It's not the first time he's published then tried to delete when it was trouble. Remember the tweets about hoping the police beat the shit out of the g20 protestors or the hitler 'joke'? I'm not so sure he's not a bad person. He's certianly an idiot.
Eddy
· 4 months ago
His editor, who should know better as a seasoned journo, was also laying the guilt on rather thick in his appeals for deletions. Milo is learning the Butcher ways, and it ain't a good thing.
Mike Butcher
· 4 months ago
You know what, you're exactly right. We shouldn't have asked people to delete Tweets and Twitpics, but whether you believe it or not, I'll go to my grave knowing that I actually wanted to try and limit the damage to James' position. Unfortunately - if you read our post - the post in question was deleted after publication leaving us unable to amend what had gone out on the feed. The apology came from me as editor, because I carry the can for what appears on TC Europe. I'd like to re-iterate what you just said: "Remember about when Bloomberg published that Steve Jobs obituary? We had a chuckle, they retracted it, we said silly Bloomberg and then we moved on." Wise words.
Danny
· 4 months ago
I'm almost glad this has happened in some ways, as it seems to be bringing issues to the fore that have been bubbling under for a while concerning Techcrunch's influence in the UK tech scene and the quality of their reporting and the way they conduct themselves,
Well done to Utku for writing this, and I think I speak for a lot of people who wish they could pen something similar but daren't because they work for a startup company that relies, to some degree, on TC.co.uk for exposure etc, as it's one of the few channels available to them.
I think it's fair to say that Techcrunch.co.uk's influence is largely borrowed from their sister site in America. They have not earned their position as the 'most influential blog in Europe', they have adopted it. And I think there's a risk associated with that artificial ascension that leads to lacksidasical errors like we've seen today.
Personally I can't stand the laregely cynical, negative, and snarky tone that TC employs. I think the UK tech industry deserves better. I think TC needs some valid competition to make it wake up and start trying harder. And I think with the recent additions of Milo Yiannopoulos and Paul Carr we're seeing the beginning of a UK tech 'Old Boy Network' that makes me very sad indeed.
Until that valid competition arrives my position is going to be what it has been for the past few months: delete TC.co.uk from my RSS reader, don't visit the site at all, don't rise to the bait by leaving comments on the actual site, and stop following them on Twitter. This isn't hard to do, and the more people who do it, the easier it gets, and the more TC will have to sit up and take notice.
Mike Butcher
· 4 months ago
Danny - I'm sorry you dislike our reporting. I'm actually a lot more open to this debate than you might think. TechCrunch Europe is run pretty much as it's own entity in Europe. I'd also like to assure you that this was not a "lacksidasical" error we take lightly - that's why I published our apology. I think that if we were quite as arrogant as you make out then we wouldn't have bothered, no? I don't know what startup you're with but we do our best to cover the market. There are in fact plenty of other outlets these days, compared to two years ago when we launched. But feel free to get in touch.
Duncan Riley
· 4 months ago
One small little hitch, or should that be gaping hole in the story: the post was indexed in Google Blog Search. Not the RSS feed, THE POST. Google Blog search doesn't index RSS feeds, it spiders the site itself (as does Google News, although it's quicker.) There's no technical hitch here, only human error (someone hit PUBLISH.) They should just all own up to the mistake and move along.
Mike Butcher
· 4 months ago
Duncan - It actually looks like - we're just checking this, but this is the most likely candidate - that the publication occurred as a result of it being saved as draft via the WordPress for BlackBerry app. Either a pre-set on the app we weren't aware of, or a bug, set the post to publish last night. Like I said we're still checking, but we're pretty sure this is going to turn out to be the source of why this post went live without us realising until it was too late. So, cock-up, not conspiracy. Yes, I know some will now argue that this is just "convenient" but as I've said all along, this was not an intentional publication, and we're simply trying to make amends.
spinach
· 4 months ago
But it's not comparable to Bloomberg and Jobs.
It's Milo.
And that's the *only* reason this one has kicked off the way it has. Because of his own personal track record in recent months. You get what you give. And the spraygun of shit that he's been firing around him has just ended up pointing in his own direction.
All Comments
Well done to Utku for writing this, and I think I speak for a lot of people who wish they could pen something similar but daren't because they work for a startup company that relies, to some degree, on TC.co.uk for exposure etc, as it's one of the few channels available to them.
I think it's fair to say that Techcrunch.co.uk's influence is largely borrowed from their sister site in America. They have not earned their position as the 'most influential blog in Europe', they have adopted it. And I think there's a risk associated with that artificial ascension that leads to lacksidasical errors like we've seen today.
Personally I can't stand the laregely cynical, negative, and snarky tone that TC employs. I think the UK tech industry deserves better. I think TC needs some valid competition to make it wake up and start trying harder. And I think with the recent additions of Milo Yiannopoulos and Paul Carr we're seeing the beginning of a UK tech 'Old Boy Network' that makes me very sad indeed.
Until that valid competition arrives my position is going to be what it has been for the past few months: delete TC.co.uk from my RSS reader, don't visit the site at all, don't rise to the bait by leaving comments on the actual site, and stop following them on Twitter. This isn't hard to do, and the more people who do it, the easier it gets, and the more TC will have to sit up and take notice.
It's Milo.
And that's the *only* reason this one has kicked off the way it has. Because of his own personal track record in recent months. You get what you give. And the spraygun of shit that he's been firing around him has just ended up pointing in his own direction.