Indeed. But I've ranted elsewhere at my distress as someone who's been in Silicon Valley for more than a decade now, at the deteriorating state of industry media coverage and its descent in certain quarters towards soap opera status. Too many posts where the journalists make themselves the story, too much loss of objectivity.
People say "well Arrington did it", but I don't think he did. He was genuinely well connected from a long time in the valley. He was genuinely a trusted source. So his posts had insight and were very well written. Not right 100% of the time, in the opinions of many, I'm sure, but who is?
The gossipy nature is distressing. The Twitter squabbles between rival publications are often childish and unnecessary. But there are folks out there trying to build quality alternatives and I have no doubt that things will get better for industry coverage. That in itself may push TC back to quality - let's face it they still run great events and have a loud megaphone in the industry. Swapping that for TMZ-style pageview grasps sounds like an inferior business strategy for the long haul.
At least since the acquisition I've been saying that TC is (or had become) the TMZ of tech. There is nothing inherently valuable about their coverage, especially these days, and their position as vaunted tech journalists seems to me to be a case of a cultural Sunk-Cost Fallacy, Status Quo, or however you view the hope that past returns are an indicator of future performance.
People say "well Arrington did it", but I don't think he did. He was genuinely well connected from a long time in the valley. He was genuinely a trusted source. So his posts had insight and were very well written. Not right 100% of the time, in the opinions of many, I'm sure, but who is?
The gossipy nature is distressing. The Twitter squabbles between rival publications are often childish and unnecessary. But there are folks out there trying to build quality alternatives and I have no doubt that things will get better for industry coverage. That in itself may push TC back to quality - let's face it they still run great events and have a loud megaphone in the industry. Swapping that for TMZ-style pageview grasps sounds like an inferior business strategy for the long haul.