Arianna Huffington, queen of all media

I have only met Arianna Huffington once. I remember it vividly but my guess is she doesn’t remember it much at all, which says volumes about both of us. The scene was surreal. Huffington and I were in Larry Flynt’s office in Los Angeles, participating in an experimental online talk show Larry was trying to distribute over the Internet. Our topic for the moment was gun control: I was conflicted while Huffington was violently opposed to guns, citing their danger to children, which she thought should over-rule any constitutional argument.  I made a point and she replied with the motherhood card, “Well you obviously […]

Crunch Time at AOL

TechCrunch, a company made up of tech blogs somewhat like this one as well as classified advertising and some events, announced its sale last week to the new-old AOL for a price widely, broadly, and deeply rumored to be $30 million. Nobody will officially confirm this price but I have no reason to believe $30 million is wrong. It is way too high, but it probably isn’t wrong. The better question is why would AOL pay TechCrunch four times what it is actually worth?

I think I know why.

Since I am not known as an equity analyst, you might wonder what makes me believe that TechCrunch is worth only a quarter of the rumored […]