How does Michael Arrington from TechCrunch

TechCrunch is a San Francisco company that runs an influential blog with the same name, started as a hobby. In 2005, Michael Arrington, an ordinary entrepreneur and former lawyer, was researching Silicon Valley start-ups and decided to publish his findings on the Internet. This is how TechCrunch website appeared, which is currently visited by about 9.2 million people every month, and whose annual income is about $ 10 million. He became one of the largest sources of news about Internet startups and technology companies. Although there are 25 full-time employees at TechCrunch, Arrington still spends a lot of time writing his articles. Most often, he works remotely from his home near Seattle. From morning to night, Michael sits in the dark in front of his computer, listening to music, working with a list of contacts and focusing on what he loves most - a description of the hot news of the technical industry.

Arrington is not a morning person and usually wakes up in a bad mood. Get out of bed makes him fresh message that something interesting is happening, but they have not yet written. Only the most interesting and hot news comes to work. We have to keep the brand, because often TechCrunch gets exclusive information and gives it to the network one of the first.

Michael recently, at the insistence of the doctor, trying to wake up at 9 am daily. 4 years in a row, since the launch of the site, he worked until he lost consciousness, slept and again began to work. He moved away from friends and family, missed many important events, recovered by 50 pounds in 5 years. Now, with the help of a doctor, he is trying to fix his body. The only thing that is not yet possible is to go to bed early. So while Arrington sleeps on average 4-5 hours a day.

His day begins with a trip to his beloved computer, which he never disconnects. He is looking for hot news among incoming mail. Each message is analyzed, hot news is checked by calling people involved in the event. After clarification, he takes something himself, gives something to the regular authors.
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Sometimes the defendants are asked to keep the publication of the article about the upcoming or accomplished event, and Michael responds to requests. He considers it a matter of trust. To receive current information from sources, it is necessary that they trust you.

Usually the process of parsing hot news ends by 11 am, and Arrington can take a shower and take a walk with their dogs.

Michael moved to Seattle recently. He likes that the city is calm, and the parents live nearby, which makes it possible to see them quite often. He spends two-thirds of his time at home and the rest in the company's San Francisco office. In California, Michael does not have his own home, so you have to live in hotels.

After the dogs are fed, Arrington forces himself to eat something and hurries to the workplace. He compares his home office with a cave. The windows are closed with thick dark curtains. Dark color attracts Michael, allows less distraction from his poppy with two 24-inch monitors. On one of them he conducts his research, and on the other he writes. He would like to have three monitors, but unfortunately, poppies only support two. Michael's office in San Francisco has the same solution.

Usually, half of his day is spent talking to sources over the phone or through messaging services. Quite a few people in Silicon Valley and in the technology industry, who would not know Michael well. Digging into the details of the events he calls the favorite part of his work. For five years, he found a lot of people who provide him with first-hand information, you just call.

Arrington believes that one of the competitive advantages of his company is that they really love entrepreneurs, comparing them with rock stars. He himself had 4 companies, but nothing came of them. TechCrunch was Michael’s first real success, and it happened by chance. If one day he writes a book, he promises to tell in it what motivates entrepreneurs. He met in his life and winners and losers. Most of them can get a good job as an accountant or lawyer. But instead, they risk everything and most often fail. Studying losers is often more interesting. You can learn much more useful from failing enterprises.

Michael never develops friendships with people that he doesn’t really like. For example, in his work he writes about digital music. But he doesn't want to work with people from music labels. He hates them and compares them with Darth Vader.

Arrington considers himself rather unorganized when exploring sources. He is trying to sort them in his head. But last year, the short-term memory began to let him down and now Michael keeps records of all calls and conversations in messengers. He makes most calls via Google Voice, so keeping an archive is quite simple. Incoming calls to Google Voice are usually forwarded to a mobile or home number.

Arrington often uses Skype in his work. He likes video conferencing and he increasingly uses them in his work, and simply in his communication with friends.

In most cases, Michael does not like PR people, preferring to go directly to executives. If a PR man directly offers to meet with the head of a new company, he always agrees. But if they start from afar, with an offer to drink or dine, then he refuses. He considers such meetings a waste of time. If Arrington has time to go to a restaurant, he prefers to spend it with family or friends.

Michael now usually publishes his articles several times a week. When he started TechCrunch, publications came out several times a day. He enjoys his work. It’s a great feeling when someone posts a comment on your work and it’s not your mom. People began to subscribe to the RSS feed and the number of subscribers grew daily. Michael considers this feedback as a reward and is still looking at the comments on his articles. Almost always he can predict what comments will receive. Most of them often do not deserve attention, but there are also comments worthy of discussion.

TechCrunch is also known for its parties. Their organization allowed to get acquainted with the right people at first. Several large and many small meetings were held annually. Michael tried to visit them all. The tradition began since his arrival in Palo Alto in 2005. He wrote a blog post in which he invited people to a party. It's 10 people. Michael made hamburgers. People drank beer and whiskey and talked until 4 in the morning. Two weeks later, 20 people came to the same party, then 100 and 200. Venture capitalists smoked weed at Arrington in the yard and lounging on his couch. He stopped holding parties at home, because from them he began to fall into disrepair. This year, about 1,000 people attended a party organized by TechCrunch.

Naturally, with such work there are people dissatisfied with Arrington and even enemies. In 2008, at a conference in Germany, someone spat at him. Because of the threats, he even hired a guard who protects him and his family from assault 24 hours a day. For some time, he even stopped working, and his work was carried out by a hired team, which Michael watched from Hawaii. Attendance rates continued to grow, and this made it clear that the team is coping and you can rely on these people.

Arrington does not consider himself a strong leader. He likes to write, but it’s very difficult to be a coach and a player at the same time. That is why he hired Heather Hardy for the position of CEO. The team of editors is managed by Eric Schonfeld, co-author of TechCrunch. Michael talks to each of them about three times a week and never holds meetings. Instead, they use the Yammer program as a means of automating the work of all employees. This is something like a message board that anyone can write to and everyone will see. If someone works better than others, everyone will know about it. If someone makes inaccuracies, then Michael points this out so that everyone can learn from the mistakes of others.

Break in the work Arrington makes around 3 hours. At this time, he is engaged in life, playing with dogs, can go to eat with his parents, friends or alone, and then returns to work. Now Michael is trying to "write" real life in the work.

Arrington likes to work at night when nothing distracts. Usually he listens to music when he writes, preferring heavy gloomy performers - Metallica, Eminem, Rage Against The Machine.
Michael can come back to bed either before midnight or at 6 in the morning. But no matter how much time is on the clock, he always reads before falling asleep. Let it be only a few pages. Usually this is fiction and it is always a regular printed book. Then he falls asleep happy.

by Ink Magazine