DISQUS

louisgray.com: louisgray.com: Armchair Quarterbacking and Why I Talk to Companies Using the Blog

  • Hutch Carpenter · 11 months ago
    This too shall pass. Maybe Paul and Bret are considering your blog post, maybe they have some other thoughts in the works. What was most interesting to me was the cathartic posts I saw from a number of bloggers. Probably felt good to get those frustrations off their chests. Good for them, and I'll bet we see 'em on FriendFeed before 2009 is over.
  • Louis Gray · 11 months ago
    The FriendFeed team, as mentioned yesterday, is one of the best, per capita. They not only have delivered a fantastic service that practically eliminated all other competition (see Profilactic or Iminta), but they continue to innovate with SUP, Real Time, etc. I know they will come up with things I will never even have considered. But a lot of people who signed up in 2008 haven't been back in months, and the noise problem still exists. There's work to do. I don't expect Paul and Bret and team to sit around and "consider" my blog post. Mine is but one opinion. But it did open the door so we could hear from others who have seen similar things.
  • StevenHodson · 11 months ago
    Louis as I said in a reply to your comment to my post I in no way meant to imply you had specifically written the post as linkbait but rather that is how it would end up being - which it did - correct? :)

    the only real point I disagree with you on the the "lite" version idea as I think that would be a total devaluation of the service.
  • Louis Gray · 11 months ago
    Steven, I don't think that a piece can retroactively become "bait" of
    any kind. It either was at the beginning, or it wasn't. I did see your
    comment there, but wanted to give you a link anyway.

    Also, I am 100% okay with users (including you) and even FriendFeed
    disagreeing with my "iite" idea. It's not the first time I brought it
    up, and I would be ecstatic if they had a better solution. But I want
    to help get the inactive or less-crazy Scoble/Gray-like users on board.
  • StevenHodson · 11 months ago
    and I respectfully disagree :) .. It is entirely possible for a person to write a post that they never intend to have it act as a linkbait post but because of the reaction to it the post does in the end become linkbait. I definitely did not mean it with any negative intent either :)
  • Mark Trapp · 11 months ago
    Maybe a more apt term, in keeping with the angling metaphors, for unintentional link-baiting should be "link-chumming"? Or maybe "link first-scene-in-Jaws"?
  • StevenHodson · 11 months ago
    omg I must be tired - or at least my eyes are .. I saw that "link first" as link fisting ROFL .. oh man what a day.
  • @GaryPaulson · 11 months ago
    Great idea. I started my blog so I could remember how to do things and give myself a place to point friends on how to do what I did -- sort of like a content management system. Many of these kinds of posts get the most views as others try to figure out how to do what is explained.

    I like the idea of 'talking back' and will try giving it a shot on my blog too. Thanks for the idea!
  • Koffee · 11 months ago
    But when do you accept you're flogging a dead horse, what's the criteria for determing failure.
  • Louis Gray · 11 months ago
    If you want me to make a list of "dead horses", FriendFeed is not on it. There are many, many other services that are DOA.
  • Koffee · 11 months ago
    Thanks Louis

    Not a list of dead horses but key criteria for assessing when a service is not scaling fast enough to succeed. My assessment is that FF has well passed the point where it should have moved into popular venacular / culture but it hasn't and now it is getting cut down on all sides by twitter, facebook, mobile devices and has nowhere to go to get mainstream acceptance. How does it get distribution when you and Robert are already onboard and yet no one has truly heard of it. Great tool, but just for 0.5% of the US me thinks.
  • Dominic/IRWebReport · 11 months ago
    Funny how honest criticism is so often construed as malice rather than a genuine interest in helping or getting through thick sculls.
  • Jeff Douglass · 11 months ago
    great post LG
  • marnie webb · 11 months ago
    Why critique a dead horse? What do you do? Stand over it and say "Run faster. Faster!" It seems to me the best way to show a service is living s to offer it critiques. It's not about being right or perfect. It's about getting better and that's what you, from your perspective anyway, offered up to FriendFeed.