In early 2006, my now-defunct startup wanted what almost all startups do: a write-up on TechCrunch.  When the four of us who founded the site started talking to Wikia about the acqu-hire which would come at the end of that year, one of the not-so-trivial (but by no means core) points was Wikia’s promise of coverage in the tech blogs, and explicitly, a massive chance that TechCrunch itself would bite.  

Wikia easily delivered on this promise.  But the project — a sports wiki/blog hybrid — was not well aligned with the interests of TechCrunch’s readership, and the traffic gained from the mentions (and, for that matter, mentions on Mashable, RWW, etc.) were not at all noteworthy except in how small they were.*

* At one point, right before the 2007 NFL season, if memory serves, we got a great write up from Mashable … which gave us either 80 or 800 visits.  

Fast forward to today.  Again, I have a neat little project.  It’s not even close to being within the editorial realm of the tech press, but that hasn’t stopped me from pitching on occasion.  There’s this odd mystique and aura around this type of coverage, and TechCrunch remains the holy grail. 

Which makes some sense, but not as much as it should.  Take a look at the Airbnb saga and you’ll see.

I’ll not recount that saga here; if you don’t know what I’m talking about, Google “airbnb ej” or “airbnb burglary” and you’ll get plenty.  Or just read the TechCrunch article — Michael Arrington covered the story, just like every other tech blog has.  That’s the important part: everyone in the tech world is talking about it, which makes TechCrunch’s post, while good, not all that important in and of itself.  If Mr. Arrington never wrote about it, the net amount of information on the topic would barely change.

With the collective attention now focused on Airbnb, they all but had to respond.  And once they did, that response would be read.   But they didn’t respond on the company blog, or via a press release, on Facebook, etc.  No, for some reason, the CEO ended up writing a guest post on TechCrunch.  

Huh?

To repeat: any response would have been noticed, wherever they chose to publish it.  

What does publishing the response at TechCrunch get Airbnb?  If you think it gets them additional exposure, that additional exposure is marginal at best (re-read the bold-faced type above).  TechCrunch is big and powerful — but it is just is not that powerful.   

There is this false belief that TechCrunch is an order of magnitude more important than it is.  And it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy when those who believe in its power act upon it.   Publishing the corporate response on TechCrunch is a coup for Mr. Arrington, no doubt.  He — along with the parties to the dispute — enters the epicenter of the saga.  He’s still not a core player, of course (far from it).  But the myth that all roads lead to (and from) TechCrunch is strengthened.

Stronger, but still mythical. And then… oh boy.  Then, Paul Graham, one of Airbnb’s investors takes Mr. Arrington to task for his coverage of the saga.  It’s odd for two reasons: one, the saga is not about TechCrunch, so blaming Mr. Arrington is incredibly misplaced; and two, when the entire world is taking shots at your investment, why are you picking on the only one which gave your investment’s CEO a free opportunity to run an op-ed?  The only (non-cynical) explanation I can come up with: Mr. Graham is convinced that Mr. Arrington is much, much, much more powerful than he actually is.

And that is impossibly powerful.  TechCrunch is a hugely visible media property.  It’s worth, as we all know, millions.  It has a million RSS subscribers at least and 1.7 million towitter followers.  It’s big.  Bigger than big.  Which in part is why we all want to be covered by it.

But Airbnb is big, too.  A valuation at over $1 billion.  Over 1,000,000 nights booked.  And now, a public relations nightmare which has been the single most talked about tech item for a week — a problem which is bigger than TechCrunch.  There is simply no way that TechCrunch can be bigger to the conversation than the conversation itself, at least not at this point in Airbnb’s growth.

Mr. Graham’s actions — he’s a Valley superstar! — demonstrate the mythical power of TechCrunch.  Like any other media property, TechCrunch is only as valuable as the attention it commands.  But if Airbnb and Mr. Graham had a sense of perspective here, we would not be talking about TechCrunch today.  And maybe, we wouldn’t be talking about Airbnb’s disaster PR plan either.