Well, the TechCrunch "Disrupt" conference in San Francisco has ended. And no one is talking about the drama surrounding TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington's sort-of dismissal any more, because a legal agreement was clearly made with AOL, his former employer, and everyone's obeying the NDA. Plus the vaguely promised self-immolation of the staff of TechCrunch didn't materialize in the slightest. But wait, who won TechCrunch Disrupt???

Of 31 startups competing to be the "winner," they came up with… this thing. "Shaker is a mixture of Second Life, The Sims, and Turntable.fm all mixed together using your Facebook data and connections. Your Facebook profile becomes a walking avatar, your pictures [...]

Here is a rather incredible follow-up story, from AOL's Moviefone, about their request of Techcrunch to make a story more friendly. It's bizarre! (The request from Moviefone went like this: "Let me know if you’re able to take another look at it and make any edits.")

And Moviefone says: "The person who wrote that email was not acting in an editorial capacity. That person's job is to act as an intermediary between the studios and editorial… the presence of a person with that role is just one means we have of ensuring editorial integrity on Moviefone." Wha? So people who don't act in an "editorial capacity" [...]

If the ship (or at least the captain of the ship) is going down, if founder Michael Arrington is really fired from AOL, then why is "his" (technically: Arianna Huffington's) site TechCrunch still publishing? The first thing you do when the corporate overlords freak out on your publication is conduct a work stoppage. The conclusion you would draw is: that's a lot of people who could lose their jobs, and they don't feel like Arrington could protect them. (He couldn't, likely. They work for AOL.) So apparently the demands made by Arrington—essentially, "sell me back my site or let me do whatever I want"—are not being met. [...]

This is terrific. It warms my heart! TechCrunch just took a big chomp out of the suits who asked them to "tone down" their coverage. They'd interviewed the makers of The Source Code, and then actually rather insightfully written about how the film was "trying to target" techies and the tech press. But the AOL Moviefone people who'd set up the interview were not happy and came crying to Techcrunch—which is, still fairly newly, owned by AOL—who then promptly told them to f off: "What I didn’t understand when writing my candid opinion about the movie and its marketing strategy was that Summit thought that by inviting [...]

Things just got EXTRA exciting in the drama that is unfolding between TechCrunch, its parent company AOL and Michael Arrington, the co-editor of the site and the new manager of a multi-million-dollar startup investment thingie. (AOL said that Arrington would no longer be the editor since his new role; he clearly disagrees!) So just now Arrington says they can either be free to do whatever they want WHATSOEVER, and not report to the Huffington Post— or AOL can sell the site back to its original owners. Crazy thing is? He's taking the absolutely correct hard line. AOL said TechCrunch would be independent; that is now not true. Good for [...]