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Comment by alexandros | Hacker News Reader

This is getting tricky again... We now know that Ron Conway knew about the dinner beforehand. We also know that his partner did not want to attend, presumably because he knew the type of conversations that would be had. They talked and decided that David Lee should go.

To me it seems that what changed before&after the dinner, was the publicity it took, which switched Ron Conway from a 'wait&see' approach (at the very least) to the openly hostile approach we saw in the 'nuclear bomb' email.

While before this update I gave Ron the benefit of the doubt (not in small part due to pg vouching), it now seems that he was much less surprised than I thought.

My estimate that the 'nuclear' email was damage control intended to be publicised has just gone up.

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Isn't it also possible that Ron Conway and David Lee decided David should go because they didn't know what was going to go down, and then once they knew, Ron decided to distance himself from that group?

Of course it is. Nothing at all is certain when working with so little information, which is why I mentioned probabilities.

However, we know that two such dinners took place, and that David Lee was present at both. Also if they didn't know what was going to go down, why didn't David Lee want to go in the first place?

Again, we are only talking probabilities here, there is a huge amount we certainly don't know.

Another possibility: David Lee is the leak. It may have been Ron Conway suggesting he attend to see what was going on. Even if he isn't the leak I tend to think David Lee was there simply to find out what was happening for SV Angel, not having intent to form agreements.

What's the connection between Arrington and Conway? Someone told Mike about the meeting (as he wrote, he wasn't invited). Then someone told Arrington about the content of the meeting (Mike wasn't there). Connect the dots.

It's possible that Ron Conway intended to blow it up from the beginning, including his own plant there. But as it always happens the shrapnel takes the unexpected course. Consider this a badly botched operation.

This comment is under-voted based on its probability.

Keep in mind Michael Arrington said he talked to three different people who were at the meeting. It's possible David Lee was one of them. I have a hard time believing all Angels assembled were comfortable with the direction the meetings appeared to be taking. I think someone (possibly publicly defensive, and with a flamboyant writing style) had the bright idea to bring Angels together for mutually beneficial agreements to control market forces affecting them, but before things went very far things went public.

"Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity."

I think the simplest explanation is that Conway either wasn't aware of the agenda or wasn't aware of the scope of it. That would explain his regret for Lee being there.

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