Okay Geek Farm
TechCrunch's Michael Arrington and Engadget's Joshua Topolsky nerd fight over the internet
Brandon Davenport
In late 2010, AOL bought TechCrunch for over $25 Million dollars in hopes of re-building their brand, and including them in their blogging network. Engadget, Switched, Joystiq and many other blogs have thrived being a part of AOL for the past few years, and TechCrunch was the icing on the cake — that is until Arrington decided to be a dick about it.
Why Mike Arrington hates Engadget
In December 2009, Engadget posted an article regarding TechCrunch suing Fusion Garage over JooJoo troubles. They pointed out that TechCrunch had done a horrible job playing “stupid” and claiming it wasn’t their fault. TechCrunch made the story out to be that Fusion Garage was a group of horrible people and TechCrunch was back-stabbed for no good reason — Engadget tore this apart and laid out the facts.
And that’s about the only reason why Arrington has been pissed at Engadget for 2 years. He’s mad because he was in the wrong, and he was called out for it — he recently published an article (everyone hated it) on why Engadget is a group of horrible people. Engadget is getting frustrated because this is such an immature thing to do, and no matter how they try to settle it, Arrington throws a fit. This proves to us that Mike Arrington alone could be the AOL blog network’s biggest problem.
Arrington is going to throw punches
In a recent article by Business Insider titled “AOL’S NEW PROBLEM: Mike Arrington”, Business Insider explains why Mike is poisoning what is already a great group of blogs. He is beginning to lash out at his own colleagues, and it isn’t healthy for AOL — Read the article
Arrington wasn’t a fan of the post and so thought he’d speak his mind about it int he comments section, which can be seen below:
Now Engadget is confused and frustrated
An interesting point is that Engadget has no prior relationship with TechCrunch, or Arrington himself. The story that they published back in December of ‘09 was just like any other article they would publish, and this is the first time anyone has raised a stink about it. Engadget’s Editor in Chief, Joshua Topolsky, published a lengthy article on his Tumblr explaining Engadget’s side of the story, and why they are getting increasingly frustrated with Arrington’s meaningless punches.
Topolsky answered a number of “questions” Arrington had for the Engadget team, and quite frankly it’s very humorous to see how childish this whole fight is. It’s hard to judge if Engadget did anything “wrong” (we would be doing the same thing), but it’s clear that Mike Arrington is off his rocker a bit — using TechCrunch as a megaphone for his soap-opera and insulting the people he works with.
Joshua Topolsky breaks it down
Arrington: Only start a fight if you really believe in what you’re saying
Topolsky: We did not start a fight. You did. Engadget covers technology and consumer electronics. We have all left high school long behind, and no one is interested in airing grievances (if we had any to begin with) in public. We are journalists covering news — hell, we don’t even consider ourselves a blog. Why do you think it would be important for us to know how to “start a fight?”
Arrington: More recently Engadget editor in chief Joshua Topolsky tried to kill our acquisition by AOL.
Topolsky: This is a lie. This did not happen. You can offer no proof of it happening because it did not occur. I can’t be any clearer: you are either making this up, or working off of some bad information.
Arrington: And for some strange reason Engadget writers and editors tend to troll our comments pointlessly.”
Topolsky: Engadget editor Laura June (who also happens to be my wife) left a comment on a TechCrunch post that said “Slow news day.” This same editor had joked with TechCrunch editor M.G. Siegler on Twitter about the phrase — both acknowledging that the phrase was humorous as it’s often seen by editors on sites with trolls in comments. The comment she left was meant as a lighthearted wink at a TechCrunch editor. Why else would she have used her name and Disqus profile? If you see this as an attack, I’m sorry. It wasn’t. If this is the impetus for your outbursts, rage-filled posts, and invention of facts, I’m at a loss for words.
Summary: This shouldn’t be the future of journalism
This is completely disgusting — the fact that Arrington feels the privilege to use TechCrunch as his own diary to tell us why he’s sad because Engadget is “mean” and everybody is out to get him. On the flip side, we have Josh who’s getting all worked up over someone he’s never met, like a kid out of high school. While it’s entertaining to watch them squabble go back and forth, this is completely unprofessional, stirring up drama that seemingly doesn’t need to be sandwhiched between coverage of gadgets and tech industry news. And I’m sure this isn’t helping the image of either party’s sites or their parent company, AOL.
