Error Forum Blog

Interesting interview with Techmeme creator Gabe Rivera by Danny Sullivan.

I’m also addicted to TechMeme. It does its’ job so well. Whilst Digg consists mostly of tedious trivia, Techmeme does a great job of finding serious tech stories. They use a mix of technology and human evaluation (i.e. link analysis).

Gabe has an interesting response to the echo-chamber effect:

“Clearly Techmeme creates superficial incentives for “echo chamber� participation, yet I don’t see clear evidence that this makes things noticeably worse. I still like to trot out the example of the day my site launched. eBay’s acquisition of Skype became one of those huge story clusters, and this was hours before Techmeme [then tech.memeorandum] was publicly launched, i.e. before anyone believed they could get on the site by linking to stories. I’d also point out the idea of many headlines on a single major story is not a problem in and of itself. Consider that the iPhone unveiling will probably be one of the major stories for all of 2007. So on one day for it to account for 40 percent of the headlines on Techmeme is not all that out of whack“.

I’ve never thought the so-called echo-chamber was a problem either, so long as each blogger adds something to the story. An opinion. A context. Spin. Whatever.

That’s how the conversation develops the story, without being moderated or censored, which is what often happens in forums.

Technorati published this chart showing the explosion of blogging.

GoogleBlogoscoped have provided an astute analysis of the same chart.

Stuntdubl lists his five deadly sins of blogging:

• 5. Stealing other people’s ideas (without links)
• 4. Not having an about page
• 3. Not having a subscribe button
• 2. Not having a best posts page
• 1. Being a Wanker

I think I’ve broken every single one of those, and will, no doubt, continue to do so. Sorry.

Blogging, as anyone who has tried it knows, is hard work. “It shows!�, I hear people say. That doesn’t mean people should read them on that basis, of course. People should only read them because they find they interesting, useful, annoying, or they have nothing better to do.

The thing I like most about blogs is the pulse of information surrounding blogs. Once you aggregate blogs in a feed reader, you can quickly see the topics that the search industry considers important enough to remark upon on that day, because a lot of people will be repeating it, and, hopefully, expanding upon it. Following the threads between blogs can be enlightening.

That’s pretty powerful, and I’d really miss it if it wasn’t there. I have missed it when I’ve been away from my computer for a few days. The industry changes so quickly, and the blogs help find, and broadcast, that pulse.

Who are the best bloggers? Who is the most influential blogger? Who cares. Everyone has their highs and lows. I think the aggregated group of search bloggers are far more interesting than any one search blogger will ever be.

PS: Sorry for breaking rule number #256: “Don’t blog about blogging�. You’re right - it’s anal

Here’s my top ten all time greatest resources! In list form!

Ok, they’re probably kinda useful for those new to blogging…

You could certainly do a lot worse than starting here…

1. Blog Software Comparison Chart - compare blog software features.
2. Technorati - Find out who is saying what about whom today.
3. Google Blog Search - does what is says on the (black) box.
4. Feedreader Comparison- Another list. Comparing feedreaders.
5. ClueTrain Manifesto - At times brilliant, at times nonsensical.
6. Digg - Often full of trite techno garbage. But it is interesting trite techno garbage. With voting.
7. What Is A Blog? - Wikipedia explains all.
8. The Long Tail - Why lots of little things can be important.
9. Top 100 Blogs - Elitist, but a good springboard. Follow the blogrolls.
10. RobotWisdom - My all time favorite blog.

You know those pop-up boxes that aren’t pop-ups? Those scripted boxes designed to get around pop-up blockers?

The websites that run these things think they’re being clever, and maybe they are getting more sign-ups, however they’re missing out on links. I don’t link to them on principle.  I wouldn’t want people to send me to these sites, why would I send people to them?

Do you do the same?

Hopefully, the net effect will be that sites that use the pop-ups-that-aren’t-really-pop-ups-but-they-are-equally-annoying will slide down the search engine rankings and out of our lives forever.

Don’t know about you, but the term “Social Media� annoys me. It sounds fake. What’s wrong with “talking�, or “conversing�, or “chatting�, or “writing�?

I suspect I know “the problem�. Those things aren’t Marketing-itized enough! People can charge a lot more for Social Media in the same way they can charge a lot more for bottled water. Or perhaps bottled air is a more appropriate metaphor.

The downside of all this is what appear to be authentic conversations can turn out to be thinly-veiled press-releases, and we all hate press-releases because they aren’t authentic conversations. They mimic conversations, but the intention is something different.

What do people do when they suspect they aren’t engaged in an authentic conversation? Their guard goes up. Just like when the used car salesman approaches, saying “how’s your day going?�, you know the state of your day is the last thing on his mind.

Social Media cannot work when peoples’ guard is up. YouTube isn’t Social Media. It is a place people go to watch and post cool videos. A forum isn’t Social Media, it’s a place where people go to have a discussion. Blogs aren’t Social Media, they are places where people go to read stuff and make comment. A company that bolts on Social Media as some kind of backwards PR strategy, with little purpose other than to have a Social Media strategy, is probably going to end up sounding pretty fake, pretty soon. Just like their press releases did.

Like all good things social, the authenticity of the conversation is key.