The Pandodaily Pantomime
Earlier this evening I attended the inaugural PandoDaily launch event. Excusing the technical difficulties (of which there were many) and the $20 price tag, my main point is this: Nobody cares about the fallout between Techcrunch and AOL.
NOBODY.
I have deleted so many lines of expletives trying to get this point across but there is nothing more reductive than this: your saga is no longer news worthy. If you think it is then you are way too far inside your own bubble to realize that the people sitting in the audience at-your-own-event want you stop talking about it and would prefer you move on to something more intelligible. You are better than this and we deserve more.
We read your articles because you break stories. We follow you (to your own rebellious launch events even) because we believe you can offer more value than the reporter sitting next to you. We listen because you have a voice and an opinion on tech that is usually right. We do not care about your soap opera.
I believe your readership is interested in what you have to say because they are inherently interested in the companies and the products that impact the world around us. The more you deviate, the less we care. Capich?
If anyone else has an opinion I would love to hear it.
Sincerely, Eoin
p.s.
Sarah: if you're wondering why this starts with "Dear Michael" it's because he dominated YOUR entire event, then continued to warble on about Arianna Huffington (all that background talking? That was the sound of your own audience losing interest in melodrama). I do wish you the best of luck, however, and I look forward to seeing the future of Pando. Respect for launching a company while child rearing!
Michael: Since you missed my question (poor mic) allow me to restate: "Aside the standard cookie-cutter responses ('we invest x amount, we look for y in a team and z traction'), what makes your investment philosophy unique? Where do you see the future of technology heading? Why is your investment brain better than any other?"