Web 3.0: From AOL to TechCrunch, NYC Takes Center Stage
Michael TechCrunch Arrington shares his Silicon Valley pulpit? IN SILICON ALLEY!
On the very eve of Arrington’s block buster TechCrunch40 in San Francisco, I predicted: “Web 3.0: Madison Avenue Money Trumps TechCrunch Cool Apps,” following AOL’s rechristening of Manhattan as the new media capital of the world.
The power of the media power center that is NYC was evident last evening: High-powered publishing execs partied up a Web 2.0 video storm as I reported, first-hand, earlier this morning in: TurnHere Video Gets the Book Marketing Party Started: EXCLUSIVE
Arrington, himself, sees the New York virtual writing on the wall, as he has tapped Erick Schonfeld to fill a new TechCrunch role–”co-editor”–straight from the Big Apple.
Can there really be two Mikes, though? Arrington has always shared his TechCrunch stage with other writers who develop their own TechCrunch personalities. But is a co-Mike really posssible: He IS uniquely Arrington, after all, with all his charm and foibles.
Notaby absent in Arrington’s announcement that the veteran of the now defunct Business 2.0 “big media” publication would be the latest and greatest TechCruncher was any talk of the addition of a “real” journalist to the “weblog.”
While Arrington was long on professional acolades for his new editorial partner, he indicated that the main editorial hole Schonfeld would fill is a video coverage one.
(Of note, I headlined last week: YouTube: Hillary Clinton Gets It, What About TechCrunch?)
A Business 2.0 veteran/refugee heading to the blogosphere is not a new story: Om Malik set out on his own to create a new brand, while Owen Thomas and Schonfeld have taken the easier way out by joining established players, Valleywag and TechCrunch, respectively.
I have taken the same route Malik did: After 1500 posts under the Digital Markets banner for CNET’s ZDNet, I set out on my blogging own, straight from the heart of Manhattan. I am having a blast and also aim to build out my personal brand, as Om has done.
Malik said of Thomas’ going to Valleywag in June: “Nick Denton has been looking for a seasoned journalist to edit and manage Valleywag for sometime.” General blogosphere reaction had Thomas raising the journalistic standards of the “rag.”
Thomas did not meet the hyped professional expectations, however. Out of the Valleywag gate he got basic Google facts wrong in a Google “lies” piece and subsequently caved to Google and Google fan boy pressure to change his story, which itself was a derivative of original reporting done by USA Today. SEE: Valleywag: Lots of Ham, Where’s the Beef?
In July, he single handedly carried on a public charade about how “Angry mob gathers outside SF datacenter,” as I chronicle in Valleywag Breakdown: Drunken Imagination.
What about Schonfeld at TechCrunch? An added “journalistic” punch to TechCrunch, or just more of TechCrunch’s “obsessively profiling and reviewing new Internet products and companies.”
If Schonfeld’s coverage of TechCrunch40 is any indication, the TechCrunch we know and love will not look dramatically different.
ALSO: Mint.com: Can Arrington and Calacanis Really Set Web 2.0 Trends? and Got Ethics? Google Rats Lured by TechCrunch Trap