TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington presents "tactical-level advice on getting press for your startup" in this full-length video from Omnisio of his Stanford speech Saturday. His level of candor (or "transparency" in Valleyspeak) surprised even me. He openly admits to playing quid pro quo with his sources — you supply the exclusives, he provides the fawning coverage to show investors. Journalists might sniff at Arrington's ethical judgment, but it works for him — as long as startups play by his rules. All this reminds me of Europe's last great monarch.

Update: Like any good court Jester, we've recontextualized Arrington's remarks to serve our own postmodern fun-poking purposes, excising much footage for brevity — and playfully misrepresenting what was left of his earnest advice for hilarity.

Louis XIV, the French king, gathered the nobles of France to Versailles, rewarding them with attention while robbing them of real power. For those outside the Web 2.0 scene, Arrington's rules must seem as baroque as the Sun King's court: Link to TechCrunch relentlessly on your blog and follow Arrington on Twitter, and he might grant you the imprimatur of a TechCrunch mention. Watch the whole speech, but replace Arrington's oft-repeated invocations of "community" with "noble court" — it makes much more sense. What's the fate of those who transgress against his sense of proper manners, or worse, refuse to kowtow entirely? No guillotine; he just blocks you on Twitter, a punishment which he believes to be the ultimate in ruthless dismissal.

Arrington's delusions of grandeur aren't so worrisome — a dash of humility and a vacation on another continent would fix that. What's scary is the collective fantasy shared by entrepreneurial true believers who honestly think they're destined to save civilization by monetizing pageviews on social networks. Decisions made in a bubble, whether it's the royal palace in Versailles, or a TechCrunch comments thread, veer toward groupthink, engender cults of personality and end in wild speculation and heavy losses. The Sun King's scheme worked for a while, but didn't it end with a monarch losing his head?

5:00 PM on Mon Apr 21 2008
By Jackson West
2,235 views
14 comments

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raincoaster at 05:53 PM on 04/21/08
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See also: recent Perez Hilton scandale. At least Arrington doesn't allow people to be deluded into thinking emailing him nekkid pictures will lead to a link.

Perez links to NO-ONE! nekkid or not.
KyleShank at 06:33 PM on 04/21/08
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+1 for mentioning King Louie and Web 2.0 in the same post.
ResearchZilla at 06:51 PM on 04/21/08
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hah! if arrington were playing a role in the john adams' series, i do believe he'd be hamilton...
categorically at 07:15 PM on 04/21/08
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Let them eat cake!
SnarkTard at 07:52 PM on 04/21/08
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Arrington is the bitch, but doesn't embrace criticism, is that right?
giania at 07:54 PM on 04/21/08
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@KyleShank
Seconded!
The illusions of proximity to other people via the internet, perceived prestige, and a good bit of posturing tends to give people funny social notions. Perhaps those that fawn over the Arringtons of this world feel as though they are in fact as privileged as those invited into a royal court when they're, linked to, mentioned, spoken (down) to or even snubbed.

The day I realized I had as much of a shot as any of these other shmoes at "moving up" in this fast-paced social gambit people dare to call media and business? They day I got linked to by Valleywag. True story.
michaellamb at 08:02 PM on 04/21/08
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who cares if you are mentioned on techcrunch? no one. here's why:
a) half the VCs pretend to be suitably impressed, but behind closed doors they roll their eyes - they know he plays for pay and is in no way an unbiased news source of any type
b) he has no track record to speak of, so other than getting some pages views for a day or two (and from most companies it's not sticky, it's just a spike with little residual value/ no long tail from TC)

What it can do is if you can get this circle rolling:
Arrington -> Center Networks -> Mathew Ingram -> Calacanis -> Scoble -> Digg -> Techmeme, then you get actually start to get people's attention, but it's so contrived and such.

I love whoever's video it was about asking people if they know Flickr for god's sake. I thought my grandma knew Flickr. People on the street were like "lolwut?"
Michael Arrington at 08:18 PM on 04/21/08
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Jackson, I hate to tug on your leash, but you've taken me out of context here. My message was one of quid pro quo, and since I practice what I preach, every TechCrunch article tomorrow will contain a link back to Valleywag.
Keymaster at 10:13 PM on 04/21/08
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Maybe if every Valleywag article links to TechCrunch tomorrow then Google will consider the two a link farm and delist them both.

Take one for the team, Owen!
masterofmonkeys at 11:16 PM on 04/21/08
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@Michael Arrington: Thanks, and I'll fling some shit your way, too.
Caligo at 12:02 AM on 04/22/08
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This answers your question about the timing on Six Apart's announcement: timed to fill a slot in Arrington's forward schedule for weekened competition posts, in return for lovin.
Ted Dziuba at 08:27 AM on 04/22/08
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This from the guy who tried to hire me. Right.
Michael Arrington at 08:52 AM on 04/22/08
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@Ted Dziuba: You're fired!
Troll_2.0 at 06:57 PM on 04/23/08
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@Michael Arrington: You smell.