I agree with you, and MG Siegler, by extension, that most tech writing is
crap. The best writing I've seen is always by technical professionals, rather
than journalists assigned to write about technology. However I count Siegler
as in the latter camp. He's a fanboy and he's never built anything.

With his article above he's saying "this criticism of a company I'm involved
with isn't valid, because these people aren't technically expert". That's
wrong because you don't need to be a technical expert to value and appreciate
personal privacy, which is the key issue. It's also hypocritical, because he's
not a technical expert himself. Like the people he complains about, he makes
his money from hype generated around products, without being capable of making
his own product.

------
aba_sababa
I agree, and I don't even read Techcrunch. For me, what really hits home is
all the _advice_ you can get about entrepreneurship, and startups, and
winning, and whatnot - and you're starting to get it from kids who literally
have no idea what they're talking about, who have never actually started a
company, and who are doing nothing more than spouting some kind of Jobsian
rhetoric mixed with a dash of old Paul Graham essays.

But everyone wants to be influential, and everyone wants to be read, and the
best way to get read is to write what people want to hear, and your writing
doesn't need to be especially introspective or well-revised in order to give
people their five-minute content fix.

------
hoi
I agree with the sentiment that it's all about pageviews. The people who focus
on the company and get to spend time to write on it are usually analysts
rather than journalists or bloggers. They're goal is not pageviews because the
content is usually not geared towards mass market and would be focused at
niche audiences.

------
puppybeard
tl;dr = "Company Not That Bad, says man working for Investment Fund with stake
in the First Company" Let's not question that source!

TechCrunch has the most punchable "journalists" I've ever seen, not including
tabloids. As for one of their people accusing others of writing shit just for
the pageviews, that's staggeringly hypocritical.

Also CrunchFund is a scam. Hire a popular hack, pay him to talk up a new
venture, guaranteed business. It's as ethical as insider trading. Bad shit.
Leads to lots of crappy "me-too" startups doing better than they deserve.

------
jjude
Scott Adams calls this High Ground Maneuver:
<http://dilbert.com/blog/entry/high_ground_maneuver/>

------
defrost
Water, water, every where,

And all the boards did shrink;

Water, water, every where,

Nor any drop to drink.

^^^

Is there a word for alluding to a classic as though you've read it and yet
mangling it enough to broadcast that you haven't?

~~~
SkyMarshal
I'm pretty sure even if he'd read it he'd still mangle it. MG's not exactly
known for his prose, just his unapologetic opinions and perhaps connections.

------
JohnQPasserby
I wish I had a machine that would search articles for phrases like "my
CrunchFund partner Michael Arrington" and mark the article as 100% not
credible.

