Is tech PR reduced to T-shirts and Twitter?

Shortly after Groupon pulled back its IPO ambitions—for a while at least—TechCrunch founder Michael Arrington’s new venture CrunchFund arrived to stir things up.

Arrington has been the center of controversy over his role at Aol—which last year bought TechCrunch, the blog Arrington founded—and any conflicts of interest that would come from managing his new venture capital vehicle CrunchFund. Initial reports said that Aol would fund the vehicle, while Arrington would resign from his editorial position at TechCrunch but continue to serve as an unpaid blogger.

That’s not the case any more. Aol announced on Monday that Arrington is officially out at Aol and TechCrunch; however, the company will invest in CrunchFund. Meanwhile, Erick Schonfeld will take over as editor of the blog.

At the TechCrunch Disrupt conference on Monday, Arrington took the stage and unbuttoned his shirt to reveal a T-shirt that said: “Unpaid blogger.”