Twitter co-founder Biz Stone took the stage at Fortune magazine’s Brainstorm Tech conference late this afternoon and was greeted by that old chestnut: When is Twitter going to make some simoleons?

Fortune’s Adam Lashinsky, who interviewed Stone (the pair are pictured here) posted a poll about that and a few other topics (the audience preferred Facebook to Twitter by about three to one, for example), and then asked a question he said was on the minds of many in Silicon Valley:

“Why the hell aren’t you guys making money?”

“I think that’s a legitimate concern,” said Stone. “We need to focus on value before we focus on profit.”

But, he added that the San Francisco-based Twitter was ready to show some commitment to revenue this year.

Oh dear, what will BoomTown have to gripe about at Twitter now?

Because–aside from the lack of a business model–I must confess I like Twitter an awful lot and find it extremely useful!

Earlier, Stone made the salient point that Twitter was just in the first innings.

“We have a lot of growing to do,” he said. “In general, we feel we are about one percent into the growing of Twitter.”

One more important issue than money-making, he noted correctly, was that the level of engagement at Twitter is not as high as the level of awareness.

“We just have to position our product better,” said Stone.

Of course, Lashinsky had to ask about the recently stolen documents that a hacker nabbed from some Twitter employees’ personal accounts.

Stone said that there are “unpolished notes,” which only “give you an idea of scope we are thinking of…the idea is that we are thinking big.”

Lashinsky asked if Twitter would sue either TechCrunch, which published some of the stolen documents, or the hacker who stole them.

(My first thought: Let’s all pray that TechCrunch will avoid touting that navel-gazing nonstory into the weekend.)

“I don’t know,” said Stone diplomatically, since TechCrunch’s Michael Arrington was sitting right in the room. “In general, we have a responsibility to look into these things and see what makes sense.”

Then, it was pretty much back to business models, and Stone seemed open to a lot of them, as long as they were not forced on the innovative digital darling.

“We want to develop a revenue model that is baked-in…and is not something that is tacked on,” he said.

Some ideas: Advertising, of course, as well as commercial accounts and verifying brands.

“We spent a lot of 2008 trying to get ahead technically of the unexpected popularity,” said Stone. “The very, very high level [of what Twitter needs to be doing] is to add more value to users.”

That means more focus on adding new features, such as a reputation system, better discovery and more explanation–for David Letterman, for example–of exactly how Twitter can be used.

And yes, making money. Stone noted that Twitter wanted to change the world too, and the best way to do that was to make “tons of money.”

“What we don’t want is to become that child actor that grew up all freaky,” he said, noting a Ron Howard development cycle was Twitter’s goal.

All hail Opie Twitter, oops, Taylor!

[Photo credit: Brad Markel for Fortune]

While the “news” that Google was in “late-stage” talks to acquire Twitter, which TechCrunch reported last night, certainly sounds exciting, it isn’t accurate in any way, according to a number of sources BoomTown spoke to close to the situation.

In fact, Twitter and Google (GOOG) have simply been engaged in “some product-related discussions,” according to one source, around real-time search and the search giant better crawling the microblogging service.

Said a source close to Twitter: “There was a discussion with [Google executive Marissa Mayer's] group about real-time search and about product stuff. It was a couple weeks ago. It was very preliminary…and that was that.”

More importantly, said another source about the idea of an imminent acquisition or serious or even early talks: “Seriously, no negotiations, no deal, nada.”

So for all those Twitterers madly typing 140 characters and caught up in the grand idea of Twoogle, we return you to your regularly scheduled tweeting.

Of course, there has been a lot of analysis, put forth by many, including me, that Google should think about acquiring Twitter.

It is the microblogging service’s likeliest acquirer, in fact. And there is no question Twitter is being watched closely by Google.

But sources at Google stressed that a strong partnership–especially in light of the growing size of the Facebook social-networking site–is what the company is most interested in at this point in time.

That could change at any time, of course. Google or anyone else could plunk down more than $1 billion in cash, and I cannot imagine Twitter’s investors would or could resist. Nor should they.

And what if, for example, Microsoft (MSFT) offered some huge cash payday for Twitter? In that case, I am certain Google would jump into the faceoff, backing up a giant Brinks trunk to the door of Twitter’s San Francisco offices.

And the reaction such an idea has gotten with this round of rumors will surely be studied at Google.

But this is all just pure speculation and should be couched as that. And that does not mean there are talks going on now, as TechCrunch reported so firmly.

And that’s also true for a range of other companies–from Microsoft to Yahoo (YHOO) to News Corp. (NWS) to Time Warner (TWX) unit AOL to Cisco (CSCO) to Comcast (CMCSA) to the big telcos–that would also be interested in buying Twitter or partnering with it.

And Facebook already tried and failed to buy Twitter last year, which BoomTown chronicled in a post in November, for $500 million in cash and stock of the social-networking service.

Why? Because although Twitter is still small, with seven million users, it has a definite momentum in the red-hot real-time online status update space.

And while I give it a hard time for its utter lack of a business plan or revenue to speak of, the well-funded Twitter is also at the beginning of a long runway of possibility that could yield it a higher price later, if it so chose to sell at all.

Moreover, if Twitter’s investors and founders wanted to sell, they wouldn’t have taken a recent round at $230 million valuation, because it would imply a $750 million to $1 billion purchase price, and no one could pay that right now.

Even the mighty Google could not–which does not typically overpay for companies.

More likely, Google would surely get killed by investors for spending that much on a revenue-free company, especially since it is still getting beat up for the pricey YouTube deal it made when times were great.

Lastly, Twitter’s founders have expressed the desire to take the company out for a longer ride, even if some of its investors would love to cash out if offered a crazy price.

“Why would the company do something like this right now?” said a source close to Twitter, in a typical sentiment. “The company’s on a tear right now.”

In fact, last night in an appearance on “The Colbert Report,” Twitter co-founder Biz Stone explicitly said Twitter planned to be a “strong, profitable, independent company.”

While entrepreneurs have said this and then quickly sold out, it is not the case now for Twitter, unless it got some insane offer, said numerous sources.

TechCrunch, which slapped a loud headline on its first post, “Sources: Google in Late-Stage Talks to Buy Twitter,” then changed it to “Sources: Google in Talks to Acquire Twitter (Updated).”

What’s next? “Google and Twitter Have a Lovely Organic Lunch and Discuss Trading T-Shirts (Updated Update)”?

The TechCrunch report, penned by Michael Arrington, also added a let’s-just-cover-all-our-bases update at the bottom of the ever-changing post that then hedged the news it had just hyped.

This is not new for the tech blog, especially related to Google.

On July 28, 2008, TechCrunch reported: “Google In Final Negotiations To Acquire Digg For ‘Around $200 Million,’” and said there was a letter of intent signed.

While the pair did hold ultimately unsuccessful talks, they never got even close to final.

And on February 6, 2008, TechCrunch had a post with the headline, “Rumor: Is Google About to Buy Bebo For $1 Billion To $1.5 Billion? Or Will it Be MySpace?”

Hmm, not so much on the about to buy Bebo. In fact, Google was never in what could be described as serious talks, and Bebo was sold to AOL, the lone bidder, for $850 million a month later.

Thus, the third time is, no surprise, not a charm either.

Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.

(Hey, it’s Loïc Le Meur and Michael Arrington again, fresh from their equally meaningful Are-French-folks-lazy-or-what? debate!)

This time, while the Mideast burns and the economy continues its meltdown, they and many others are going at it about the favored hyped Silicon Valley company of the moment, Twitter.

The new bone being gnawed on is something I can hardly grasp the point of–some drivel argument about what constitutes the authority of a tweet.

While tweet status would seem only important to, say, a Warner Bros. cartoon character like Sylvester, all I can think is: Who cares?

While I know I seem to say this a lot these days, I guess I am not really clear why people can’t use these various Web tools in any way they like, without a bunch of tech pundits pushing their self-aggrandizing agendas.

You want to rank tweets? Fine–knock yourself out! You want to use tweets to tell your family about your trip to Buffalo? Maybe not so much, but what the heck!

I think, though, the real story is the endless echo chamber of Silicon Valley that seems to persist in overestimating the meaning of Twitter, especially compared to so much more that is going on in the tech industry.

With only about six million registered users (with a much lower number of active ones), Twitter gets written about as if it were a mover and shaker extraordinaire, instead of just being what it is: An interesting status-alert start-up that makes zero revenues and turned down a very large buyout offer from another once-too-overhyped start-up (Facebook).

Well, after yet another week in the real world, I am here to tell you, precious few people still have any clue what Twitter is or how it works.

This is not to say Twitter is not useful or cool or that its growth is not impressive. All that is true about the service.

But the fact remains that Twitter is simply an unknown to most average people in a way other tech trends have not been.

The last time I did a What-the-Heck-Is-Twitter? experiment was in April and it went as follows:

So I was in Washington, D.C., this past weekend for a lovely wedding, traveling back to a city where I started my career and worked for 15 years after college.

And I conducted a little experiment among the more than 100 folks gathered for the wedding, all of whom were quite intelligent, armed with all kinds of the latest devices (many, many people had iPhones, for example) and not sluggish about technology.

They were also made up of a wide range of ages and genders, from kids to seniors.

And so I asked a large group of people–about 30–and here is the grand total who knew what Twitter was: 0

FriendFeed: 0

Widget: 1 (but she thought it was one of the units used in a business class study).

Facebook: Everyone I asked knew about it and about half had an account, although different people used it differently.”

This time, I asked yet another group of about 40 folks, in New York, Scranton and Buffalo, many of whom were young people and all of whom used the Internet regularly.

Those who knew what Twitter was: 3 (two only because they’d read about it being used in the Mumbai terror attacks).

Those who could actually explain how it worked and had used it: 1 (a journalist, natch!).

Friendfeed: 0 (even my family had not bothered to look at my recent post on the cool start-up).

Widget: 25, except most people now call them apps and are talking about using them in an Apple (AAPL) iPhone or an iPod Touch. Everyone was surprisingly knowledgeable, especially younger people, about apps for smartphones.

Facebook: 40–a perfect score, and almost everyone I talked to had a Facebook profile, which accounts for its huge growth to more than 140 million users worldwide.

You get the idea–while the digerati have moved away from Facebook as an important trendsetter, I am thinking that perhaps its time has just started.

Not that I have the tweet authority to say so or anything.

[UPDATE below.]

Yesterday, the one-man-band of a tech blogger, Michael Arrington, let loose with yet another outrageously indignant diatribe–this time that he and his TechCrunch site would forthwith break all news embargoes.

Not content with the traffic generated last week by his obviously faked Wrestlemania bout with French entrepreneur Loïc Le Meur about the lazy-lunching Europeans, he moved on to a more promising, but ultimately meaningless, riff on PR people versus journalists, over embargo-breaking.

It’s a sure-fire hit, given tech PR people and bloggers obsessively monitor Techmeme.

(What next for the Geraldo Rivera of investigative tech blogging? A withering prosecution of Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang in the HOV lane on Highway 101 in Sunnyvale without a hybrid? Quelle scandale!)

But BoomTown is not going to do a thumbsucker response to TechCrunch’s news embargo jihad, because, well, who really cares about the details of PR-media interaction anyway (except those who take themselves way too seriously)?

Here’s the essential 411 you’ll need to know: Some embargoes are good and some are bad and some are just–how can I phrase this correctly?–whatever.

And let’s be honest, pretty much everyone has broken an embargo, either by accident or on purpose.

But Arrington’s ire about this seems overwrought, and I suspect the true crankiness is natural product of the end cycle of dopey Web 2.0 “exclusives,” which TechCrunch has gotten in droves.

And all of it is increasingly less important as the economy withers and a lot of the less sustainable start-ups fade away. There are big important stories happening in tech right now about major public companies, the state of innovation and the future of the industry, which require more serious journalism.

So I think we can all imagine a day very soon when the Web 2.0 echo chamber dissipates–as it inevitably did in Web 1.0–and no one goes nuts if Start-up X adds a new embeddable widget, Start-up Y changes its homepage design or Start-up Z contemplates a new social-networking site for dogs to gain a new revenue stream.

And, in a less frothy landscape, the more important exclusives now go out to many. For example, consider yesterday’s story on LinkedIn’s changing of the guard, which went out to a dozen news outlets in advance rather than to just one like TechCrunch alone.

Of course, the true exclusives that a tech site gets through enterprise reporting take hard work and no handouts, which TechCrunch does legitimately get. Yesterday, in fact, TechCrunch’s Robin Wauters got a few really good ones about product units Yahoo is cutting.

But in this bruising contest, TechCrunch clearly does not dominate, based on its size, as it did with the easier press release exclusives. In the new environment, in fact, tiny little voices that are accurate and insightful have just as much impact.

So, my takeaway from Arrington’s rant could be boiled down to three words: “GIVE ME EXCLUSIVES!”

That verbal stamping of foot brought to my mind the loud declarations of Dr. Seuss’s “Yertle the Turtle.”

In the story, Yertle wants to be higher than anyone, so he forces the other turtles to pile up under him in an ever-unwieldy tower to rule over everyone and everything.

It ends badly, of course, when Yertle asks for too much:

But, as Yertle, the Turtle King, lifted his hand
And started to order and give the command,
That plain little turtle below in the stack,
That plain little turtle whose name was just Mack,
Decided he’d taken enough. And he had.
And that plain little lad got a bit mad.
And that plain little Mack did a plain little thing.
He burped!

And his burp shook the throne of the king!

And Yertle the Turtle, the king of the trees,
The king of the air and the birds and the bees,
The king of a house and a cow and a mule…
Well, that was the end of the Turtle King’s rule!
For Yertle, the King of all Sala-ma-Sond,
Fell off his high throne and fell Plunk! in the pond!
And today the great Yertle, that Marvelous he,
Is King of the Mud. That is all he can see.
And the turtles, of course…all the turtles are free
As turtles and, maybe, all creatures should be.”

We’re all in the mud now, TechCrunch. But come on in–the water’s just as fine.

[UPDATE: Now Arrington is going for the full cup full of crazy by attacking an admittedly obnoxious PR lady, getting all hot and bothered by spam she sends with the kind of indignation I like to reserve for the vile terrorists in Mumbai or wife beaters. Oh, dear. Then again, the rest of us can concentrate on real stories, while he busies himself huffing and puffing away on his anti-PR sousaphone.]

Last night, BoomTown was at the Horn Group offices in San Francisco to appear on a panel called “Is Social Media Killing PR?”

Focused on the “future of the media ecosystem,” it was moderated by Media Survey’s Sam Whitmore. Besides me, the other panelists were the Horn Group’s Susan Etlinger and Jeremiah Owyang, a Web strategist with Forrester Research.

The panel topic was inspired by recent blog rants by Jason Calacanis, Robert Scoble and Michael Arrington, all of whom have taken potshots at the PR industry as unnecessary or broken in the new social media order.

Of course, as was the intent, their pieces caused a teapot-tempest in the sector, although I said at the start of the panel that I was not so sure that PR folks should bite at this particular bait from a trio of bloggers well known for liking to start controversial debates.

In any case, it was a good discussion to a packed audience about what the implications of social media are for the PR business–essentially, fewer press releases and more Twitters!

My take was that as much as things have changed, little actually has and that social media were not going to turn a weak pitch into a strong one.

All that counted a decade ago were good products and solid start-ups–and that is all that still counts today.

And, in fact, with all the social tools PR folks now have, it is easier than ever for them and companies to go right around the gatekeepers of the media directly to customers.

Here’s a short video I did at the event:

BoomTown always enjoys chatting with the always sunny Loïc Le Meur of Seesmic (and will, in fact, be appearing at his Paris-based digital conference in December, called Le Web).

But I am not quite sure what to make of his big, happy smile that was in this picture above (click in the image to make it larger), which went with a story in the New York Times about start-ups cutting costs.

In fact, the whole Seesmic crew is grinning awfully hard, putting a very game face on recent layoffs that cut the staff at the video blog service by more than a third.

Money–or, more accurately, non-money–quote from the Times piece:

“To preserve cash, many tech start-ups are rushing to lay off employees and cut expenses. They are shelving their dreams of Google-size riches and getting small, humble and thrifty, all with the more modest goal of surviving the coming economic winter.”

In a less puritan mode, Seesmic raised $6 million in May from a bunch of high-profile angels, of $12 million total.

They include LinkedIn’s Reid Hoffman, former AOL head Steve Case, SoftTech VC Jeff Clavier, entrepreneur Mark Pincus, former Goldman Sachs analyst Michael Parekh, entrepreneur Ariel Poler, investor Ron Conway, FON founder Martin Varsavsky and an investment group called Atomico founded by Skype founders Niklas Zennström and Janus Friis. Tech bloggers Jeff Pulver, Michael Arrington and Dan Gillmor have also invested.

Now, Le Meur is trying to stretch his dollars in the economic downturn, spurred by venture capitalists who have been pressing entrepreneurs like him to do so.

“If I can’t make this work in three years it will be a failure,” Mr. Le Meur said to the Times. “If I can and I get through this, it will be much stronger.”

In other words, what doesn’t kill us …

C’est la vie in Silicon Valley!

But in more bon-vivant times, back in February, I did a video post on my happier visit to Seesmic’s San Francisco HQ.

(Note: Many in the video are no longer at Seesmic and neither are the shows discussed, as well as the now-defunct Web 2.0 sentiments about growth without revenue.)

Here’s the video:

Image Credit: Jim Wilson/New York Times

As the economy continues its very drastic downward slide–part of a binge and purge cycle that is almost classic in its psychology–it is, of course, no surprise to see Web 2.0 finally wise up.

While the quarter-dropping-in-the-slot was a bit slow, I think no one now doubts the impact of the tech and Internet business, going forward, from large companies to small start-ups, and all the rest of the ecosystem that relies on the virtuous circle of digital life.

Much has been made here and all over the blogosphere about various prescriptions to hunker down by venture capitalists and plans by companies to cut costs in this downturn.

That includes the realization that, as one Web exec wrote me yesterday, “no more eyeballs=business.”

Of course, this change in tone is a good thing and much needed, given how frothy things had become in Silicon Valley over the last two years.

While the excess was by no means anything like the last bubble–where inane start-ups actually had the audacity to IPO and, thereby, essentially take cynical and sometimes criminal advantage of an ignorant investing public–the maxim of Web 2.0 that basics like revenues or positive cash flow do not matter compared to growth has been a dangerous one.

And though growth is key too, part of an investment and belief in the future of important trends like social networking and the ubiquity of online advertising, the go-go strategy had taken too much of the attention of entrepreneurs.

And while the crash is certainly not due to that focus, and tech is indeed getting unfairly hurt, given how healthy much of the sector is, Silicon Valley needed an attitude adjustment.

In other words, while the recent excess is not the culprit, its departure is a very good thing.

The problem is, that does not matter at all, given the situation and where it is headed.

And where is that?

Onward, of course, although maybe not upward for a while.

In what is a typical shift in the zeitgeist this past week, TechCrunch’s Michael Arrington penned an interesting rumination today about what he calls the “ignoble but much needed end to Web 2.0.”

Like me, he references the dopey lip-synching video made by a bunch of Web 2.0 folks while on a vacation, which will surely become a classic example of how profoundly out-of-touch and egregiously silly their mindset has become.

Arrington writes:

“Goodbye, Web 2.0. I hope I never have to type those words again. Now can we please get back to work? There’s still a ton left to do before we get to Matrix-style virtual reality, the Singularity, and mobile phones with batteries that last a whole day.”

Although it might feel like it, I think calling it an “end” is probably too dramatic for what is happening now.

But I would have to agree wholeheartedly that moving on to what really matters is perhaps the silver lining in this decidedly difficult time.

With more critics piling on to the just-say-no-to-Yahoogle bandwagon–questioning the controversial ad deal for Yahoo to outsource some of its search ads to Google–sources said some top Google execs are now hightailing it to Washington, D.C., to smooth over any regulatory feathers the company might have ruffled with its aggressive, damn-the-torpedoes approach to pushing the deal forward.

The partnership is set to start up around Oct. 13 and promises to give the much-suffering Yahoo (YHOO) a huge boost in revenues.

Google (GOOG), of course, benefits by blocking Microsoft (MSFT), which has caused the software giant to lobby against the deal like a lipstick-wearing pitbull.

Google and Microsoft have been locked in a variety of tech battles on many fronts of late, but the Yahoo front has been a particularly rough one.

Critics like Microsoft have a lot of ammo here though, especially because Yahoo and Google together will claim over 80 percent of the search market.

That has caused a big outcry to prevent the No. 1 and No. 2 players from partnering.

The latest objection, among a passel of them, came earlier this week from the World Federation of Advertisers, which has asked the European Commission to stop the partnership, even though the deal, as currently conceived, impacts only U.S. Web sites.

So to assuage the tumult, Google is glad-handing regulators, even as Yahoo announced a new group for advertisers called the Digital Advisory Council.

“Opening up Yahoo! is a key part of our strategy, and we want to help advertisers understand how they can benefit from this approach,” said Yahoo U.S. EVP Hilary Schneider. “At the same time, there has been confusion and misinformation surrounding Yahoo!’s agreement with Google, which represents another key milestone in opening up our network. As questions emerge about how Yahoo! will implement this agreement, the Advisory Council will provide a forum for us to engage in a dialogue with key customers on those issues.”

Well, phew! A council! That’s sure to bring online ad harmony across the planet!

Actually, it all feels like that model United Nations thing I grudgingly did in high school, and almost as useful.

And the pair also got a boost from New York Times Digital Domain columnist Randall Stross, who penned a piece Sunday called “Why the Google-Yahoo Ad Deal Is Nothing to Fear.”

Nothing? Really? Not even a little bit?

BoomTown has got to say, we’re still a smidgen nervous. OK, tons and tons. (And, it turns out TechCrunch’s Michael Arrington agrees with me, so you know it is serious!)

Still, in the interest of fairness, let’s examine Stross’s main argument, which is essentially that Google’s and Yahoo’s more than 80 percent market share does not matter.

“Google controls about 70 percent of the search advertising market. Doesn’t that give it a monopolist’s ability to set prices as high as it wishes?

“It does not. Google does not set the prices. Its advertisers do, bidding against one another for the amount they will pay when a user clicks on one of their ads. They do the same for ads on Yahoo and Microsoft search sites, too.”

Noting Microsoft’s efforts to portray Google as a “price-controlling monster,” Stross then tried to make a case that worries about higher prices are currently just speculation and not based in practice.

“Even though this is a business based on auction pricing, the specter of price fixing has been raised by demagogues. Shout ‘monopoly’ loud enough and point to ‘90 percent share’ of something–it doesn’t really matter what–and federal and state regulators will decide this is a matter meriting their close attention.

“One company has done more than any other to publicly disparage the Yahoo-Google deal: Microsoft, the same company that did not succeed in acquiring Yahoo earlier this year. Hell hath no fury like a suitor scorned.”

Oh dear, the loser-boyfriend argument, which is a canard.

Sure, Microsoft is up to all sorts of tricks and aggressive lobbying about the deal–just as Google surely would be if the tables were turned and Microsoft had won the heart of Yahoo CEO Jerry Yang and consummated a merger marriage.

And Google and Yahoo are correct that the auction model means advertisers set prices for ads.

But what Stross is leaving out is the key problem of what happens later, when perhaps Yahoo’s share of the search market declines even further–as is the inexorable trend–and Yahoo becomes yet another vassal of Google’s largess.

That’s now true for AOL, Ask, MySpace and many others. And it is in no one’s interest–especially publishers–to have just one place to turn, which is what they will have, since Google will increasingly yield the best results.

Last week, for example, I was meeting with a big advertiser on both Google and Yahoo, who noted that he liked to have two strong choices.

“In the end, as Yahoo’s results weaken, it will probably only make sense to use Google,” he said. “And that opens up a whole can of worms.”

Indeed. Which is why–at the very least–regulators should force Google and Yahoo to make some commitments about their deal.

The kind of trust-but-verify-later requirements that anticipate possible problems was well argued in the form of a white paper yesterday from a nonprofit think tank called the American Antitrust Institute.

The report was relatively even-handed, noting, “the transaction should be viewed as presumptively anticompetitive, although it may also contain possible pro-competitive benefits.”

So, in the interests of consumer and advertisers and publishers, it is incumbent on the government to get tweaks to the Yahoogle deal that minimize the former and maximize the latter.

Without such promises, who knows what tomorrow brings in a world in which one search engine survives?

Please see this disclosure related to me and Google.

I have posted below a video interview with ContentNext’s founder Rafat Ali, who spoke about the deal. I caught up with him in his New York hotel this morning (by coincidence I flew into New York today on a redeye).

But the deal–which comes after the mid-May sale of Ars Technica to Condé Nast for a reported $25 million–begs the question of which tech blog might be next to be acquired.

And, after much noisy poking around today, BoomTown is giving the nod to one of the sector’s larger and splashier sites: TechCrunch.

Several sources told me TechCrunch has been in off-and-on talks recently with Time Warner’s AOL (TWX), which wants to pay from $20 and $30 million for the site.

I could not find out what price TechCrunch thinks is fair, although one might assume it is higher than that.

TechCrunch CEO Heather Harde told me via email that she had no comment. “My policy is not to comment on rumors of our business,” she wrote.

TechCrunch, which was founded in mid-2005 by Michael Arrington, is a group-edited blog that has grown large by focusing–”obsessively,” according to the site’s About page–on Web 2.0 start-ups, covering every jog and tittle of their life cycles.

Sources said the talks between TechCrunch and AOL have been ongoing for the past six to eight weeks, although the site has been in talks with several other large media companies interested in it in the past and these have not led to an acquisition.

AOL would probably be a good home for a site like TechCrunch, since it has a blog focus from its own Switched site and sites it bought, like Engadget.

AOL acquired that popular gadget site in 2005 in the $25 million acquisition of Weblogs, which was founded by entrepreneur Jason Calacanis.

Calacanis, by the way, runs an annual tech conference with TechCrunch, now called TechCrunch50.

Also, I have stayed in Calacanis’s house in the Brentwood (see post and video here), when I was interviewing a Disney exec onstage at a paidContent conference in Los Angeles recently.

Oh, yes, it’s a small tech blogging world after all.

But the money has suddenly become big for the sites involved in that universe too, although most still have relatively small businesses.

Nonetheless, tech bloggers have grown in number and influence, as sites–like this one–compete to break news and attract readers.

Such efforts take funding–despite the lower costs as compared with traditional media–and this probably means inevitable consolidation.

Before its acquisition by Guardian, for example, ContentNext had been raising several million dollars recently to fuel more expansion.

Other sites have also recently raised funds, such as GigaOm, Silicon Alley Insider and VentureBeat.

Most of them have also been talking about various roll-ups between and among one other. Sources told me that VentureBeat, for example, has spoken separately in the past to both paidContent and TechCrunch about joining forces.

VentureBeat’s Founder Matt Marshall would not comment on that, but did note that “size matters, so you have to do what you can to get the economics of scale.”

That includes adding on more sites and doing conferences, as VentureBeat has done (its new conference is called MobileBeat, for example, which will take place in Sunnyvale, Calif. on July 24.)

“Consolidation is what you are probably going to see,” predicted Marshall about the tech blogging arena.

Here’s ContentNext’s Ali talking about exactly that and more today:

Thanks to TechCrunch’s Michael Arrington for pointing us to “Weekend King,” a San Francisco-made movie, which sounds just delicious from the trailer below.

It’s about a repulsive but rich computer programmer named Rupert Coleman from Silicon Valley who buys a bankrupt town in Utah and hopes to become its beloved ruler.

High jinks and heart-warming life lessons ensue, of course!

Arrington thought it sounded “sappy,” which it does, but BoomTown went all soft and melty in the middle over the idea of it.

Why? True story: Once, while at a party in 1999 talking with a well-known Web billionaire, sick of the excess, I suggested that he take a ton of his Web 1.0 bubble money and buy a village or town somewhere and dude it up with all sorts of cool stuff like free everything.

The catch? Require the citizens to rename it after him and hold an annual parade dedicated to his glorious accomplishments.

He demurred (No, it was not Mark Cuban, because he’d have totally done it!), much to my disappointment, so you can see why I love the idea of this movie.

(In the latest excessive Web 2.0 bubble, my new request of an Internet multi-billionaire recently was to convince him to try to become best friends with Brangelina and brood by dangling the plane and donations galore to worthy causes and free babysitting forever. Again, no luck.)

Here’s the video:

Another day, another tech blog eruption featuring Michael “The Volcano” Arrington of TechCrunch and, this time, Wired’s Betsy “Ain’t-Backing-Down” Schiffman.

When last we checked in with Arrington, he was elegantly telling Chris Shipley that her longstanding tech conference might want to take a dirt nap. Specifically: “Demo needs to die.”

But that’s not all!

Before that, Arrington was comparing tech blogs to gangs and contemplating bloody fights with some post-bashing tango. In it, he advised tech blogs not to raise money and talked of the importance of sector roll-ups without, oops, actually mentioning TechCrunch was both considering raising money and doing a roll-up of tech blogs.

Here’s one incredible quote from the piece: “Personally, I’ve found that if a fight is necessary, fight clean and fight hard. Make it as bloody as possible and end it fast, with no loose ends dangling about. Leave no lingering emotional stone unturned. When everyone gets up and dusts themselves off, the issue should have been resolved one way or the other, and both sides should be happy to shake hands and tango another day, even if the handshaking is done privately.”

In the latest kerfuffle, Schiffman wrote what was a minor criticism at the very end of a piece about a syndication deal that TechCrunch struck with the Washington Post (WPO).

She wrote: “We’ve got nothing against TechCrunch, but it seems crazy-crazy to us that the Washington Post, a paper known for the sort of reporting that can take down U.S. presidents, is publishing content written by a dude who invests in the companies he writes about. But what do we know.”

Snarky yes, but Arrington writes like this all the time (as does BoomTown).

More importantly, since Arrington does actually invest in several companies and says he also advises some covered by TechCrunch (see here in a very short disclosure, given he invested his own money), it is not an outrageous point to make related to a deal with a venerable media institution like the Post.

In any case, Arrington has got to have heard this one before and in much worse ways.

I know I have many times due to my relationship with Megan Smith, who is currently a vice president at Google (GOOG), as is disclosed here in detail, even though I do not own one single share in the company and–TMI–we split all costs exactly down to the penny (except for all those pricey over-and-above-birthdays-and-Christmas toys she likes to buy for our kids, which I sensibly refuse to pay for).

As I wrote in my disclosure: “I am well aware of the controversies surrounding ethics online now swirling about, some of which have resulted in giving readers some pause about the quality and honesty of some in the blogosphere. Such wariness is always a good thing for everyone and I encourage readers to ask tough questions and demand more of those providing them information of all kinds. I know that I am asking for a large measure of trust from readers of the site, and I pledge to do everything I can to be deserving of that trust.”

So I get maybe being irked, especially if you are trying to be as transparent as possible, and maybe writing Wired a stern note saying it was unfair.

But instead of that, he chose to respond by putting out another set of classy bons mots on Twitter: “Wow. F*** You too, Wired.”

In a post yesterday, peacefully titled “OK, Wired, Let’s Do This,” Arrington blamed this explosion on “a night of heavy drinking at the Time 100 party.”

OK, maybe he’s drunk and incredibly rash, but it was liquor imbibed at a very important soiree!

But post-drinking, I assume since it was posted in the afternoon, Arrington followed up with another winner on Twitter: “No one at Wired is responding to me today about their post yesterday. I’m organizing a Wired burning party (the mag, not their offices).”

Well, phew, just the magazines on fire! Ha, ha, ha!

Actually, not funny at all–I am just humorless about book-burning, so I will take any and all criticism on the subject for that stance, given the ugly history of the burning of media–but there you have it.

Except not at all.

Arrington wrote his own piece yesterday, which was meant to be reasonable, although it was seeping with indignation about small slights over when and how Wired responded to him (which appeared to have been done, but not to his liking, as Wired’s follow-up responding to Arrington’s antics recounted) and with too much of a gotcha focus on what is a dumb, name-calling tag word Wired used on the story.

But while he was right about the juvenile tag, Arrington then, like clockwork, in the very same piece called Schiffman a “troll.”

Well, at least he’s consistent.

But not at all like what I know the Washington Post expects from those it affiliates with, which is to say making the highest and most strenuous efforts to be civil, fair and temperate.

While it has not always succeeded at this–its Janet Cooke debacle in the early 1980s, for example, was a black eye–the Post has always tried to aim for the highest of standards.

How do I know this? Because I started delivering mail at the Post while I was in college at Georgetown University, was later an intern there and then a reporter for a decade more.

I could not be more proud of my time there or be more in admiration of the people who work there every day–even in these tough times for newspapers–who try very hard to act, when representing the Post, as professionals.

No one exemplifies that more than the Post’s owner and CEO Don Graham (pictured here), whom I admire profoundly. At once a gentle soul and also wise to the ways of the world, Graham is a true hero of mine.

While I love my various jobs at Dow Jones (NWS), I have missed being at the Post many times over the years, and Graham and I have always been in touch.

So I am very sorry to see the Post dragged into this temper tantrum by one of its new contributors, sullying its fine reputation.

And if it is just showboating, as some have suggested–a traffic-inducing faux wrestling match for the cheap seats in the back (and they are cheap)–than it is a lousy show.

In any case, Arrington will surely once again–as he has–claim that competitors like Wired and also this site should not comment on his behavior at TechCrunch (and, just to be clear, AllThingsD, wholly owned by Dow Jones, is not vying with TechCrunch to appear in the Washington Post either).

But standards and public online conduct are an increasingly important issue, if the blogosphere–as I believe Arrington must want also–is to have the kind of credibility it deserves.

And while Arrington and I obviously do not see eye-to-eye on a lot of stuff–I have criticized some of TechCrunch’s practices and Arrington’s own professional behavior directly to him via email and to others and I have even written about it several times (here, for example)–I do admire TechCrunch’s energy and relentless focus and the way it has forced others to compete more rigorously in covering the Web 2.0 sector.

And, lastly, whether Schiffman or I question such a syndication deal, it really does not matter, since it is solely up to the editors of the Post as to what they want to publish.

So, if they choose TechCrunch, that’s their decision.

But–and I can’t wait to see what delightful name Arrington slings at me for saying so–TechCrunch, in accepting what is a real honor and validation from one of this country’s great media organizations, should be ashamed of returning the favor by dragging the Post into a largely unprovoked and dirty gutter fight.

Please see this disclosure related to me and Google. ]]> http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080514/memo-to-don-graham-thar-he-blows/feed/ 11 http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080403/memo-to-chris-shipley-luca-brasi-sleeps-with-the-fishes/ http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080403/memo-to-chris-shipley-luca-brasi-sleeps-with-the-fishes/#comments Thu, 03 Apr 2008 11:00:46 +0000 Kara Swisher http://kara.allthingsd.com/20080403/memo-to-chris-shipley-luca-brasi-sleeps-with-the-fishes/