Digg: TechCrunch Bails on Arrington Web 2.0 Fave
NEWS FLASH: Kevin Rose is a Digg has been, pedaling a “used” Digg, but no takers!
Michael TechCrunch Arrington began the year by piling on the Digg worship, he closes it though by bailing on the Web 2.0 turnkey startup that he famously warned would disintermediate the New York Times!
Arrington shared that he “couldn’t live without Digg” in January. He confided:
Anyone who reads this blog knows my position on Digg, where users pick what news makes it to the home page. It’s the future of news, and the most disruptive force to mainstream media since blogs were born. Digg has to continue to battle spam while pleasing its most active users, which won’t be easy. But I use the Digg site every day.
Digg battles spam? Like the 10 Digg accounts Arrington himself has fessed up to?
At the 2006 Future of Web Apps Summit, Arrington glowed that Digg was the Web 2.0 startup he would most like to be join the executive ranks of.
In March of 2006, Arrington signaled “the power of Digg” as a “significant social force.” In congratulating Digg on its 2nd birthday last December, Arrington consulted his crystal ball to announce: “Digg investors are going to make a boatload of money.”
Last summer, on the eve of the launch of Digg 3.0, Arrington declared “Digg is looking more and more like the newspaper of the Web and is challenging even the New York Times on page views.” I challenged Arrington on THAT comparison!
Last March, Arrington went to bat for the Kevin Rose phenomenon,” asserting “Wired Magazine seems hell bent on convincing the world that Digg is falling apart”:
My problem is Wired isn’t simply reporting news about Digg. They’re making the news. And they’re going negative. Wired isn’t just reporting Digg news - they are actively engaged in using Wired to undermine Digg.
Arrington’s handy chameleon Web personality, however, has been jumping on the “negative” Digg boat as well, though, as I chronicle in Who Needs Digg? We Got Twitter, Stumpleupon, Facebook…
Today’s who needs Digg TechCrunch post, penned by lieutenant Riley, takes the about face Digg cake: “For sale, used social voting site, asking price $300 million, goes by the name of Digg”:
If anybody has a spare $300 million and would like to buy Digg, Allen & Company’s contact details are here.
Arrington is “obsessive” about profiling Web 2.0 startups, but carefree in annointing Web 2.0 winners, even those he himself founds and puts money in. The Arrington track record is on a (bad) roll.
What TechCrunch effect? Edgeio, anyone? SEE: Edgeio Web 2.0 Bomb: Michael TechCrunch Arrington Cheers $5 million Startup Loss
ALSO: Gawker: Will Nick Denton PAY For Media Respectability? and Google Knol: The End of Google.com, NOT Wikipedia and Google Zeitgeist: $200 University Payola AdWords Scam and Google Warning: How GOOG 411 Tricks Consumers and Why Facebook Will NEVER Kill LinkedIn