TechCrunch and Jason Calacanis (did you know that he runs Mahalo?) have announced their second TechCrunch conference: the TechCrunch50, with 10 more companies than last year. The conference will be held over three days — overlapping Demo's fall event. Demo is the startup-launch Arrington and Calacanis are trying to compete against, their distinction being that all finalists are supposedly chosen by "merit," as they define it. The "merit" is so important that TechCrunch head Michael Arrington mentioned it twice in the 248-word announcement. I can't wait.