Gawker: valleywag, howard lindzon

Henry Blodget's family feud

Owen Thomas — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 19:20:00 EDT

Why did disgraced stock analyst Henry Blodget post a long email by Mahalo CEO Jason Calacanis to Silicon Alley Insider, and then take it down? There's the obvious reason: Calacanis hadn't given permission for it to be republished. But Silicon Alley Insider has reprinted Calacanis's emails before. We think it more has to do with the fight that broke out in the comments between Calacanis and Howard Lindzon, a Phoenix, Ariz. hedge-fund manager who owns a piece of Blodget's blog. Could it be that Calacanis's copyright gave Blodget a convenient excuse to unpublish the piece — an item that was generating ill will between one of his investors and a startup CEO whom Blodget thought it expedient to suck up to?

If so, the peacemaking attempt failed. Lindzon has made no secret of his dislike for Calacanis, on his blog and on Twitter after Twitter after Twitter. In a post discussing the bailout, Lindzon gratuitously dissed Calacanis as someone who "started a bad business (Mahalo.ugh) at the top and now is scared and panicking to his e-mail list." Calacanis extended an olive branch:

Actually, we agree that value is built in the down market. There is less competition for talent, customers and market share in down markets, so it is the ideal time to start. However, many of the A/B round Web 2.0 companies are going to run out of cash before they get to the promised land, and my email newsletter was a to try and help those folks who are struggling.

Lindzon replied:

Actually, stay off my blog.

Does staying off Lindzon's blog include Silicon Alley Insider? No wonder Blodget, always eager to please, would just as soon stay out of this fight.

Jason Calacanis missive unpublished by Silicon Alley Insider

Jackson West — Mon, 29 Sep 2008 06:00:00 EDT

It's Mahalo founder Jason Calacanis's world, we just have the misfortune of living in it. The former Silicon Alley Reporter publisher decided to quit blogging, instead opting to send out his verbose fonts of wisdom as emails. Take his latest 2,948-word missive, "(The) Startup Depression" — claiming that anywhere from half to four in five startups will fail thanks to the current economic crisis (or at least, will blame their failure on the economy). Apparently Calacanis asked that the post be taken down. Because of a principled stand for intellectual property? Because SAI's publisher was getting the pageviews and Mahalo wasn't? Or because Calacanis can't take the heat in a public forum? The fight that broke out in the comments between Wallstrip creator Howard Lindzon, Blodget and serial entrepreneur Scott Rafer suggests the latter.

Awesome.

New York VCs know their bathrooms, bars

Nicholas Carlson — Tue, 29 Jan 2008 14:24:34 EST

So you're after venture capital and you want to know as much as possible about your potential investors before making your pitch. You could try following them on Twitter. But you might learn more than you wanted to.

"Howard twitters about bathrooms, I twitter about bars and my buddies twitter about drinking coffee," venture capital associate Kristian Hansen explains in a blog post ostensibly written to analyze Twitter's business prospects. (The Howard in question is Wallstrip founder Howard Lindzon, who runs a VC firm on the side.) "I am not sure what else you could really do with this service," Hansen concludes. Sure you are, Kristian. Trash Iminlikewithyou founder Charles Forman, of course!

A loyalty program without much mileage

Tim Faulkner — Mon, 01 Oct 2007 14:45:34 EDT

According to Mike Lazerow, the founder of Buddy Media, creator of Facebook application AceBucks, his company's virtual-currency service is just misunderstood. The "boo birds" just don't get it. Lazerow & Co. aren't competing with PayPal, Facebook's own rumored micropayment system, Beenz, or Flooz. Acebucks is not a payment processor and its not an online currency that translates into real goods or real money. So what the hell is it? It's a "loyalty program." In other words, it's a frequent-flier program — without the free plane trips, though. Remind us why Peter Thiel, Mark Pincus, Howard Lindzon, and other net bigwigs invested $1.5 million in this company?

Blogging Times expires

Chris Mohney — Tue, 27 Feb 2007 16:00:26 EST

1938 Media notes that the Blogging Times, a well-intentioned weak sister of blog news, has apparently vanished. Nothing there but a Wordpress default page; archives gone too. With founder Minic Rivera now ensconced in the carapace of the Blog Herald, one assumes that BT owner Howard Lindzon is focusing on his more successful Wallstrip vlog. Not much breathable atmosphere in the blog-news space, and there are a lot of throats gasping for the little available air.