Calacanis sues Arrington: "Insist upon a detailed contract."

calacanis.com

14 points·FiddlerClamp··3 comments

"Mike took TechCrunch50 and re-branded it as TechCrunch Disrupt, and a valuable property I created and owned half of became part of a sale to Aol"

Can someone tell me how this is different from: "After dissolving the partnership, Mike decided to launch a conference of his own."... And why that should be a sue-able offense?

Even IF Mike was talking to AOL first, he has the right to sell TC (without the LLC) and the acquirer has the right to launch a competing conference (unless there were written agreements to the contrary which no one has mentioned).

Jason, it's all about execution. If you guys parted ways, you're both welcome to create new conferences (were there pre-existing agreements to the contrary?). IMO, 90% of the value of the TechCrunch50 was the TechCrunch brand.

I think Jasons argument is that he created proprietary value in the form of partnerships, sponsorships and acquaintances that Arrington has leveraged with his "new" and successful conference.

It might be a justifiable argument, but that's for a judge to decide. My opinion is that even with those sponsorships, partnerships etc.. that Arringtons probably leveraged TechCrunch the most to create both successful conferences. I`m sure this is something he argues.

In a partnership dissolution, there's generally agreements about the assets. I would assume they'd each have rights to access those relationships and produce conferences in the future. In my mind, Calcanis came to the partnership as the "lesser" party (which is why it was named the TechCrunch50 and not the JasonNation50)... For TechCrunch to NOT be able to have ongoing relationships with folks who were working with the TechCrunch50 seems odd... But it all comes down to the partnership and dissolution agreements that were signed.

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