Why TechCrunch lives, and Valleywag dies
Valleywag is dead (or, at least, diminished), as CNET's Caroline McCarthy reports. About time. I used to like Valleywag, but then it started trying to drive page views by breaking "news" about the sex trade in Silicon Valley, trying to foment controversy around Peter Thiel's personal life, and so on.
When it broke news, even scandalous news, it was good. When it didn't, well, it wasn't.
Contrast that with TechCrunch. TechCrunch routinely breaks real news. It covers startups that matter (and many that don't). It has become an hourly read for me, as it offers content that I don't easily find elsewhere.
Is it unique in this? No. CNET breaks a lot of technology news and has done some interesting work with blogs (pats himself on the back), plus it remains a must-visit product reviews site. Nobody does general business news better than The Wall Street Journal. The Register? It provides a great deal of exceptional content with a fantastic, biting tone.
Valleywag? Increasing snide, decreasing substance. Owen Thomas did much better work while he was at Business 2.0. I like his writing. I just think he had to pander to the wrong elements at Valleywag. Hopefully we'll get the best of Valleywag (and Thomas) as it's folded into Gawker.
Matt Asay brings a decade of in-the-trenches open-source business and legal experience to The Open Road, with an emphasis on emerging open-source business strategies and opportunities. Matt is vice president of business development at Alfresco, a company that develops open-source software for content management. He is a member of the CNET Blog Network and is not an employee of CNET. Disclosure. You can follow Matt on Twitter @mjasay. 
I actually liked Valleyrag for a while until they started bringing that idiot prostitute blogger on board. My last straw was when she started attacking Sudhir Venkatesh and Owen and the cowards were to cowardly or ignorant to throttle her. At that point I went after them hard (who cares - little ole me). The funny thing is they cared, they could dish it out but they couldn't take it and the eventually they booted me off as a commenter.
In the end I think you could make a case study using those guys for all the ways not to build an internet super blog/news service.
If anyone wants to see my warped battle with those guys start with this thread and then go back to Day 1.
Hookernomics vs. Freakonmics
http://www.johnmwillis.com/valleywag/hookernomics-vs-freakonmics/
John
- by tcardone05 November 13, 2008 1:57 PM PST
- That and they get hits every time Arrington finds new Digg being sold rumors. Sometimes there are good articles on TechCrunch, between the OMG ill look at alexa charts and oh look a new startup just emailed me about their venture ones.
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