Ask YC: How to get TechCrunch'd?

I think the person suited best to answer this question would be Mike Arrington himself:

http://omnisio.com/startupschool08/mike-arrington

Main point: Tell a story. Don't just bombard him with the same bland description of your site. Leak information so that he can piece together a greater conspiracy. And make the process of giving information valuable, as in not constantly talking about your startup in twitter, but just leaking little tweets here and there so as to make people think they've discovered a gem.

What worked for us (http://ReviewGist.com) was what Mike suggested at http://blog.guykawasaki.com/2006/11/how_to_get_in_t.html.

Essentially: Make is short, not more than a couple of sentences and relate it to something already existing.

You should be asking: Why should we focus on being techcrunch'd?

Look Here: http://tinyurl.com/5lacfh

Raise millions, then crash spectacularly. Deadpool posts are way more enticing than success stories.

If you're 'new and growing' that won't work, so keep in mind there's more to TechCrunch than Arrington - I met Duncan Riley at BlogOz last year, and if he's a reflection of the other bloggers then they're all approachable and keen to hear your interesting story.

How about make a service users actually want to use? You were doing that too, right?

1) get funded 2) be outstanding 3) become popular

Offer Michael Arrington an opportunity to kick you when you're down.