Former TechCrunch UK writer Sam Sethi’s newest venture: Twitblogs. The service is targeted towards Twitter users who want to write more than 140 characters, or want to embed images into their posts, etc.
In other words, it’s a feature-poor but usability-rich blogging service similar to Tumblr and others. Users actually don’t even create accounts. Instead they log in with their Twitter credentials. And any posts created on the site are automatically posted to Twitter as well to get extra exposure. So heavy Twitter users can use Twitter for the quick messages and Twitblogs for the longer stuff, and everything flows into Twitter automatically.
Generally I like services like this, which are created on the cheap and put out there for users to try out. Some survive to funding, most fade away. But in this case the service has serious founder baggage to deal with as well.
Sethi’s previous startup, Blognation, folded a year ago and left writers and employees unpaid for months of work. We’ve had our own unpleasant issues with Sethi as well, all documented here. Some of his former writers have accused him of fraud and other crimes.
None of this matters that much for users. Except that they must type their Twitter credentials directly into Twitblog to test the service. That’s iffy at the best of times. But when a service is run by someone who’s shown questionable ethical behavior in the past, it’s a non-starter. The service also lacks terms of use and a privacy policy, so users won’t know how their private information may be used, sold or exploited.
Just my 0.02c :
The entrepreneur world will be served better with agenda-less blogging.
i agree
Here we go. Back to the old bullshit, waste of time, techcrunch post titles. You can never break yourself from this stupid temptation, can you Mike.
when you leave tc everything goes down hill.
When you think about it, at the end of the day, journalism should expose people who would otherwise be left unfettered
At first glance, I was also annoyed with a post like this, but if Michael doesn’t report it then no one will.
Good for you Michael for having the cajones to stand up to people who deserve it.
Absolutely. Agree.
I don’t get the point of this post.
that is so true
Jack
Yocial.com
HA!
Why do ppl have such a hard time realizing that this blog BELONGS to mike arrington. If he wants to post about a really runny dump he took this morning, it’s perfectly within is rights and none of us are under any obligation to read it.
If this was a public blog that was bought out or is being financed by investors, then I can see your point about Mike staying completely objective and avoid posting about subjects that are a conflict of interest.
But it’s not. TC is Mike’s blog and if he wants to post a negative article about someone he doesn’t like, then so be it.
Get over it.
Twitblogs looks like a very good idea. I will certainly look into using it with my students.
It’s interesting that a service would exist to extend the posts of a site which was once defined by its character limit, though I suppose blogs have been using it in a similar fashion for a while now.
Why not try other services that do similar things, like http://www.twitlonger.com ?
Most often, 140 characters is way too much.
Twitter has become the platform of choice for people wanting to stretch their 15 minutes.
I’d like to see a TwitOff.com where pointless tweets (the vast majority of them) can be abridged to say one or two characters, maybe a word.
well, right said Robert. I was also wondering if there was a need for this venture. Actually, if you see, there are tons of external twitter websites that I am sure not even 20% of people are aware of.
In fact, 140 chars are way too much as Chris said. More than that will spoil the fun of micro-blogging!
Past politics aside, this is actually a nice little service that I will use a lot. Even though I have a regular WP blog, there are many many times I want to write something that is a little longer, and Tumbl’r is too disconnected from Twitter to be used for that function.
http://www.tinypaste.com is a much more logical choice. This seems like it is trying to hard to do a simple task.
Love it, couldn’t imagine a simpler implementation. A lot of services could learn from that site.
I use tinypaste all the time, First thing I thought of when I read this article
Hard to imagine if there’s a way to start a project with even less imagination and creativity. I wonder why I am sure that this will even work.
that’s impressive. It must be hard to launch a startup from prison.
This website is a marginally beneficial service.. it’s not innovative… it’s not that highly useful… it’s backed by a shady founder.. why cover this Techcrunch? Seriously.. this guy seems to have created nothing useful in life so far.
I’m pretty sure Mike posted this more as a “warning”, so anyone who heard of the service through other means would now think twice about using it, knowing who the founder is. Personally, I think that’s good. After reading the linked post about Sam many months ago, there’s no way I would support anything this guy ever does, ever.
http://www.twitlonger.com allows posting of 140+ character messages and automatically sends to Twitter. Doesn’t do anything else, it’s just for those times (like giving directions of talking tech details) when 140 isn’t enough, but you want to keep it inside the Twitterverse.
Disclaimer – I made this.
The whole purpose of twitter is microblogging or short quick posts. why go on another third party site and trust them with your credentials to write longer posts. Makes no sense to me.
Steve
grindvision.com
There are occasional times that you want to say something to the Twitterverse that needs more than 140 characters, posting a technical explanation is one good example, but it shouldn’t be used as a blogging service. Occasional one-offs are fine.
As a developer it annoys me greatly that Twitter doesn’t have a better authentication API, because I don’t like taking other peoples details, but at the minute we have to live with it.
i watched in 07 as the whole blognation/techcrunch issues were going on and hoped to have seen this die out. But as for twits ahhh sorry twitblogs i think it defeats the purpose that twitter was created for. I mean just open a wordpress.com blog then if you want to write longer posts.
I wonder if Sethi’s new biz model could be a lawsuit against this blog for slander/libel, although I do appreciate that crunchbase’s viewpoints (linked-to herein) are documented out in the open and clearly just opinion.
If it’s “clearly opinion” than it can’t be libel.
truth is an absolute defense.
You’re just feeding the monster by giving him free publicity.
If you really have problems with this guy, you should’ve just not posted anything about him.
He sounds like an awful human being who preys on people.
Mike showing his “this is my company, the hell with being objective” attitude.
Mike, you really need to create another blog where you can pontificate and slam people you do not personally like to your heart’s desire and leave this one to unbiased stories containing some journalistic integrity.
Based on your past actions, it will be interesting to see how long this comment lasts before being censored.
Someone should write a program to continually pings this site and capture every post that you have deleted. I would bet that your readers would be surprised and dismayed by your tactics to control and manipulate the discussions around your content.
Keep it up and the site will be up shortly.
John: you really do need to look into Sam’s past. He hasn’t paid tons of people money he promised them including Marc Orchant, the blogger who died from a heart attack back when he was having troubles with Sam. I’m having a lot of trouble getting into this service because of Sam’s reputation and past dealings with bloggers I trust.
Robert:
He very well may be a very bad person, but do you not think Mike uses this blog as his personal soapbox for bad mouthing people he does not like?
Minimally this article should not have been written by Mike.
As a blogger yourself, do you condone censoring dissenting opinions of your readers.
It is time for Mike to grow up and realize that this is no longer his personal soap box.
Jophn: one thing I like about Mike is he wears his heart on his sleeve and tells you if you are pissing him off. It’s his blog, I’m not going to tell him not to do it. I was tempted by doing a post about this myself, but decided not to. In the past when I’ve blasted things I’ve actually helped them out and, personally, until Marc Orchant’s wife is paid the money due her I don’t want to help this company or Sam out. She’s really struggling, I’ve been told, and she’s not the only one who was promised things by Sam. I think it’s worth warning people that Sam doesn’t keep his promises, though, so, yes, I think Mike is doing a public service here to remind newcomers to watch out when dealing with Sam.
Robert: I do agree with you. I think as users and bloggers we need to know more and more about personal life and backgrounds of those who initiated new services.
I really think when someone signs-up for a particular web service and creats his/he account; this looks like a private relationship where both parties (the founder, and the user) have to create a bi-directional trustworthy.
It`s really a big business here, track founders, their black boxes have much to tell about the future and privacy of their business.
Mike: We need to know more about those. Plz keep informing us.
You are one big suckup Robert!
Do any of you bloggers that have amazingly got substantial traction get that there comes a point where it is no longer your personal soapbox and understand the importance of journalistic integrity?
What a joke!
I read up the piece on Sam Sethi and he sounds like a fucktard asshole.. I don’t understand why is TC giving publicity to his new service.. remember even negative PR is also good publicity.
@Al
Hell with “journalistic integrity” this is a fuckign blog.. get over it.. its not your NYTimes.. even they are fucking biased.. Best is to use your head.. and read between the lines..
ha…cop said right
Robert,
When Sethi was trying to convince me to be a partner on TwitWall (see my comment below) , he was name dropping everyone as ‘his friend’ who can be instrumental in taking TwitWall to the next level.
Just as an FYI, your name frequently came up during the 2 conversations even after I told him that I found out about his history on BlogNation.
Your comment totally fits a pattern of how Sethi operates and to what extent he would go. An obvious proof that he has not learned from his BlogNation mistakes- even today.
Thanks for making it clearer to me now.
This post seems like a hatchet job, however, given Sethi’s past he’s got some atoning to do before I feel sorry for him.
hope history wont repeat this time like blognation
Congrats to Sethi, his old site Blognation will be missed.
It always gets me how little features twitter has. Then again I have never understood the constant hype and love that twitter receives especially from micheal and the other TC writers. Then again I dont use twitter.
Twitter is loved by anyone that desires the ability to create brand hype from people that do not have enough in their life to not pursue such non-consequential and egocentric communications.
Sound like a great tool form M.A. perspective!
Tried it 4 times… didn’t work.
well, i hope this one fades away……
I don’t know what the appropriate amount of agenda might be, and how much of should be open and how much should be hidden, but I for one appreciate the background information.
One may or may not have an opinion on Sethi, but at least one can make the connection now if one wants to.
Most users don’t have any idea whether any given new service is run by a guy in his bedroom, a team of industry veterans backed by tier 1 VC money, or an offshoot project of an established company (e.g. I noticed one commenter on FF speculating that Twitblogs might be owned/operatied by Twitter). Knowing the provenance of the company and the founders helps you determine whether you want to trust them with your personal information or login information for other sites and just how much of your want to trust the service will be there for the long haul (e.g. I Want Sandy, Pownce, etc.)
Twitwall already does this pretty well, but I wonder: isn’t the whole purpose of Twitter to find the 140 characters or less way of saying things?
Jessie Ann Heekin
Sometimes 140 just isn’t enough, no matter how condensed you try to make what you’re saying. It really annoys me sometimes.
@Sean,
I guess that is true, and Twitwall makes is more effective than a spammy string of tweets. I get it!
Jessie Ann Heekin
With a reputation like his, I wonder why he left out the Terms and Privacy Policy. Those were the first things he should have worried about. Has he resolved to remain shady?
I’m surprised you passed up the pun-alicious opportunity of the name “Twit” Blogs…
I don’t get it! Twitterfeed (http://twitterfeed.com/) is far more logical to use that this. Just paste in your XML feed URL and it will tweet your blog post.
Far more simpler and easier!
You’ve got it, Twitterfeed – http://twitterfeed.com/ – is awesome for that. You can set up a Tumblr or Posterious page and just feed it into Twitterfeed and onwards to your Twitter account. Ditto for your Flickr feed and all sorts..
People should use glue like Twitterfeed to join services together, not log into all new services that don’t add anything.
The entire service/concept is pointless. You can post a tweet and link to the whole content if you really have that much to say.
While it may be free publicity for someone who may not deserve it, I’m glad TC posted about it. Before reading this, I’d never heard of Sam Sethi or Blognation. Important information to have if the allegations are true and he’s still building sites. Thanks TC, I appreciate it.
I saw many comments on Twitter search
http://search.t...rch?q=twitblogs
Looks ok, we should give every individual a chance to do better next… it is all about entrepreneurship.
If Sam’s past ventures were a failure or if he just made mistakes, he would deserve another chance.
But when you commit fraud, fail to deal with the consequences and don’t make right what you did wrong, you don’t move to another venture without carrying that past. I should know, I was right in the middle of the whole Blognation debacle as a former writer.
Mike is right to point out that he’s a pathological fraud, I think the whole world should know about this and never forget it.
Mike,
Its good that you wanted to reveal all the info about sam in the profile but you could of done it in a non personnal way. The whole way you have gone about it judging by the comments makes people judge the product before even using it.
Thats is so unproffessional.
http://www.yout...h?v=FJ64v9lUMO4
Sethi was not an entrepreneur who fell out with Mike but tried to come back with a new startup. He defrauded those who put faith in him. One died at his desk. Others were left out of pocket for blogging, design work, hosting etc for thousands of dollars. Did Sethi pay people back? No. Did he apologize? No. He blamed his failure on Arrington. He then kept quiet for a year and told everyone he was not coming back into tech or Startups. He is not to be trusted.
Spot on.
Can’t imagine who now signs your paycheck.
Sethi does sound like a dick, but this post reeks of payback from Mike.
there’s no need for payback. blognation imploded and sam hurt a lot of people on the way down. the last thing i want to see is more people hurt by him. Sethi is little more than an ankle biter at this point.
There is also Zaplife.com!
Either way,
This type of system is nothing but a bloodsucker.
There were other services similar to Twitter,
that Evan Williams congratulated at TC50,
without complaint.
But this is just a Lyme disease ridden tick, sucking all, literally ALL, of your Twitter make up onto their site.
I hope it fails fast.
Stefan heller – it’s not news that a fraudster is active again? This is not news?!
TwitBlogs – Blogs for Twits ? Should get plenty of referrals from round here.
Twatblogs may be even better
This whole thing is just a giant failcoaster rip of tinypaste
And tinypaste is just a failcoaster rip of shorttext.com
It occurs to me after reading the post that Mike opinionated or not has effectively provided you with information so that you can make an informed choice about using or not using this service.
The fact that Robert also supports Mikes opinion should be of some relevance to you as unless I’m mistaken this “IS” actually his soapbox.
Let’s boil this down to the basics, and ignore the facts about Sam (he has yet to ever take responsibility, and is just ‘woe is me’ and ignoring those that got hurt).
You have to be the greatest idiot in the world to hand over personal information to a site that has no links for:
* About
* Terms
* Privacy
That’s simple – and has nothing to do with Sethi. There are a lot of things that we can not like about the guy, but the fact that he’s not being transparent here with simple things should make you pause.
It’s not like you can read the EULA and then decide to walk away – you can’t even get the basic information.
I’ve been using http://twitwall.com and really like it. Looks just like twitter and this twitblogs but without all this drama and baggage.
Michael, for the record, Sam Sethi was once a big fan of TwitWall.
Sam contacted me and wanted to be part of TwitWall.com Sam and I spoke about TwitWall. Soon after, Sam’s now TwitBlogs partner, Roger Kondrat expressed the enthusiasm on TwitWall. After our first chat, I googled Sam, and found out about his checkered past. I was mostly concerned about how Sam dealt with people/partners around him. After my second chat with him, I felt it was for the best interest of TwitWall, NOT to involve Sam.
Below are links to both Sam and Roger’s TwitWall before they formed an alliance to just blatantly copy TwitWall.com
I hope everyone finds this little footnote of TwitBlogs history quite remarkable and interesting:
Sam Sethi on TwitWall:
http://twitwall...ew/?what=060D00
Roger Kondrat on TwitWall:
http://twitwall...ho=rogerkondrat
Honestly, at the time, I was unsure if their desire was genuine. But today, the truth, again, prevails with your article.
Great post Mr. Arrington!
now. that is grade A tech gossip. where is valleywag coverage on this?
All, some additional information about this new “Sethi” development. There’s another service, http://twitwall.com that was founded by a fellow named Michael Carluen.
A few weeks back Carluen reached out to me to tell me that he’d recently been contacted by Sam and that I had come up in their discussions.
It seems that Twitwall had already launched in beta and Sethi contacted Carluen to see about how he might get involved in the venture.
Luckily for Carluen he was savvy enough to do a little checking up on Sethi before agreeing to allow him to become involved and of course he found both the Blognation debacle as well as Sethi’s prior issues with TechCrunch.
Knowing what value TechCrunch represents to a startup and also judging from the prior problems that Sethi had with other startups Carluen told Sethi that he was not interested in pursuing a joint venture.
Sethi responded by sending Carluen an email that indicated that he had planned on filing a lawsuit against TechCrunch (for allegedly leaking his highly questionable “term sheet” for Blognation funding), he went on to say that I (Oliver Starr) was simply a disgruntled former employee that had been fired months before Blognation collapsed.
Of course those that followed the Blognation saga will recall that Sam had claimed that I was fired two months before the final demise of Blognation in one venue, was terminated one month prior to the failure of Blognation in a second place and at the same time he wrote me via Skype to apologize for doing what he had done, and for lying about firing me. Those with a good memory will also recall that it seemed peculiar that someone that had been fired from a Blogging enterprise would still have access enabling them to post to the site (which I did) right up to the date upon which all the controversy erupted. (http://owstarr....eres-sam-sethi/)
Of course those close to this situation know that Sam has never made good on his promises to pay each and every Blognation author every cent he promised – most particularly the Orchant family who have sustained serious financial trauma as a result of Marc’s passing.
Personally, I have sent Sam numerous requests for payment and even retained a collection agency in the UK for purposes of collecting on this debt. Sam has ignored my requests and further responded to the collection agency that he owed me nothing and that I was in fact responsible for the failure of Blognation!
None of this should come as a surprise to anyone that has had dealings with Sam. There is obviously something pathologically amiss with this individual.
What is surprising is what Sam did after being rejected in his partnership offer with Michael Carluen; after poking around and prodding Michael for as much information as he could apparently get he went off and started Twitblogs…
Not only is Sam dishonest and totally willing to lie, cheat, defraud and manipulate people, he’s also an entrepreneur totally incapable of coming up with his own ideas for a start-up!
Remember that originally, the idea for Blognation wasn’t Sam’s either, but was the brainchild of Lee Wilkins (whom Sam managed to oust from Blognation somehow prior to my involvement).
I strongly urge members of the technology community to treat Sam like the pariah that he is and not reward him for his devious behavior and deceitful ways.
Any traffic his site gets validates the way he has treated the bloggers that worked for him, the entrepreneurs that he has ripped off and rewards him for behavior that if not actually criminal is certainly as low and evil as any I’ve ever encountered while working in this (or any) industry.
Oliver Starr
http://owstarr.com
what a mess. there’s always one more ugly layer with this guy.
wow…
Man. Talk about the stuff movies are made of. Truth is stranger than fiction I guess.
okay I went there b4 finishing your article are you saying this bloke is a crook and my twitter account is now compromised ? – guss i’ll go change my password then
No moat.
So Sam Sethi launches a service that allows you to type more than 140 chars and have it appear on Twitter.
If thats the case, then he should change his bio on Linked-In, because, by his definition, his new service is boring.
“I am currently taking timeout to look, read and think about what comes next on the web. I am so bored with reading more about MicroBlogging (Twitter, Identi.ca, Tumblr), Social Networks (Facebook, Plaxo) and aggregator services (Friendfeed, MyBloglog).
Instead I am trying drown out the noise to spot the new trends.”
http://www.link...com/in/samsethi
Doesn’t seem like a new trend. Seems like rehashing old stuff.
Hea Sam, how about creating a service that keeps all your lies up to date, and on track?
Hoho, this line from his Linked-In bio is best:
“So I am now thinking of how to create a reputation algorithm (Reputation is something awarded by others and not something I can create myself) similar to page ranking. This is pretty much done.”
Hmmm….Ne-Nehhhhh. Out audience said “NO”!
Hoho, this line from his Linked-In bio is best:
“So I am now thinking of how to create a reputation algorithm (Reputation is something awarded by others and not something I can create myself) similar to page ranking. This is pretty much done.”
Hmmm….Ne-Nehhhhh. Our audience said “NO”!
Wow, I didn’t think we’d ever heard from this guy again. Michael certainly did a good thing in posting this – I checked out Twitblogs earlier today, and now finding out that Sethi is involved, I won’t go near it again.
The audacity is astonishing. The internet never forgets…
Ethics and security issues aside, I fail to see the point of Twitblogs.
Twitter is for microblogging and Twitblogs expands this microblogging into, what, “blogging”?
And this is coming from a guy who states on his LinkedIn profile that he is “so bored with reading more about MicroBlogging (Twitter, Identi.ca, Tumblr)”?
“Extended Microblogging” is so much more exciting?
EPIC FAIL
nice blogs ,i like it
Check out mine too, you will like them: http://www.nichea.info
http://www.memoments.info
Ok I have gone through most of the comments made above. Some bloggers have expressed their anger whilst others have mentioned thoughts on the new service.
I don’t want to get into TC v/s SS debate but it is worth showcasing some facts. Sam has also worked/founded some successful start ups like Feedburner (http://www.tech...l-is-confirmed/). He was also been a Director of CMGI, Microstrategy and Gateway Computers (see Sam’s LinkedIn Profile).
Correction. Sam Sethi did not “found” or work at Feedburner. He wrote about it. That’s quite different.
Loving the drama and gossip. But, he sounds a bit imbalanced. He might fly to the valley and “rip your head off”.
am sure his site is just going to be spammed by seo ppl for one way links… not a too gr8 idea Sam, all the very best though.
I’ve been using http://www.cityspeek.com here in Portland and am happy with it. I dont quite see why a site like twitblogs gets coverage when there are other site out there where you can post pics,video,groups,has a map like twittervision and cross posts my pics to flickr and messages to twitter. i’ll stick with my little unknown site