At Democamp 12 tonight Albert Lai gave the gathered crowd an update on what’s been happening with Bubbleshare since he organized and presented at the very first Democamp over a year ago. At the end of his update Albert offered a free steak dinner to anyone who could say who tipped One Degree to a possible Bubbleshare sale to News Corp.
I was surprised that Albert seemed to be upset about our publication of the rumour before getting confirmation from him. In hindsight this was indeed a silly thing to do. I got the tip from a good source who was not a competitor or in any way related to the business Albert and Bubbleshare is in and I just accepted it at face value that I had a scoop. I did ask Albert for confirmation or denial – after posting the rumour – and didn’t hear back. When we finally got official word of a deal it was with a different acquirer we posted about it immediately. Albert, I apologize if this caused you or Bubbleshare any hardship or frustration. No harm was intended. It was just a case of an amateur journalist getting caught up in the thrill of it all.
Hey Ken. Publishing rumours isn’t always bad. You should do your best to check it out first, but in the end you cannot wait for “confirmation.” You have to go with your gut.
Rick (business journalist for – good grief – 27 years)
Ken,
Thank you for the thoughtful words.
No apology is require.
However, we would have appreciated it if you would have notified us or asked us for comments BEFORE you posted the rumors. 😉
For what its worth, as with many of the readers/commenters at TechCrunch, I don’t think any large publicly traded company would leave a deal merely because of their rumored involvement in it.
Regardless, thanks for setting the record straight for me and the team at BubbleShare.
While we did have multiple interested parties in BubbleShare, we did not once attempt to spread any rumors about our potential acquires.
And I’d STILL like to find out who the tipster was. 😉
– albert | bubbleshare