Jonathan Tasini pic from NY Times (click)

Remember when Arianna Huffington and her co-owners sold The Huffington Post to AOL for $315 million?
And remember how some of those who blogged and contributed to the site out of a sort of collective, we’re a left-wing blog in a world of right-wing media altrusim felt a bit let down? Like the last thing they expected was a sale of ‘their’ content to a fat cat corporate — it looked cynical to them …and sparked a dissonance expressed as: ‘We’d write for free for Arianna, but not AOL.

I can’t be the only one who thought, ‘Gee, Arianna has really schmoozed those guys; telling them what they wanted to hear to get them on board, then selling the baby’.

Well, it’s moved further with a class action lawsuit initiated by one of those bloggers, Jonathan Tasini — sparking a scathing and, forgive me, rather nasty attempted riposte from Ms Huffington (she sounds pissed-off to me) … but, I have to say a very un-hysterical and measured reply in return from Mr Tasini which includes this:

There is little doubt that unjust enrichment has taken place. In society, our law tries to reflect our moral values, and vice versa. The thousands of bloggers created the value of the Huffington Post. Arianna Huffington created a tiny piece of that value—but she has declared that she, and only she, should benefit from the value of the sale to AOL.
I have no idea whether we will win the legal case. Judges do what they will do. It is a novel argument—as was the legal argument at the heart of the case I brought against The New York Times in 1993, which we won in the U.S. Supreme Court in 2001 …. At the time, many pundits or “observers” opined that we had no chance. So, I suggest we all take the opinions of various people with a healthy dose of skepticism, or, at least, a “wait and see” attitude.
But, this is the reason I have said to the blogger community—to the dozens of people who have already written and called asking to be part of the effort (including insiders who are sharing more information to strengthen our case)—that the machinations in court are a small piece of what we must do. This is really not about Ms. Huffington; she will be a forgotten “brand” when the next new fad appears.

Left-winger(?) Arianna Huffington (pic: The Hollywood Reporter- click)

There’s no doubt in my mind that The Huffington Post pursues page views with a clinical, calculated cynicism. e.g. Huffington Post Continues Nipple Parade and I have no problem buying NY Times editor Bill Keller’s memorable put-down of the ‘adorable kitten videos‘ approach the site uses. It’s true.

So, yes, I’m willing to easily believe Arianna Huffington is a chameleon. (I think that’s been established, already. Maybe it’s the secret of her success?) I personally believe that if needs be, Arianna could/would assume the role of a poser who would whisper all the right things in the right ears to get people onside, boosting her site’s fortunes along the way. But equally there’s no doubt that her venture was a capitalist gamble — one that was losing money for a while, and one that’s paid off for those who put (ahem) capital at risk. Including (naturally) Ms Huffington.

It’s understandable why people like Jonathan Tasini and other ‘contributors’ who did some of the heavy lifting as far as creating buzz and attracting influential audiences and stablemates in the early days are now gagging on her ‘Oh but you should be soooo happy for the exposure darling … just ignore me while I go to the bank ka-ching! line of reasoning. It’s the call girl principle (‘the value of a given service is greatly diminished once that service has been rendered’ — harsh but true.) Continue reading →