Valleywag: Joyce Kim

Jason Calacanis-Kevin Rose catfight devolves into pussyfest

Tim Faulkner — Fri, 03 Aug 2007 11:16:11 PDT

Jason Calacanis and Kevin Rose, interviewed together on the second episode of the GigaOm Show? Of course, the "fur would fly" — or so hosts Om Malik and Joyce Kim promised. Despite recent photographic evidence of a peace accord, Calacanis did, after all, try to undercut Kevin Rose's Digg social-news site with a revamped Netscape during his short tenure at AOL. So, did the claws come out?

Sorry, that's a big no. Of course, much of the feud was actually in the minds of Digg users and not the two entrepreneurs. Any animosity between the Web luminaries was simply "shit talking," as Rose put it on the show, not personal. But Calacanis and Rose are known for being outspoken and opinionated, and their approaches to business couldn't be more different. Surely, the two would inject some much-needed spice into the staid program — if only for their good friends Malik and Kim, Calacanis's sister-in-law.

Instead, the most contentious point of the interview came when Calacanis made this statement:

Netscape wasn't just a copy of Digg. It basically built on it. It did a lot of things that were much more innovative than Digg had done to date. And you've told me that before.

Kevin immediately interrupted. He couldn't allow Calacanis to declare Netscape more innovative than Digg. Nor could he allow his followers to believe that he had agreed to such a claim and had told Calacanis so himself. But rather than arguing the point, Rose just made a semantic shift:

Well, I think it's a different direction ... I don't think I'd call it ... yeah, it's a different direction.

What's the matter, boys? Too pussy to even agree to disagree? This wasn't a catfight; it was two kittens pawing at each other. When Kim called on the two to critique Pownce and Mahalo, the pair's respective new ventures, they just purred praise at each other.

Malik should be ashamed of himself. If he can't deliver on a simple catfight, then he's sure to lose his audience to the Valley's new sex kittens.

Horny Michael Arrington's new lust object

Owen Thomas — Thu, 02 Aug 2007 10:14:41 PDT

It appears that Michael Arrington is no longer devastated by the abrupt departure on Tuesday of Julia Allison, the New York-based TV commentator he'd begged to stay in town after she flew in for his TechCrunch9 party. The TechCrunch editor has found a new lust object: Morgan Webb, host of WebbAlert, yet another online tech-news show with a busty host in the vein of Rocketboom. After the jump, the hilarious homina-homina that the horny hetero slipped into his review.

Says Michael Arrington:

As an aside, she's also fairly hot — Webb's pictures have been in FHM and Maxim magazine, and in April she was voted the 51st sexiest woman in the world in a FHM survey.

Well, folks, now you know the real way to get your startup into TechCrunch. You don't have to send flowers, or show up unannounced at Arrington's doorstep. You just have to have long hair and a killer rack. Valley foxes, take note.

"How many of these ghastly tech reports can anyone watch?" asks a friend of Valleywag. One, of course — the one with the hottest chick. WebbAlert is sure to do some damage — to, say, the GigaOm Show. Blogger Om Malik, with his face for radio and voice for magazines, just can't compete with the likes of Morgan Webb, even with comely cohost Joyce Kim.

To save his show, Malik should turn it over completely to Kim. And he'd better do it soon. More competition is on the way: We hear that NakedNews.com is launching NakedTechNews.com. Now that's sure to get an Arrington review.

Jason Calacanis and Kevin Rose make nice for Om Malik

Megan McCarthy — Fri, 27 Jul 2007 14:41:23 PDT

What on earth could bring together supposed mortal enemies Kevin Rose and Jason Calacanis? Why, Om Malik, of course. Rose is the founder of Digg, and Calacanis, the blowhard entrepreneur who created a Digg clone when he was an executive at AOL. But love has conquered all that. First, there's Malik, the cuddly tech blogger, a friend to all. And, perhaps more importantly, there's Malik's stunning cohost for his new Internet TV show, "The GigaOm Show." Lawyer-turned-videoblogger Joyce Kim, you see, is Calacanis's sister-in-law. Family trumps all. The four were among the stars at a launch party that Revision3, Rose's online-video company, threw for Malik and Kim Wednesday night in the tower of San Francisco's de Young Museum. (Revision3 is producing and distributing the show.) New Revision3 CEO Jim Louderback looks like a weatherman and talks extremely loudly. (My boss has nicknamed him "Jumpin' Jim Louderback.") After the jump, a gallery of photos from the glitzy affair.

(Photo of Calacanis, Kim, and Rose by Scott Beale/Laughing Squid)