When we worked together at Business 2.0, I always thought my then-colleague Erick Schonfeld was a bit of an evil genius. Now an editor at TechCrunch, Schonfeld hasn't proven me wrong. He's taking all of the boring startup spiels — "elevator pitches" — he gets from wantrepreneurs trooping through his office and turning them into content. All he has to do is sit back and hit "Record"; he doesn't actually have to do the critical thinking required to evaluate whether the ideas hold any promise, or even make sense. How boring is this idea? Look at David Carr from the New York Times, sitting two seats over from Schonfeld, who's fallen asleep just from listening to the idea. But I have no doubt this is the crowdsourced, video-enabled future of innovation journalism, folks.

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