There’s been buzz about for the last few months that Michael Arrington, impresario at the TechCruch family of blogs was about to release something called a CrunchPad. The device was to be a mobile computing tablet that did just about anything, in a form factor that blew away just about everything. Have you heard about Apple Computer’s not-yet-released MacTablet? The CrunchPad was going to be better.

Today, Arrington announced that the device was dead, because his manufacturing partner had decided to rip him off.

I don’t know what the bigger story is here, that a supposedly very smart guy who happens to have been a corporate lawyer before becoming an internet entrepreneur was ripped off in this way (or not and is trying for lots of extra press . . . or both), or that it took less than an hour from the time Mr. Arrington announced his problems to the world for highly-trafficked, well-regarded blogs Gizmodo and Engadget to repeat Mike’s tale of woe.

At least Engadget acknowledged that the CruchPad was only vapor.

Particularly in the aftermath of the Tiger-Woods-Domestic-Violence news debacle from this weekend, it seemed important to point this out to you, and to remind you to be careful who you believe.