I continue to be fascinated by Owen Van Natta’s abrupt departure from Project Playlist, the company he ran for five whole months before becoming the CEO of the much more exciting MySpace.
Emails have been flying in from company CEOs who say Van Natta, with a promise of “massive funding from China,” offered to acquire them (there was no funding). Playlist employees, speaking off the record, are in shock. And worst of all, Van Natta recruited a number of executives, including one, ironically, from MySpace, on the promise that he’d lead the company to a win. Which he definitely would have done, if he hadn’t been interviewing non stop for other jobs since nearly the very day he was announced to head up Playlist.
We’ll post the full list of the down and out executives soon. But among the saddest stories is Jason Bitensky, who joined Project Playlist today as Director of National Sales. Bitensky, a former Slide executive, was heavily recruited by Van Natta for months, says a source, and he finally agreed a couple of weeks ago to resign from his current position at Nabbr and join Van Natta at Playlist. Unfortunately, he gave his notice to Nabbr before the news broke that Van Natta was jumping ship, putting him in an awkward position, to say the least.
The fact that Van Natta was making promises to potential executives at the same time he was planning to bail on the company is inexcusable, and says a lot about his character. This guy is all about one person – himself – and is apparently quite willing to use, and hurt, others to get what he wants.
Bitensky won’t comment on this story, and an email to Playlist hasn’t been returned yet. Bitensky hasn’t announced his new position, but an email to him at Nabbr returned an automated response that gave his new email address at Playlist. He must be thrilled about leaving his old job.
…because Nabbr was on its way to IPO
yeah
play-list was not the most reputable company to work for in the first place. any ceo going to work there knows its a high stakes gamble. if he did not take the job he would really have looked ridiculous.
HobbyLocator.com – its a job
SpamLocator.com – locate bullshite spammer from Ning.
His real name is DouchebagLocator.com
This is the best thing for Playlist.com. How else would it have gathered multiple daily blog posts on TechCrunch.
Can we expect to see PlaylistCrunch or VanNattaCrunch in the near future?
Either would be better than TwitterCrunch
Agreed, wake me up when Twitter is a business and not just a very expensive hobby.
wake me up when twitter is not just some feature posing as a product or a business
Who cares? This is a non story…belongs in the gossip mags. An exec lying or misleading a recruit? Big deal. If you are interviewing for a job you have to take every promise with a grain of salt and you also have to do your own due diligence. This happens everyday and to report on this this time must mean you have a personal connection with somebody that got screwed.
You’re obviously new to techcrunch, all they post is unsubstantiated gossip now.
haha, i guess it must be a slow day in real news.
This place has gone down hill. It’s became the .dot for gossip.
Way to go Michael Arrington!
What happened to posting about start ups, about finding that obscure new website.
So many great organizations out there to write about.
Some of us like this type of post because it helps educate people that online there are no ethics… that the web is full of used car salesmen who would sell out their own mother for a dollar..
that’s not only in web businesses. if you found this post useful in informing you that people will screw you over, more power to you.
Actually they were right on the money when they said DeWolfe was leaving MySpace and VanNatta coming in as new CEO…you must be holding a grudge against TC…
Peace.
this isn’t really about holding a grudge. this also isn’t really news, is it? somebody screwed somebody else by promising him something and then leaving the company. happens a hundred to hundred fifty times a day.
He’s right. Arrington has directly questioned OVN’s character in several posts. This kind of stuff happens all the time mike, it is not news. The promises he broke are meaningless to those not involved, he made a wise decision to jump ship, wise.
in related news, paris hilton is still alive and tupac is also still alive. apparently, living in new orleans.
Like MySpace wasn’t already headed for disaster…
well that’s not a good way to be conducting business
it’s the Calacanis way…
ummm… what?
I carry my team to the finish line… always.
You did that with Weblogs. So, there’s the proof. Nothing else to say.
from my experience (which is not probably at least average), about 90% people or maybe even more are thinking just about themselves, I guess it is a human nature. Also, what I have noticed, this percentage is greater among successful people or to say it in more simple words – there is a better chance that you will get screwed by a businessman than by a construction worker.
I wonder what other people’s experience is.
have you ever hired a contractor?
He has a douchebag face. Anybody who purposely has 2 day stubble is a 100% douchebag. Why is this guy a exec again.
How do douchebags get ahead in life? I don’t get it.
I bet any random myspace employee underneath him can run the company better than this super douche. Hope he fails miserably.
Execs are overrated anyway. Most just ride with the direction of the wind. Any moron could have engineered the microsoft deal with facebook.
“Anybody who purposely has a 2-day stubble is a 100% douchebag.” lol.
I always wondered why Larry Ellison wanted that Yassir Arafat look…
Maybe – just maybe – because they are able to grasp the advanced concept that their facial hair has nothing to do with their potential business acumen
Gossip on TC, shocking! Sad, but, not surprising…
Ethics and integrity speak to the quality of a leader. To leave a company after only being there for five months is equivalent to stealing from the companies employees and its investors.
If you guys dislike techcrunch so much why don’t you stop posting useless comments or better yet stop reading. I’m tired of looking at all your pointless critiques in the comments section.
yofrez – it’s probably due to the jobless in this economy. Idle hands = flames
Bailing out of the sinking ship isn’t a lack of integrity or ethics, it’s just plain smart. The commenters that you criticize are much smarter than your dumb ass.
Pretty brutal take down of the guy.
Is he looking for a life preserver?
Is Perez Hilton running TechCrunch?
I think you are being overly critical of Van Natta. He did what any high level executive has to do…he can’t put aside his current employers best interest while in talks with a potential employer.
Who’s to say that Van Natta wont bring these same people over to MySpace?
or myspace buying project playlist.
Has playlist.com ever received so much press? What a great service! Cheers!
TC is turning into valleywag
new Owen Van Natta on as a kid (played soccer with him & went to same HS), He was an complete tool then, why would he change?
Hey, everybody needs to shut up their stupid face, Ok? Natta had reasons to leave. Ok? He gets to work with Murdoch. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity. Sanjay is ok with it, so shut up your stupid face. Ok? Natta is a tough dude and will beat the Snocolate out of anybody who says it to his face. Such is the word of Sanjay.
rofl
whether this post has teeth or not, I like the aggressive viewpoint MA.
The 5 month stint leaves a very sour taste in my mouth. Yes, Owen is looking out for himself and himself only. It’s all about ego and power and no regard for collateral damage. Gross!
How lucky for both Playlist & MySpace.
The stalking continues…
How much of this is MA’s spoiled grapes because his buddy Jason didn’t get the top job? This reads like something out of Valleywag, not TechCrunch.
Arrington didn’t spill his grapes, so shut up your stupid face, ok? Jason is fine, ok? He is taking over the search with his army of oompa loompa’s, ok? Jason didn’t want the job anyhow. He has better trout to boil. Who wants to work in socal by the beach? Such is the word of Sanjay Sharma.
Completely lame headline and story. Get back to reporting on deals and start-ups.
they don’t want to do the work.
Mr. Mike Arrington:
Remember back a few months ago when you were telling everyone about how you were hiding in fear at your parents house? Remember the story about someone spitting in your face in Europe?
After reading this piece, is it any real wonder why? If this is a news site/blog as you say it is, why do you continue to interject your own personal fucking feelings about people and painting them out to be less than you?
My advice to you is to work on your narrative approach to detach yourself from the story and just report the fucking story and remove the personal and snide comments – these are people you’re dealing with. Nobody is perfect and I fail to see how this passes as news when you’re interjecting what you think instead of allowing the reader to determine for themselves.
On a final note, I’m not condoning the behavior that led to your need to fear for your life or the public crap you’ve dealt with but, don’t you think you tend to invite it?
yeah and the way to go is to state that anonymously
Dude,
Back off! Read the WSJ article from yesterday announcing Van Natta’s arrival (Murdoch owns both MySpace and WSJ) http://bit.ly/9KOo8
The WSJ says “Mr. Van Natta — known for a blunt style that has caused friction with co-workers”. We all know what “blunt” is code for, right? The WSJ goes on to say “over time, his hard-driving personal style, an asset at the negotiating table, aggravated disagreements between him and Mr. Zuckerberg”. Anyone that has a clue can read between the lines.
Keep up the good work TechCrunch and go playlist.com!!
A better question to be asking here, Michael, is what did Van Natta have to do to get out of his contract at Playlist? If the answer is “Nothing”, or “Not Much”, then Playlist should be at fault, first for hiring this flake in the first place, and second for giving him such an easy out.
MySpace has been a joke for years, with only cretins, bands and comedians keeping it (barely) afloat while Facebook, Twitter and others continue to grow. I wouldn’t expect this to change, either short or long term.
130 million. MySpace is “barely afloat”? It’s only one of the top ten websites in the world, and top 5 in the US.
social network numbers are fickle.
from facebook guarding their real user numbers, keeping millions on the back-burner, staggering them out so that they can control the appearance of growth, through to myspace claiming to have millions whereas anyone knows most people don’t use the site in the same way anymore.
MySpace definitely has size, I’ll give you that. Then again, its growth has been non-existent for over a year, while sites like Facebook have continued growing, and surpassed them.
In this industry, if you’re not growing, you’re dying, and MySpace simply isn’t growing. It’ll be a player for quite some time, but it has been surpassed as the #1 social networking site, and it doesn’t seem possible for it to reclaim that throne anymore.
A lot of search engines have size too (Yahoo, MSN Live), but that doesn’t make them attractive or competitive or having a particularly bright future.
myspace is one of the few social sites actually making money. how can you call it a joke? explain.
Yes, it’s making money, but not giant windfalls. The joke has to do with the fact that the past 18 months have seen a huge boon in social networking everywhere *except* MySpace. MySpace is basically the same size site it was in late 2007, with the exception that Twitter has come from more or less 0 in that time frame, and Facebook has not only caught up to, but surpassed Facebook.
MySpace has already been introduced heavily to the market, so this isn’t an awareness issue.
Where’s the future growth coming from? Apart from music and comedy (which, hey, might be enough to have a profitable business, but not a billion dollar blockbuster), where’s the beef?
Throw those facts on top of the current leadership issues, and it’s not a pretty picture for MySpace.
Nabber.com may be worth $6 billion. The playlist market is a trillion dollar industry. http://iamned.com/blog/ no recession. People need o stop complaining about job loss.
Did Owen steal your girlfriend or something, Michael? It’s like you’re trying to win this year’s Player Haters Ball.
This drama has about as much entertainment value as a bunch of preppy 6th graders in Atherton fighting over who is the biggest pimp.
Yes, he continues to slam MySpace & anyone associated with it. Even sending reporters down here to pathetically try to film a meeting. The last few weeks on TC all points to a personal vendetta, as well as completely cheapens his site & shows him for who he is – a sad loser.
Taking this job is the only way Owen could get back to the Allen Conference.
Myspace will by project playlist morons.
Mr. God has it, ok? Myspace buys Playlist and everybody is buddies again. Suck it people.
New to Tech Crunch and I gotta say that all the MySpace, Twitter, and dare I say FaceBook talk is already pretty fucking boring.
Honestly curious if this is the standard for this site or if this is a recent trend that we will move off of soon enough. If you guys tell me this is the norm, I think I might pull the rip chord…
Bye for now Tech Crunch, I will check in sometime in 2010, maybe when Twitter finally admits they have no revenue model and their service is useless.
Good riddance to you, Mr. Joe. Now go punch yourself in the face. Such is the word of Sanjay Sharma.
Last thing….Anyone else notice the douche bag with the rolled up sleeves is on a Pirate Ship in this photo?
Actually that might make him less douchy as I would love Pirate ship access…I mean who wouldn’t
Bet Josh Brooks wishes he’d stayed at MySpace.
Sad story? Just look at this Bitensky guy, he has about as much loyalty as Natta. Short stint with Slide Inc, then Nabbr, now Playlist…. If he wasn’t so quick to try and hit up the next best thing he wouldn’t be in this position. Kid looks like a butt-pirate to me!
Alright enough about Myspace and Van Natta as well as Project Playlist.
I think we can write about other more useful things happening in the music industry than Project PLaylist / playlist.com and Myspace gossip.
Seriously now. Get some news on here and stop wasting time on Myspace and some new CEO as well as a playlist.com.
Enough press already for them.
Seriously, if you want me and others returning to your blog, write something new and interesting that will get people excited and talk about.
I have had enough of gossip and people whining about their jobs and their business going down. Maybe some upcoming sites and exciting new developments? How about .MUSIC and one of the biggest petitions ever made online (600,000 signatures thus far in a matter of 2-3 months) to introduce .MUSIC for the web with a full marketplace backend. Yes, you can check it out at Music.us.
You can do better than this. I think others have expressed their discontent about “duplicate” content.
I have faith in you buddy. That is why I am here.
Regards,
Constantine from Music.us
.MUSIC Domain Extension
Gee Mike – have you ever left a job without telling anyone before techcrunch? Ever recruit someone and then leave after you recruited them? I have a memory of you doing that.
Please, give us details. Hypocrisy must be specified, not alluded to.
Sounds a lot like Veoh.
Who was the one who said: “Kill or be killed. Take no prisioners.”
Oh, it was me!
Since when do CEO’s have to be nuns?
As long as you don’t get caught, make sure the P&L and stock price is up.
Screw the rest (That’s why you have an HR depratment, to create an illusion for your employees. That’s wht you have a PR team, to spin things around).
If I’m going to do business with MySpace (or TechCrunch, for that matter), I want to make sure I get my money back, and then some. I don’t care if you drive a Prius, or if you send money to a dog shelter.
Business…that’s what’s for dinner!
Tostada a-hole,
you are what’s wrong with this world. Always looking for a way to the top at anyone’s expense.
I recently came across a new experience in the valley involving CEOs. As part of my process to build a new startup, I was introduced to an “established” valley CEO candidate. After spending A LOT of time, he finally confided that he was basically broke and had to bring in cash really fast. That shocked me – you should see his BMW, iPhone, the whole “picture”. I don’t know the whole story with OVN but I would recommend all entrepreneurs (tech or not) to do a background check on ANY potential CEOs. A lot of these guys lack so much integrity that you’d feel like you were living on Wall Street – if you could get good Pizza around here that is!
As for OVN, pretty sleazy thing to do. I am glad to see TechCrunch is taking the dill-hole to mat!
I think Jason should have bitch slapped Van Natta and dared him to a staring contest. A cat fight would have ensured shortly after which Jason would have exited the stage with one promise we all have been waiting for “You ain’t seen nothing yet biach”
Lots of aggression here, my eyes….
Hey, it’s the 29th. Where is today’s “Van Natta is a Bastard because he stole my Girlfriend” article, Mike?
For those folks who are defending OVN… He INTENTIONALLY and KNOWINGLY F**Ked a lot of people and if you don’t recognize that, well… I so hope your sister or daughter dates a dude JUST LIKE HIM.
I’m not sure which one of you would win the prize for being the biggest pussy. You’re all poor judges of character.