Sam Sethi Replies

Sam Sethi, publisher of Blognation takes strong issue on my report of Oliver Starr's angry departure.  He left it as a comment, but I thought it deserved the same level of visibility as the original report received. He closes by taking a swipe at "friends of Mike Arrington" spreading untuths that Sam characterizes as "Naked Conversations."

To clarify a point, I know and like Mike who was been very kind and generous to me when Naked Conversations was published. But if I have a friend in this situation, it is Oliver Starr, who chose to leave TechCrunch to join Blognation. In any case, my loyalty is to my readers, not my friends.

I don't know Sam and we are now in a his-word-vs-the-other-guy's word situation. I would be surprised if what Oliver wrote proves to be untrue.

Sam has one legitimate gripe with me I think. I was covering news and I did not try to gain the balance of pursuing a comment from Sam before publishing. I wish blogging worked the way newspapers do, but that is not the case. The best I can do is draw your attention to what he has to say.

Sam's Comment in full:

A number of facts need to be corrected in your post. Much of what you wrote is blogsphere fiction and gossip. 1.I resigned - Mike never fired me on matter of principal. 2.I never stole any money and Arrington knows that as he claimed it from the sponsors. In fact Mike never paid me and still owes me expenses. 3. All the editors knew coming in that the project was seeking funding and would only be paid once we got the funding. That has taken 6 weeks longer than we planned. They will all be paid in full and we will funds in place to trade through to profitability so I guess this short term gain will disappear very soon. 4. I never stole the blognation.com domain. Odd given the owner Tristan is part of the blognation management team. So please could you correct this post because apart from this is ugly there is little or no actual fact. And yet I am truly sorry that the editors have had to endure this longer period of fund raising causing them to not being paid as expected. I had the same experience with Arrington and never intended to replicate that but it has happened and all of the remaining editors who were not fired from blognation know directly from the VC's when they expect to be paid and it is before xmas and imminent. I wish that this dirty laundry never came out publically, it is hard enough building a global startup from scratch in less than 6 months with out Arrington and his friends trying to take you down but I guess that is the naked conversation.

Comments

[Debi Jones]

Hi Shel,

Sam just can't keep himself from lying. It's out of his control apparently. He contacted me in September and said that he wanted to wait until mid October when he would have funding in the bank before he brought another editor aboard. About the second week of October Sam told me that "the money was in the bank." How does that become you'll get paid when we get funding?

Further, more than one smoking gun does exist.

http://mobilejones.com/2007/12/06/sam-sethi-and-the-smoking-guns/

More documentation will be released.

[Oliver Starr]

Shel,

Hi. First, let me say that I appreciate your words of belief in what I have to say. I also appreciate you giving Sam an equal platform. Why? Because each time that he has been given the opportunity to state his case he simply underscores the veracity of my words and adds to his own misery by heaping more new untruths upon the already steaming pile.

As Debi points out in the post linked above, there is more than enough evidence to not only prove that what I've said is true but probably to support criminal fraud charges.

In addition to email that demonstrates that Sam's claims are false and that he said on multiple occasions that funds were in the bank, I have Skype transcripts from the Blognation Group Chat where Sam lies, contradicts himself and makes dozens of promises upon which he has yet to deliver.

Even above Sam can't help himself and adds a new lie to his ever-growing list. To wit:

"it is hard enough building a global startup from scratch in less than 6 months with out Arrington and his friends trying to take you down but I guess that is the naked conversation."

Why he does this I don't know but he has been trying to get Blognation off the ground for more than six months and maybe much more. Just check the Internet archive (http://web.archive.org/web/*/http://www.blognation.com) and you can see this for yourself.

Now I don't know what the truth is concerning Sam and Arrington's dispute but what I find very interesting is the fact that Sam is addressing this old news instead of the statements that I said in my original email or in any of the responses I have posted subsequently.

It isn't enough to simply say "he's lying" and hope that people will believe you. Especially when inconsistencies in what you (read: Sam) have said previously have been pointed out or when pointed questions have been asked that you have either ignored or failed to clearly answer.

Sam has made many, many promises to quite a few people; to my knowledge he hasn't kept a one. Even things as simple as his statement that he would respond to my allegations in detail in a post on Blognation have failed to prove true.

I don't know why Sam has such a tough time with the truth. I can't say whether he doesn't realize that he's lying or that he's simply an inherently dishonest person but I have to wonder if there's some underlying pathology at work here. While chronic lying but failing to be aware of it isn't by itself a condition, it is characteristic of schizophrenia as well as certain other delusional states. Constantly lying to manipulate people is likewise not by itself a condition either, it is however one behavior that is regularly attributed to sociopaths.

Now, I'm not a psychologist or psychiatrist, so these are merely guesses on my part but what is clear is that someone who dissembles to the degree that Sam has, and someone that is so evasive when asked direct questions is certainly someone that cannot be relied upon.

From my experience both as a CEO and as an executive, reliability and trustworthiness are two characteristics that are indisputable as essential. Sam's continual failure to deliver upon his promises; promises including those as significant as the ones made in the contracts he has executed with each Blognation editor or as minor as when he promises to call and then does not - all add up to a very negative track record. One of dishonesty and unreliability.

It is no wonder Sam has had trouble raising funds; after all if you're willing to lie to your employees or the public in general, what would make you think that investors would expect any less if they gave you money?

Oliver Starr

[anon]

the story changes to suit his current mood. Fired? Quit? Here's what he said a year ago:

http://twitter.com/ssethi/statuses/1070443

[shel israel]

Anon,

You make a good point, but it would carry greater strength if you identified yourself so we could know where you are coming from. Next time I won't publish your comment if it it is anonymous.