Bad Press in Motley Fool and Barron's. Re: Barron's - no surprise, I guess they're getting arrogant for catalyzing AMZN's recent crash. As for The Motley Fool, this is a post I made there. Ignore it if you don't want to see a long rant by me, otherwise take it with a grain of salt:
Looks like Louis Corrigan has set off a stick of
dynamite here on the normally cordial LCOS boards.
Reading Corrigan's (aka TMFSeymor, tmfseymour@aol.com) two
highly charged articles regarding the USAI/LCOS debacle - I can
see he's clearly wet his panties over the failed merger.
"They Won. We Lost. Next: The Defeats & Victories of Barry Diller" 5/20/99 Feature
fool.com
"Lycos Held Hostage by Speculators" 5/19/99
fool.com
Never in my years at the Motley Fool have I seen any
column laced with such vitriol and an outright
anti-capitalist tirade! I'm curious, does
this reflect a dramatic shift in focus by The Fool?
Yet another among gazillions of articles
attacking daytraders and internet investors -
articles which have been ubiquitous in the mass
media for the last two years. If I wanted to read such
a harangue, I'd be hanging out at Barron's or
BusinessWeek, not The Fool.
After seeing these two TMFSeymor articles, reflecting his
anger at the failed merger, I was hoping to
see a counterpoint. After all, one of the few times
I see a Fool writer get a bit emotional about a stock is
in the Dueling Fools section - where there
is an equivalent counterweight. Do these two
unapologetically pro-Diller anti-Wetherell articles
reflect the editorial direction of the Fool staff?
Why else would The Motley Fool be so one-sided on the failed merger?
A future USAI/Fool ecommerce relationship in the works, perhaps
(TMF = no LCOS, but hot Net real estate for USAI nonetheless)?
Here are a few of my favorite excerpts peppered with my
commentary. First, his article portraying Diller in a favorable
light against a twisted backdrop of clueless Internet investors:
<cite>Diller has even invested $10 million in the novel Free PC initiative that
gives people computers if they agree to be bombarded with ads, a move that
suggests he's serious about exploring radically new business models. </cite>
Nice try, Seymor. If Diller was truly a visionary - truly "serious about
exploring radically new business models" - then why did he turn down a
chance to buy 20% of AOL in 1994, for around $100 million. A stake worth
around $20 billion today? Even after major AOL shareholders gave an
extended personal presentation extolling the virtues of AOL, Diller passed on it.
Think about it - it's his dream to be the #1 media mogul - it's his job.
Think about all the research he's done on what it takes to be successful in
the business - think of all the board meetings and conventions he's attended with
the greatest media minds of our generation. If ANYONE should have been amassing
an Internet empire, it should have been Diller. He should have been snapping up
Internet real estate in 1995 or 1996! And I'm not talking about a mere
$10m chipshot here, TMFSeymor. If he established himself early on (at those
rock-bottom prices!) than he would finally be the media-empire emperor he's
always dreamed about becoming. Where has Diller been on the virtual landscape
for the last 3 years, Mr. Corrigan? Your portrayal of Diller as media visionary
is utter garbage.
<cite>TheStreet.com columnist Christopher Byron has asserted that Diller has most
likely already forgotten more about the ways of Wall
Street than David Wetherell will probably ever learn."</cite>
Hmm, I see. This quote supports your contention that Diller is an investing
maven (despite the minor snafu of missing the Internet revolution for a few years
and all) and your argument that Wetherell is an "idiot". This quote is most revealing -
underscoring the crap lying behind the spin of your article. Christopher Byron has
done more to attack Internet stocks for the last two years than any journalist in
the world. Check out the sordid details at netconductor.com
By the way, did you hear the hubbub about his latest scandalous
article (for MSNBC)- "Xoom deal has no oomph". Approximately 24 hours after
posting that article attacking the deal, he had to retract it and
issued an apology. msnbc.com
Your attacks on capitalism, and Internet stocks
sound like a carbon copy of Byron (and Diller - see my earlier posting on this).
Except he uses wittier insults. Nice to see you get your news from the
investing uber-idiot himself.
<cite>Excessive debt can lead to a loss of control, and Diller is a notorious
control freak.
Yes, Seagram now holds a 45% stake in USA Networks and Liberty
Media another 21%, but Diller has clearly chosen business partners that
recognize he's The Man.</cite>
True, Diller is a control freak. In fact, you may be understating it a
bit. You point out that Seagram's controls much of Diller's
empire yet qualify that by saying "Diller has clearly chosen business partners
that recognize he's The Man". Actually, Bronfman is not a yes-man. In fact,
Bronfman literally was the only obstacle blocking a major business move attempted by
Diller. I don't remember the details but it was covered in an article at
www.pathfinder.com (which Time-Warner finally destroyed this weekend). If you
can't find the article in question, let me know and I'll try to track it down
next weekend. Maybe Diller only thought that he partnered with people who see
him as "The Man" (when he's not busy throwing videotapes in anger at them).
===
Now excerpts from the endearing anti-capitalist/anti-Wetherell article:
<cite>"Lycos Held Hostage by Speculators"</cite>
The deal was "held hostage" by more than just
speculators, such as the opposition to the deal by
several mutual fund managers. Notably, the #1-performing
fund in existence dumped all shares upon announcement
of the merger then bought back in after it failed.
His portfolio turnover was less than 30%? More than
evil daytraders are determining the stock price here.
Well, rather than retread old ground, I'll just point
you to my earlier rant at this forum:
boards.fool.com
"Giving Old Media Queen Barry Diller the boot"
TMFSeymor Louis Corrigan wrote:
<cite>[Wetherell is] "an absolute idiot"</cite>
Unlike many CMGI fans here, I do not worship Wetherell.
In fact, I do think the suggestions that he could, with
the help of MSDW, get a better deal were baffling. Was
he not seeking the best deal possible in the first place?
Nevertheless, your article's caricature of Wetherell as
an idiotic and greedy hypocrite are petty snipes to support
your argument.
<cite>
Are Lycos investors -- and Internet investors in general
-- prepared to own actual businesses rather than
simply trade stubs?
And like ticket scalpers, Lycos "shareowners" seem to
have little interest in the main event -- in this case,
building a business. They
just want the highest price for their stubs.
These speculators live in a world colored by blind, unthinking
greed, a world that's completely divorced from the ugly realities
that make capitalism actually work. That's why the collapse of
the Lycos-USA deal seems to represent the triumph of speculation
over actual e-commerce, the triumph of Internet hype over business
reality.
Wetherell is the patron saint of Internet speculators. The Internet to
him is about getting as rich as possible before the party ends.
Apparently, Wetherell had himself underestimated the
greed that drives speculators into a Lycos at
$145 a share looking for greater fools. Now he gets the Internet.
Given the way Internet mania is breeding fantasists at an
astonishing rate, I'm not stupid enough to predict that it will
all end badly, at least not anytime soon. </cite>
Note how TMFSeymor argues, like thousands of journalists before him,
that Internet mania is just outta control, baby! But here he clearly
hedges his bet here by pussyfooting the details of how this
rampant "speculation" will end. Will it crash, when? TMFSeymor
says LCOS investors (oops, I mean speculators - we all know investors
wouldn't buy this stock, right Seymor?) are building castles on the sand
but plays coy about when high tide will come around. Thanks for the insight.
And it's kinda funny that you, like Diller (re: his speech mentioned in my last
post), attack the stock prices of Net companies by the fact that they
are not earning "real profits". Funny how you can fool the entire open market
into throwing $ at these stocks with cash-burn rates from hell, despite
not earning "real profits" yet. What are these crazy investors thinking, in this
2-year old Net bubble!
And here's the end of his borderline anti-capitalist LCOS-investors-are-idiots
tirade for good measure...
<cite>a tremendous amount of power currently resides in the hands
of folks who, at best, have a farcical sense of how the Internet will develop.
It suggests that Internet speculators simply haven't given much thought to
what they're buying or why. They just want the stocks to keep going up.
What will their reaction be when they're forced to get a clue?</cite>
- Netconductor.com
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