Embargoes are back in the news today because once again TechCrunch wrote about not adhering to them. I’ve written about embargoes a number of times here before, but there’s one key difference this time: I now work for TechCrunch.

That being said, my position remains the same. I agreed with Mike before, and I still do. The embargo system just doesn’t work. I completely understand PR companies’ perspective on why they feel they need to exist, but I still don’t agree that they should. It’d be one thing not only if they were never broken but that there weren’t all kinds of backroom deals to circumvent them that no one really likes to talk about. But of course, they are and there are, respectively.

But stepping outside all of the bullshit, here’s my real fundamental problem with embargoes: I believe news should flow freely. I don’t think it should be bottled up only to be opened at a certain date and time. That takes something that is potentially very cool and raw, and turns it into more of a generic, pre-packaged story.

That’s why I love the way the Amazon/Zappos deal went down this summer. They didn’t pre-brief anyone on it, they simply did a blog post and video about it. Sarah Lacy caught wind of it right before it broke and there was a mad scramble to do some actual reporting and get the details. It was exciting to watch it unfold, it was exciting to read.

Were there details that were missing immediately as the story broke? Sure, but eventually everything was ironed out, and it was great watching stories about the deal and then commentary about it roll in, in real-time. Was the overall quality worse than if everyone had been pre-briefed? I honestly don’t think so, at all. If anything, I thought the stories were more interesting.

I realize that a lot of writers may absolutely hate the idea of no embargoes. Basically, it would mean that you have to be on your toes at all times, ready to write if something breaks. I love this because it’s exciting, but I also don’t have a family to tend to. And I also basically don’t sleep.

I also realize that people in PR would hate this because it would drastically alter their jobs. Rather than prepping for embargoes, they would set up meetings for after a story breaks for writers who want follow-ups. And of course answer any questions. And they could maybe coach companies to make sure they get all their main points across when breaking their own news.

All that said, I don’t actually expect embargoes to go away anytime soon. Even if writers or PR people say they support the idea, most are probably terrified of such a change. And so news will remain in the bottle.

[photo: flickr/Mykl Roventine]