I feell like I’m the only human being at this bizarre intersection of mostly obscure elements to actually write about it. for the sake of the record, even lol.
the second time in as many years McClatchy has said yes to the same motherfucker, this time for 2/3 the hypothetical incentive, but he (Tony Haile) is twice as rich, conservatively…
…and I got to ask him a question on the day he sold Scroll to Twitter. I had just got out of the shower and didn’t expect to be added as a speaker in Chris Messina’s Twitter Space and my words were (more or less verbatim:) “I just got out of the shower but uh… I forgot about Tony Haile. (yes, he was in the call and I did say that) ..but I would ask him to narrate how exactly he got from chartbeat to scroll to Twitter.” in third person even though I could hear him breathing lol.
… and how utterly unconcerned McClatchy is about loping in a local, at least partially advertising-supported, 150-year-old newspaper in a deal spending resources/time intentionally forgoing ad revenue. the actual consequences of which won’t be more than a blip, I’m sure, but the disrespect… jesus christ.
(the guy who invented the whole rich digital analytics industry somehow managed to sell his anti-analytics industry startup to Twitter for a ridiculous, unknown sum less than a decade later?)