SFGate profiles Mike Arrington

There is a long article in today's SFGate about TechCrunch blogger Mike Arrington. His quick rise to powerful blogger and Web 2.0 influencer is pretty incredible. They even call him Mr. Web 2.0. TechCrunch is a great source of information, but not knowing the relationships which exist between TechCrunch and the companies they review is a little bit of a concern.

Old-school journalists question Arrington's ethics and potential for conflicts of interest. He even engaged in a high-profile dustup with the New York Times at an Online News Association conference in October in which he accused the Times of ethical lapses but later backed down. Blogger and author Nick Carr charged that while Arrington discloses his investments when he writes about companies, he doesn't always disclose those investments when he writes -- sometimes negatively -- about their competitors. Tech gossip blog Valleywag has a field day with each alleged transgression.

Arrington struck back on his blog, writing that his friendships and his activity as an entrepreneur and investor help him get access to inside information.

"No one should think TechCrunch is objective or conflict-free," he wrote. "We aren't. We never have been. We never will be."