Unless you subscribe to the theory that there is no such thing as bad press, don’t be the company that emails us and compares their new product to Flickr, but spells it “Flicker” in the email. And don’t send us links to the product that show error messages that are completely wrong. In this case, the message on the link says they only support Firefox versions 1.5.0.8 and higher. I’m running 1.5.0.12, which is the most recent version in the 1.5 product.
If you aren’t ready to get press attention on your product, don’t reach out to the press. And figure out the correct spelling of the companies you are claiming to be killing.
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I’m getting fed-up with Firefox 2.0 using insane amounts of memory when I have long browsing sessions of Flash and Ajax-type pages. Is this why you use 1.5?
I’ll take a link to an error page on our site, Mike.
I’m on my travel computer and haven’t upgraded this one yet. No other reason.
what fools!
seriously though, check out my website, it totally kills youtub and facebok
I thought we left “we recommend X browser” declarations back in Web 1.0?
I’ve been a front-end developer (who is also L337 with back-end) for years now and haven’t found anything you can’t work around with a little effort or AT LEAST make degrade gracefully. Simply putting up a “use this browser!” message is incredibly lazy. It’s your product, stupid. Focus on that rather than spamming the tech blogs for a mention.
isn’t 8 less than 12?
but yes, its unaceptable to sind a professionil message with mispelld product nams
JoeBoo - you’ll figure the math out if you think about it for a while.
JoeBoo,
1.5.0.8 and higher would include .12
“Simply putting up a “use this browser!” message is incredibly lazy.”
unless you are developing a web application that will run on the only browser available for some specific device *cough*iPhone*cough*
It’s post like this that make people think you are a scary monster, Mike.
I’m in a bad mood for some reason. I usually let this stuff go, but it’s just such an incredible waste of everyone’s time.
Why publicly embarrass people? They are trying to earn a living?
It is not like these are some criminals who need to be paraded around in public.
Everyone makes mistakes, so what?! They made a spelling error and an error in judgment, that does not detract from the potential quality of the product or service they are offering.
Having visited the site - it is quite interesting. They are offering a story-telling web service that allows members to illustrate periods of their lives in a flash based setting - they refer to as story telling.
Here is the sign up page:
http://www.panraven.com/login/Login.html
Hopefully, sympathetic readers will try this out and give this company the review they deserve - DESPITE a couple of harmless promotional mistakes.
Ouch. I’m guessing they probably created the site when 1.5.8 was current.
Actually it’s only a waste of your time Michael until you share this crap with us.
Nah, I agree with Michael posting this; companies sending PR send such poorly though-out irrelevant dross that one wonders what forethought went into the rest of it. When an error message pops up on the ensuing visit, the answer becomes “not much.” Publishing an invitation towards professionalism won’t solve the whole problem, but it might help the reviewers here find what they are looking for (amid tons of chaff) with greater ease.
“Actually it’s only a waste of your time Michael until you share this crap with us.”
Zing!
Brian - I’ll dot connect for you. Perhaps companies will be less likely to do this in the future now.
Hahahahahaha, that’s hilarious. Kind of a d*ck thing to do by Mike, still hilarious lol.
Markus - yeah, how will I ever recover from that one. Oh, the woe.
I guess they have gotten bigger and when that happens everywhere, everyone in the office is no longer brilliant. Things like this just make you look Stoopid.
Far from owning Flickr, these guys get owned by http://www.scrapblog.com
I agree with Mike, if these guys are begging for publicity they should do it properly or deal with the consequences. I thought it was funny and well worth a read.
I guess sooner or later someone had to be kicked a little. Warnings regarding preparation prior to submission certainly won’t be taken seriously if there aren’t demonstrated consequences. I’ve submitted unprepared crap in my time, and have just been lucky enough not to have it written up
On the other hand this is a really good looking site, whose owners may have been just a little overenthusiastic, and a little less thorough in their submission than they needed to be.
Don’t know that I’d put it in a similar space to Flickr, as they are both entirely different offerings, and looking at it I’d say they target a slightly different audience, but this is a really nice concept executed well nonetheless.
If you’re interested in taking blogging beyond the one-pager, or in being able to tell a story with your photo albums then you could do a lot worse than jumping on board.
Let us not make that mistake. Not in this era where bad publicity spreads real fast.
But wait a second, there is no such thing as bad publicity!
Any publicity is good publicity!
Hey I connect dots well it wasn’t a blast on you, I am reading this blog after all BUT you know that a mention on your blog about what you should and shouldn’t do when looking for publicity featuring these idiots will just encourage them. I don’t know if you intended will get through to them. Read the comments above, any publicity is good publicity. I’d love to hear more about non-widget businesses rather than this.
I agree with Michael although it could have been an honest mistake. Last week I had submitted my site http://zakly.info (a barebones contact manager) to TechCrunch but did not completely test the validation module till yesterday. As a result, users could not register themselves. I am glad TC did not cover the website but if it did, would I have deserved the brickbats too?
- Leonard Fernandes
I don’t know, I kind of don’t think it’s ever bad for the media to demand that PR people perform at a certain level, considering that most PR people make way more money than the average journalist. But, I know that most tech PR people are talking about stuff they could never understand with a ton of clients and pressure. It gets easy to make mistakes.
To whoever it is that sent Mike this: Ouch, but it happens.
Look, the jest of it is, everyone is trying to get Mike’s attention and so we all are tempted by his little Submit Your Site form and we get carried away. None of us think our submission is going to get torn apart by cigar-smokin’, happy go lucky Mike right on the front page of TC. But it’s a great lesson. Anything worth doing, is worth doing right. Spell-check and re-read. It’s really easy. We all make mistakes but if you’re trying to impress someone that holds your future in their hands make it count people.
Worth it or not, mean or not… I just read 27 comments, and enjoyed every second of it. Thanks!
The point is that whether you are pitching to an investor, a client, or meeting your girlfriend’s parents for the first time, you put your best foot forward…so to speak. It would have taken them 30 seconds to check the link and anybody who is serious about being taken seriously would have done so. Mike isn’t a bad guy for pointing this out, only one party can take responsibility for presenting their product/service in an unprofessional and unflattering light and that is the company in question. It’s that simple. Attention to detail can speak volumes about a person or company’s ability do deliver products and services with a high level of quality of consistency. If you are ok with mediocrity, then by all means tell Mike what a dick he is…. the alternative was for him to write about the company using the bad link only to have everybody come back here and bitch about how the link doesn’t work and the company sucks…
Ok I just want to say I never called Mike a dick, I merely was pointing out the fact that a lot of people read this blog and Mike’s responsibility is to filter out this crap from us readers, because it IS annoying and we don’t want to see it either. If you want to keep them from submitting garbage tell the offenders. If someone is pulled over for Marijuana possession, the cop doesn’t stop every car going by to let him know how upset he is that he has to deal with this offender. You know? Keep the better content coming.
@Mike…the sad thing is the people reading and commenting on this post/comments are not the people who submit poorly thought out, poorly worded requests for attention. I am guessing we will see you repeat this once a quarter (and that’s you being kind-hearted.) It works for the first few weeks of American Idol each season, right?
While I understand your frustration Mike, I think this post would have been better suited for your blog than Techcrunch. (Techcrunch isn’t a typical blog is it?)
Let’s keep Techcrunch professional.
P.S. It was a terrible pitch and the site definately feels incomplete. Poor move on their part.
Nice one Brian - recant, recant…
If nothing else, this post did generate some interesting discussion. Usually I don’t come back to check out the comments more than once…
Hopefully the guys from Panraven pulled some traffic from it, as payment for stepping up to the sacrificial alter.
well, u know i’m not that stupid.
looks like michael is pms-ing again.
And of course Mike or his buddies are probably not invested in this website…
What an arrogant post… i’m shocked. Don’t you never make mistakes ? Comme back on earth Michael Arrington, be strong enough to act with humility little tech whore.
How do I stop my reader being filled with crap blog posts like this?
I sympathize with Mike. I’ve had Philippine businesses badger me to blog “innovative” products that would put my readers to sleep.
im in yr kod release, decrementin’ yr verzionz.
signed,
LolQA
#1 on Heather Harde’s to do list should be to reign in Michael’s unprofessionalism
Great post Michael, it was entertaining, if anything. Panraven still come out winners, as I doubt they will be complaining about the boost in traffic.
That rather unfortunate episode aside, I think the company does have quite a slick product. I haven’t seen the back-end, so I can’t say whether it’s intuitive and all that, but from what I gathered by browsing through their showcase, it does look and feel appealing.
Flickr killer or not, I don’t think they need to be ashamed of their product.
such a bs post - mike - do you not remember posting the yahoo story yesterday with semel’s name spelled incorrectly in the title?
as a comment said above - this does not belong on tc in the least - and its just amazing how all of us continue to return to this over and over.
Don’t write a post entitled “Don’t Be This Company,” using a Firefox image when the post isn’t about Firefox…?
BUT THEIR BANNER IS SO PRETTY. (it is!)
“John” - You’re right, what techcrunch needs is a complete editorial overhaul. This just isn’t working out at all.
“Bobby,” I have typos in nearly every post. That’s what you get when you post real time and without an editorial staff. Go read CNET, get yesterday’s news all pretty and nice. Please, never return. Or at least use your real name when leaving a comment instead of cowering behind the best made up name that can come to you on the spur of the moment.
What’s the matter Michael? Has the pressure of keeping up with the news gotten to you? Perhaps you should turn the mirror to your own copy. PR/publicity people make mistakes, the good one’s admit them, apologize and correct their errors. Perhaps you should have considered a bit of humanity before throwing a hardworking person to the wolves, or is that not part of the new media paradigm?
Mike,
Why are you purposely trying to estrange your audience. A big part of any good blog is the community and it seems like you have no respect for your readers, which is certainly not helping to build your community. You are a hot shot now, but things change quickly. Everyone gets their 15 minutes.