Arrington Plays His Nuclear Option Against the NY Times
betabeat.comI'm all in favor of disclosure, so bad on the Times here etc. All the same, if we accept that there's an utterly subjective continuum between "appearance of conflict" and "actual full raging conflict impacting journalistic coverage" I would place the Times at the former end and TechCrunch at the latter.
Mike Arrington has played his "nuclear card"
Nowhere in the extensive coverage of Crunchfund or the op-ed scolding by David Carr did the NY Times mention that it was an investor in True Ventures.
Ironically, the NY Times even lumped GigaOm and Om Malik into its list of conflicted bloggers.
Do the Times tech/media reporters and editors stand to personally gain or lose from this investment?
I'm guessing as editorial employees they're completely separated from any kind of investment decisions made by NYT corporate.
Regardless, NYTimes should have a robust system to prevent covered persons from reporting on matters in which they are related.
Childlike logic. Just because someone else is doing something wrong doesn't give you license to do it too. Arrington should have brought it up as an issue, not used it as a trump card.
What's so "nuclear" about it?
At best, it's an "interesting tidbit" that might cause a bit of embarrassment to the Times.