When your biannual business event has been satirized by Mike Judge, you need to level up, which is a casual phrase humans say to other humans. And, oh, what a level this year's TechCrunch Disrupt "Battlefield" showed us. Corruption! Hubris! Exploitation! Investment from Michael Arrington! Butlers! It truly had it all.

It's not easy being Michael Arrington. To kickoff TechCrunch Disrupt SF this morning, the Uber investor directed a fierce and poignant native ad for his CrunchFund investment Uber—right there on stage, in real-time. With Uber CEO Travis Kalanick by his side, it was a veritable duet of damage control! But then Lyft investor Peter Thiel had to spoil the cozy fireside mood by acting just like Arrington.

The defamation suit against Jennifer Allen—who last spring claimed titan investor and TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington had raped her—will not have its day in court.

This week, we learned Microsoft has been able to read anyone's Hotmail inbox, if it so pleases. But what about Google? According to TechCrunch founder and friendly VC giant Mike Arrington, his Gmail account was rifled through just the same.

Every year, a chosen cadre of investors, high profile tech luminaries, and startup folk get together at the SV Angel Summit. A tipster tells us this year's confidential confab is happening today, with an off-the-record cocktail party and mayoral meet-and-greet this evening. Such fun! Let's look at the guest list.

In 2011, TechCrunch founder and Bully-in-Chief Michael Arrington gave an off the record talk to an audience of powerful tech CEOs. Details of unsavory comments leaked. Later that year, he did it again, and now we have the closed-doors video of Arrington's corruption, in his own words.

Mike Arrington's jowls and brash questions have been a staple of TechCrunch's annual green-tinted festival of self-congratulation. But a well-informed source tells us the former main act won't be attending this year.