Any Excuse to Link to Your Buddy

Must admit, I'm a bit tired of the semi-conflict-of-interest stuff going on in the blogsphere.  Checkout TechCrunch attempting to stir controversy out of nothing between a friend of Mike Arrington's and one of the startups that he has invested in.  Is it really a story that Loren Feldman was less than polite or that Loic Le Meur responded with this?

"Thank you Loren Feldman of 1938 Media for treating us as idiots like this, reality check is always good. You know what ? We are idiots that enjoy talking to each other and that really is what I like. We are happy idiots who like to hang out together. Let the happy idiots in peace !"

It feels like Arrington is trying to manufacture something here to drive traffic to two sites he has personal ties to because I don't get that Le Meur "didn't take it very well" or was "frustrated" from his response above at all.  In fact, in Le Meur's update to his post, he says he had fun watching Feldman's video.  

For me, it is not okay to manufacture a story and then justify it with a disclosure midway through the article.  For bigger blogs like TechCrunch I expect nearly the same editorial standards as mainstream print media.  I feel like Michael Arrington pushes this boundary a lot.  IMHO, the professional thing for him to do would be to not invest in consumer oriented websites.  

As someone who enjoys keeping up on startup news, I probably won't boycott TechCrunch all together, but when I see that the similar stories getting coverage on TechCrunch & it competitors, I'll direct my pageviews elsewhere.