TechCrunch Needed A Publicity Stunt
Mark Pannell | July 17, 2009In May of this year, a resourceful hacker was able to pierce the veil of Twitter’s secrecy, obtaining some 310 confidential documents along the way. The hacker was able to gain access to a Twitter employee’s Google Apps account where the sensitive material resided. According to Twitter founder Biz Stone, the intrusion “speaks to the importance of following good personal security guidelines such as choosing strong passwords.” Although the documents were procured two months ago, they were finally sent to TechCrunch on Wednesday. Never one to be accused of having a strong moral compass, TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington made this statement initially:
There is clearly an ethical line here that we don’t want to cross, and the vast majority of these documents aren’t going to be published, at least by us. But a few of the documents have so much news value that we think it’s appropriate to publish them.
The general consensus from TechCrunch’s readership in the comments was that they should not publish the stolen documents. In a follow-up post, Arrington even acknowledges the wishes of his readers. But he was not to be swayed from his decision. He had this to say in said post:
It’s not our fault that Google has a ridiculously easy way to get access to accounts via their password recovery question. It’s not our fault that Twitter stored all of these documents and sensitive information in the cloud and had easy-to-guess passwords and recovery questions. We’ve been sitting in the office for eight hours now debating what the right thing to do is in this situation. We’ve spoken with our lawyers. We’ve spoken with Twitter. And we’ve heard what our readers have to say. All of that factors in to our decision on what to post or not to post.
And post they did. Earlier tonight, TechCrunch unleashed a wealth of confidential information from the stolen Twitter documents. But the cherry on top was the fact that Arrington fancied himself a martyr for doing so, as seen in the screenshot below.
So what are we to gather from this? That he sacrificed in some way for the future of journalism? That’s a little arrogant, even for somebody like Michael Arrington. This had nothing to do with ethics, morals, or any other buzzwords that scream, “I wouldn’t have done that.” Sensationalist journalism is usually good for traffic in short runs. And TechCrunch needed traffic in short runs. Why? To prevent slipping even further into second place behind rival Mashable.
Very interesting conclusion – I don’t think it’s likely to be far off.
@endcycle
I could be way off base, but it just struck me as odd timing.
I doubt it has much to do with Mashable. However, TechCrunch is the TMZ of tech startups so it’s not surprising. They get some great leads and break some good stories but the journalism is nothing to brag about.
Haha. TechCrunch really is the TMZ of tech journalism, aren’t they? Granted, should any of this really surprise us? We’re dealing with the man who said this:
“From now our new policy is to break every embargo. We’ll happily agree to whatever you ask of us, and then we’ll just do whatever we feel like right after that. We may break an embargo by one minute or three days. We’ll choose at random.”
So true. For journalism, sensationalism is almost everything.
I agree. Sensationalism = page views.
Well your screen shot just proves he is in it for the MONEY.
He has no credibility and he might have had some hits to his site. Because no news is bad news but BAD news is never bad. Isn’t that right?
He jump started the conversation and even though he lacks credibility he is still being talked about. Vicious cycle we live in.
Well I think he deserves what ever happens to him. You should NOT be arrogant about something which was hacked into in the first place. Plus, you shouldn’t print stolen material. I don’t care if you are a blogger, joe schmo or anyone. Stolen things should NOT be printed EVER. Common sense should kick in.
Eh. I’m not sure he did it for the money. I think Arrington was probably doing quite well financially before Twittergate. If my Mashable theory is correct, it probably had more to do with his competitive spirit than monetary gain.
I also don’t agree that he has no credibility. Michael is an extremely intelligent man. There’s a reason TechCrunch is one of the most read blogs in the world. I don’t agree with his decision to publish the documents, but I have the utmost respect for his career trajectory.
We all knew that he would eventually publish at least some of the documents as soon as they fell into his hands. I would call his ethics into question any day of the week. With that said, I would love to spend a day learning from him. Kind of a Catch 22, huh?