I’m a big champion of services like Twitter and the newer Friendfeed (can you believe Friendfeed is less than a year old?). But there’s a difference between liking a service and having an addiction. Robert Scoble crossed that line, and I believe he’s asking for help.
I spoke to Robert for a few minutes at the Le Web conference a couple of weeks ago. I said “You sure do like Twitter and Friendfeed.” His response – “Yeah, but I wonder if that was such a smart investment of my time.”
This isn’t the first time Robert has questioned whether he’s wasting his time on those services. On November 18 he wrote (on Friendfeed) “I invested a lot of time this year in FriendFeed and Twitter instead of my blog. Was that the right decision?”
I asked Robert how much time he actually spends on those services. He monitors them all day, he said, hitting refresh over and over on both (he doesn’t use desktop clients to manage the services, and he says he doesn’t like real-time streaming feature on Friendfeed). In addition to watching all day, he says he spends at least seven hours a day, seven days a week, actually reading and responding directly on those services.
That’s 2,555 hours over the last year.
Which is more than a full time job (2,000 hours/year).
It is more than 106 full 24 hour days interacting with those services in aggregate.
It is an addiction.
What is the cost of this addiction? Well, I’ll put his family life aside, that’s his business. But his blog has clearly suffered. He now posts only a few times a week, sometimes sporadically writing multiple posts in a day but often skipping 3-4 days in between. A year ago, Robert wrote multiple posts, every day. I used to read his blog daily, now I visit once a week.
“Some people tell me my thought leadership has declined as I’ve blogged less.”
What has he gained? On Twitter Robert has nearly 45,000 followers and has written over 16,000 messages. On Friendfeed Robert has nearly 23,000 subscribers.
So lots of people follow Robert on those services, but they aren’t visiting his site and the content he writes is on someone else’s server. Plus all that content is just really forgettable, compared to a good thought piece that people refer back to over time. There is no direct way to monetize any of that content, which is something that a full time blogger with a family really needs to think about.
Meanwhile, all this attention from Robert has certainly helped the valuations of Friendfeed and Twitter. How much of that value does Robert receive? Zilch.
So Robert has spent 2,555 hours spent reading tens out thousands of mostly inane Twitter and Friendfeed messages, and has written a few thousand messages of his own. Meanwhile, we as a community lost the regularly entertaining and thoughtful posts of a great writer.
Like I said, it’s time for an intervention. I want Scobleizer back.
I just blogged my response here: http://scobleiz...ding-this-year/
well, at least you blogged a response. I expected a one sentence emotional grunt on friendfeed, no more.
Friendfeed is not a “grunt” platform. Lots of great conversation occurs on FF
point to one.
and the “conversation” is fine. But Robert’s brain is better used actually writing articles that I want to read. Watching people grunt back and forth is entertaining but hardly educational.
Susan and Mike,
Here’s one example of a great conversation that took place on friendfeed, about the future of journalism: http://friendfe...nce-newspapers/ Lots of entrepreneurs and journalists showed up there.
I agree with you that the FriendFeed conversation is “fine”; moreover, I believe at various times – depending on who your engaging – it can be really excellent material.
Not sure what you’re referring to by your comment “grunt back and forth”? point to one.
Robert, as we both know, is a terrific writer / researcher, blogger, video blogger, tech evanglist and conversationalist who has begun quickly expanding his global reach well beyond a single blog website. Friendfeed is a rich and diverse platform designed for sharing, collaboration, listening, learning and growing – perfect medium for engaging one’s audience.
How much time does a world class professional blogger like Robert spend on their blog? Is that that equivalent to Robert’s time in Friendfeed? I think the answer is *YES!* it is! So then your argument is moot with regard to the too much time on FF angle. He is investing his time on FF to get insight / feedback.
I agree with your sentiment about Robert blogging less and that’s bad. I miss his blog posts which contained a sea of knowledge, insightful analysis and industry news I couldn’t get anywhere else.
Balance is certainly the key…
I see Robert on FF for hours on end, and for his own personal health, he and many of us – myself included here, need to consider that very carefully.
Thanks!
Susan
Thanks for information
__________________________
http://tinyurl.com/4rdhmc
well, from me you’re getting a torrent. i actually scrapped upgrade and re-design plans for my blogs exactly because of the integration problem between my blogging and my twittering.
here’s my blog post To: Robert Scoble, InRe: FriendFeed and Twitter
i also left part of that post over at Bob’s.
to me this is an UI issue having more to do with our blogs than these services. i’d like to see more of a discussion on what modules to use in Drupal 5 (for my case) or other hacks in order to not just use our blogs as twittering platforms but then be able to aggregate the responses.
that to me is what’s key. we need to be able to scrape those in some way to be able to aggregate them to our blogs and bring the water cooler back into our blogs.
Hum, sounds like a old media vs new media discussion, only few years ahead.
Or behind.
Go Robert Go! Keep on the friendfeed. It is not worthy of an intervention; it is a good drug.
Cheers!
Rodney Rumford
But then, I always thought Scoble was being paid to contribute so much to Twitter/Friendfeed.
If he indeed was, just compare the monetary revenues from twitter/FF vis-a-vis Scobelizer!
Scobe questions himself? did i waste my time?
depends if Scobe is a entrepreneur or not.
“Failure is a Entrepreneurs Tuition”
CureLocator.com – all is well
Robert, the fact that you’re the first commenter and already have a blog post in response shows the enormity of your problem.
DO something. Don’t just talk.
Robert, I totally agree with Michael.
Look at the results … he’s pulling in hundreds of thousands monthly from his site. I think you could have been there too (and probably still can be).
But you need to focus on your blog more.
Be honest with yourself – you’re like Hammy in Over The Hedge. Next year you’ll find a better FriendFeed … and then where will all your hard work have gotten you?
Build what is yours.
Heh, Mike, we’re talking about you over on friendfeed. The intervention isn’t working.
http://friendfe...d-a-friendfeed/
Back slowly away from the Friendfeed Robert.
Intervention or not, this is making great entertainment. You should intervene more often Mike.
This is so dramatic I could almost cry.
Robert. What can I say bro? Mike is right dude and your math interpretation is wrong. Unless of course all your followers begin to bring new traffic to your blog you are wasting your time on Twitter & FF. The only exception is finding random topics of course.
But look at it this way. So you find one or two breaking stories. What does that make you? CNN? get real dude. You were blogging big time before Tweets and FF.
Those followers are not loyal blog readers and this whole thing on FF and twitter may turn out to be a 36 month fad. Look at it this way. I do not follow Mike on Twitter.
In fact I see his tweets and wonder since when I started getting them? I must have added him during some random addition of following other tweets.
So where is your blog 36 months from now? Your blog is your bread and butter. So unless FF or Twitter can cut you a slice of their yet be realized revenue stream then you are only benefiting them.
You will loose your MOJO bro. So trust me on that.
Back away from FF and Twitter. Less tweets bro, and less time reading replies. In fact just tweet on random shiit and read it randomly. by reading the 5th or so page then log off.
You are so lucky to have a friend like Mike showing some love. Dam you guys are so cool.
In fact I hear there is a Twitter/FF/FB Livefeed 3.0
It is like Twitter on the CLEAR. Friggin scary bro. It makes them all look like kinder garden. Then you will be in your element.
It seems to me that the operating word that captures the essence of what you are saying is “thoughtful.” As Web 2.0 gathered speed and ideas of the Clue Train Manifesto turned every blog post into a discussion – thought became a two way think just like the forum in ancient Rome. However, as the social (and perhaps socialist) element of Web 2.0 became stronger the exchange of ideas and thought gave way to popularity and presence for its own sake. The more that Robert descended down this Rabbit Hole the more it was applauded by those who prefer mindless popularity over the exchange of clear thought. Perhaps this post will be the start of getting the balance back.
what he said.
Rome was not ancient. Ancient belongs to who the Romans referred as the Ancients. Ancient is a very distance past. Not your sudden civilized existence within the last 2,500 to 5,000 years.
Ancient goes beyond that. Like a fully highly civilized society with all the trappings and more you would normally associated with an advance society but more like 10,00 to 25,000 years ago.
Thus when the Romans came along they too were marveled. Then again you are not to be blamed for the false history you have been spoon fed since birth. I mean the Greeks stole what they could.
What he said.
I tend to believe that FriendFeed and Twitter are a good extension to blogging. What has happened in the last two years is that the conversation has expanded beyond the siloed blogs and now occurs on 3rd party sites like Twitter, FriendFeed, Socialmedian, and Strands.
Robert and others have chosen FriendFeed and Twitter as their circle of influence. Others who have had large spheres of influence in blogging, or just on Twitter, for example, have hesitated and don’t want to relinquish their leadership role.
Robert’s work on his blog is still quality, but it has changed. He stopped working on breaking news and competing with TC and others, and has become more opinion-based.
I started using FriendFeed in October of 2007, and even as one of the more active users, it doesn’t consume too much energy. It’s like e-mail. You make sure you don’t miss the big ones, and you reply to the ones that make sense.
Everything can take a lot of time if you let it – including blogging, e-mail, conferences, etc. It’s about balance and having a good workflow. We’d love it if you came back to FriendFeed and participated, Mike.
Louis, I disagree with a few things that you wrote. First, Robert hasn’t backed away just from breaking news, he goes days without blogging any more, and that’s a bad thing. You can’t compare a one sentence grunt on Twitter to a real thought piece.
Second, all he’s doing is growing Friendfeed’s market value. It’s an incredible investment of time and energy for very little payback.
I think Friendfeed and Twitter are great in moderation. But to spend a third of your life there is a sickness. And you are enabling him by telling him it’s ok.
I agree in that I would like to see Robert blogging more. I think he has a great substance/noise ratio.
But as you disagreed with a few things, I’ll take one item up: “all he’s doing is growing Friendfeed’s market value. It’s an incredible investment of time and energy for very little payback.”
I think he is expanding FriendFeed’s reach, yes, but he is growing his own market value by establishing himself as a leader of a growing community, and also by reaching a community that perhaps doesn’t care as much for his blog. What he has done is diversified his audience with his diverse activities. Not too many people have the stamina he does to be as active in so many places. (I don’t come close)
I will continue to enable him and others
Why am I contributing to a discussion on TechCrunch which gives zero value to me when I could be blogging on my own site? Thanks for opening our eyes Michael!
What? Sickness?
I’ve gotten far more value out of Twitter and FriendFeed than out of blogs in that as the links appear on Twitter or FF I then check out the blog item.
RSS isn’t really working for most people and why scan long blog articles “by myself” using RSS, when I can be pointed to the good stuff by people on Twitter or FF?
So there’s still room and importance for blogs, but maybe blogs are where more and more people end up–not where they start in gathering new info.
By the way, I’m here because of a post on Twitter.
@Mike and Nick, Micheal not saying don’t use those services, he posts links and talks on Twitter himself. Just when your spending that many hours on it is crazy.
If it fits his model for commenting on versus making news, I say go for it. I definitely don’t visit his site any more but I still feel connected.
Passing comments at a cocktail party versus an 800 word essay – I usually don’t read that far before I’m interrupted anyways.
yes the key is owning content and monetizing it, thats why i use twitter to help maximize blog hits but nothing more and thats why my blog makes $50k/month
great. the spammy blog guy agrees with me.
But he’s wearing a tie! Maybe he can help convince Robert to go back to blogging.
Yes, and my blog is making $ 500K/month without a single minute spent on twitter.
Ad now come and buy my ”Getting rich by blogging without twitter” training book series, CD, DVD, and visit my seminar (coming to your city faster than you can run).
The Untwitterer
PS I hope you don’t min looking at my cheesy smiley picture on all of my stuff
ok lol
, peter urban’s comment is pure lolz
410 Link No Longer Available. The advertiser is no longer available
This is the error I get when I click links in my feed reader to comment on your blog or email the link or the technorati links.
Robert and Michael, call me paranoid but I bet you guys both organized this rant & rave together to raise some valid questions about the changing nature of the social web. I think there’s a place for focused writing of blogs but I can’t help thinking Robert’s experiment of jumping into the fray is both bold and worthwhile. It could easily be said that M’s clinging to the old for reasons like thought leadership could possibly put him in a position of being obsolete very quickly. Love both of you!
I called Robert tonight to ask him if he was ok with me blogging a private conversation, and he agreed. He also gave me stats on his FF and TW usage. But no, the disagreement is real.
Mike’s right. And he isn’t the only one I’ve had this debate with.
By the way, Mike, you should check out the video work I’ve been doing. It’s quite good lately. I have a video with Loic Le Meur going up tonight that you’ll find interesting and one with Tim O’Reilly in time for Christmas that is even better.
the day you find the edit button on imovie is the day i start watching your 45 minute videos.
Like I said, you should check out the stuff we’ve been doing lately. All edited. The Guy Kawasaki interview was cut from 50 minutes down to 25. So was the Loic Le Meur one. Tim O’Reilly will be much harder because he said some smart shit in his interview and that makes it tough to cut.
By the way, when we gonna interview you?
u call me a spammy blog? u serious? i’m the only honest guy on wall street, show some respect
ok checking your blog again.
nope, i agree with my original comments. spammy. and I’ll add sketchy.
and by honest i mean 100% transparent, u can see my trades/business revenue/income etc.
I also see this:
here is some simple math for you? If you make that much trading, why waste your time producing sketchy videos? Keep trading.
and this pic is of me on CNN fools:
http://www.yout...h?v=2GYHydUQkns
u guys are all clowning around just like kevin rose, u deserve to lose $4.8 million/year with your lack of business sense
dude, you sell dvds of yourself on youtube. I mean, seriously. this is not your target audience.
Bahaha. “greed is good.” You’re such a douche nozzle.
yes, i sell trading dvds and until i came along, it was a dirty business…u guys should all have instructional DVDs, they’re so easy, useful, profitable and actually help reduce reader confusion
Make money fast by selling “Make Money Fast” DVDs and books. God, I wish I was sleazy enough to sucker people.
Argh… that snapshot popup keeps covering the “Add Comment” button. Die, snap, die!
If you’re such an amazing trader why are you producing spammy “make money fast” crap? If your “secrets” are so valuable why wouldn’t you keep them to yourself and profit off of them? Are you just such a philanthropist that you view it as your duty to tell the world of your immense finance knowledge while pimping bit clips on CNN? Please.
Congrats you’re the bush league stock market version of Robert Kiyosaki – you belong on a late night infomercial.
“Back slowly away from the Friendfeed Robert.”
Best line in this convo stream yet. Michael, Robert needs to hit rock bottom. You have to let him fail before he understands the craziness of his addiction.
haha, watch the video on the right hand side, was done a few weeks ago by Slate…oh yeah not to mention, i’m #1 on Covestor out of 15,000+ traders:
http://www.cove...?showselector=1
u’ve covered them, u know they’re real
go team.
The name of your company is BullShip Press…
Your selling a 12 hour “high def DVD” of raw video footage of yourself for $500…
And you wonder why we think your a bit spammy?
yes my dvds are the format through which i teach trading…#1 on covestor–a website that verifies all trades–out of 15,000+ traders, means u should probly listen before u jump to conclusions
Geez! Get defensive much? If you and your content were of such great value you wouldn’t feel the need to consistently respond to your critics with such condescending replies.
poor robert probably hasnt seen sunshine in awhile.
Hah, you miss that I can do all this from my iPhone. Here’s a photo I posted from San Francisco today. Are you caught in all that snow? Eat your heart out: http://friendfe...your-heart-out/
Robert, do you realize how much you self-promote when on the defense? Not a dig, but an observation over a very, very long period of time.
Scoble does great work – but by putting out such a firehose of material on Twitter – I had to shut it off. Scoble being more selective would have worked better for all of us.
Who was it who said this? ‘The problem is not Scoble, the problem is unfiltered Scoble.’
I used to read Scobleizer all the time, but now that Robert has been so invested into FriendFeed, I finally unsubscribed from his blog. The posts were so few and far between that I found it better to focus on more active blogs. I don’t say this to be mean, I really like Scoble. It’s just that I don’t have enough time in my personal life to constantly monitor threads on FF.
If I wanted to be that tied down in life, I would just get another job, so at least my time investment would have a revenue stream.
Kevan: if I promise to blog more, will you resubscribe?
never fall for the unsubscribed trick, Robert. It’s a fool’s game. My recommendation is to attack your readers whenever possible. They won’t love you, but they keep coming back.
Yes, Robert, I will.
In fact, I just did, as a show of goodwill. It’s not always a fools game, Mr. Mike.
“My recommendation is to attack your readers whenever possible. They won’t love you, but they keep coming back.”
I’ve never had a Mike Arrington quote worth remembering before, but this one smacks of awesomeness.
Yep – because “Treat them mean, keep them keen” is SO HOT and always works…. for VIKINGS!!!
Kevan – serious question here. Why would you unsubscribe from a blog that posts every 3-4 days? I mean, it’s not really throwing up a bunch of noise in your reader. And you do like when Robert posts.
Bottom line and the one point you failed to mention is it’s annoying as all get-out. Let’s be real. Yeah friendfeed it up, that’s okay, but 7 hours a day? C’mon now.
You do sound a little bitter tho Michael, you gonna be ok?
i need a hug, then I’ll be ok.
This post is now about how hilarious Timothy Sykes is.
@ Timothy Sykes:
Why would I trust you with my investments when you can’t figure out the shift key?
who said anything about trusting me with your investments? i just show how i make money trading and blogging, how i’m up 250% this year while the market is getting crushed, trade-by-trade all detailed…if u wanna learn yourself, cool, if not, i dont care…have fun watching cramer who’s down 40%+…or any other “financial expert”…who cares if i once turned $12k into $2mil with no leverage or that i was the only human character on wall street warriors, don’t trust me or anyone in finance, always be skeptical…its sad/funny/pathetic that i’m still #1 on Covestor after all these months, but when u work in a joke of an industry, u learn toe expect anything
ok, you are now moving from commenter to advertiser. If you keep this up we’re sending you a bill.
Please make it a pre-pay service.
@Timothy Sykes,
I checked your CNN video (about greed). You’re mixing up ambition and greed. In other words you come off like the rest of Wall Street – morally challenged and confused.
I read and watch Robert Scoble. His interviews with thought leaders in my industry make me a better technologist and entrepreneur. His Tweets and discussions are not equal in any shape or form to the value he generates at Scobleizer or on Fast Company. Scobles wife needs to light a fire under his ass. The majority of those 8 hours should be spent taking care of the family or figuring out more tangible ways to make more bank (get another sponsor besides Seagate).
Of course I spend a good chunk of my day hitting the refresh button on Techcrunch :p instead of coding my brains out.
I’d bet good money you’ve never watched one of his videos all the way through though.
*hugs Michael makes it all bedduh*
nah i wont advertise, just backing myself up when i get accused of being sketchy when in fact i’m the antithesis of sketchy, i love blog brawls, bring em all!
ok, but first admit that you are a little sketchy.
I trade low priced stocks that are sketchy, but i bet against them and poke holes in their weak stories…i think that makes me not sketchy…seriously dude, i’ll send u my book/reality tv show DVD, ive got nothing to hide and an industry to dominate, haters, fans, whatever, as long as i keep banking on my trades, my subscribers keep doing that too, keeping everything open, verified and detailed for all to see, its a cakewalk to the top considering 99.9% of financial peeps are full of BS (my publishing company is BullShip Press, LLC–i’m gonna cut through it, not add to it!)
Michael – I think I love this best of any comment I’ve ever seen you make. It really did make me laugh out loud rather than just type LOL.
Last comment promise, just wanted to let it be known that I checked w/ godaddy and…
Godaddy: “SKETCHYGUY.COM is available!”
Snatch it up!
@Timothy, why do you have to make this about you? We’re talking about getting Robert off FF and Twitter. Getting you off blogs and stocks should be handled at another time on another website.
yeah timothy. we’re trying to save a life here.
Sketchy is perhaps not the right word. I’d go with smarmy:
http://www.urba...php?term=smarmy
Imagine Tony Robbins crossed with a used car salesman. (Or wait… is that redundant?)
I honestly do believe that these two websites are very addicting but for the right reasons. I myself don’t have much experience with Friendfeed so I’ll stay more on the Twitter side of things.
I believe sites like Twitter are very useful when trying to reach your audience. Replying to them also gives your audience a sense of pride that you are communicating directly with them. You can use this to ask them of their opinion on a recent article etc.
Spending countless hours on Twitter can be very good for business growth etc, and in my opinion isn’t a waste of time. I myself must spend at least 10 hours a week involved or indirectly involved with my Twitter profile, and use it very frequently when attempting to reach my audience.
Mike – Robert opened his influence to a different and arguable more diverse community by using Friendfeed and Twitter. People have more access to him on these services. He responds fast. People like that immediacy. I’d say that helps him far more than it does harm.
OK, Robert may be addicted to FriendFeed, but you seem addicted to your own posts, Michael? Are you continually hitting the “refresh” button on this post to see what the next comment is?
BTW, i’m finding myself now wanting to buy Mr. Sketchy’s video… is he somehow a part of this week’s “controversy?” If so, at least someone here is making money.
hilarious! I don’t know what’s more amusing, the banter between mike and robert, or the sketchy dude and mike.
Agreed. This post (through the comments, not the actual post) has made me remember what I like about Arrington. Funny man.
I used to spend very many hours on these two sites, especially Freindfeed, but not anymore. Now, I have been relived!
gotta love that i’m still mr. sketchy…do u guys even know what Covestor is? Mike, time to write another piece on them, not fantasy league BS kaching that is sketchy
Funny how Tim shut up so quickly…hahaha….
just went to sleep, i’m an east coaster! feel free to email me/ask me any questions
Robert–I feel this is more an issue of balance, or lack thereof. Twitter & FF are fine, but you seem to have neglected your blog in terms of commentary and analysis. You have more active days there every once in a while, but the content is not what it used to be–and speaking for myself, I miss your insights from the good ole’ blogging days.
I read techcrunch everyday, and I have to say that while there is a lot I appreciate about the substantial elements of your writing, I find myself increasingly turned off by the growing amount of personal attacks and bickering that you are posting for the world to see. I am interested in technology, not some teenage soap opera about who was more boorish at le web or who uses the wrong platform for self-expression. And stop being so mean to every failing startup who didn’t make it big. Don’t you think running a failing business is punishment enough? Get over it and write about something interesting. You are coming off as a self absorbed nut case who is trying to alienate his own readership, and while I always thought all the personality critiques you get all the time were either not relevant or probably exaggerated, now I’m starting to understand. I hope they don’t invite you back to le web–or any other conference for that matter, and I don’t give a **** about a conference! I just want you to get brought down a notch and do what you do best: write about tech.
you’re skating on thin ice mister.
I’d say B A N N E D from the TC blog
I suppose I should mention that I almost don’t use friendfeed at all–so that’s not what this is about. Just trying to do an intervention of my own.
The mere fact that you are having such an emotional reaction proves that Mike’s ruse is working, he pretty much described this method further up in the comments.
Divide your prospective audience, there is no money to be made in the middle. Get them to choose. Pick an archetype brand that will truly stick in people’s minds, for Mike it is a mixture of The Powerbroker and The Anti-Hero (unrepentance, etc.).
And oh yeah, nothing sells like controversy, as is again proven on this thread. Wouldn’t be in the least surprised if Scoble and Arrington hashed out a bimonthly “controversy starter potential post list” and then sprinkled those in at strategic intervals or moments, as in right before Christmas, a time for good will, harmony and… contentious family interventions…
Meh. I kinda figured that I would get at least one response like that. I suppose that its entirely possible that this is some kind of ’strategic move’, but the point I’m making isn’t that I’m riled up because I care strongly about one side of the discussion sooooo much. I really couldn’t care less about that. I see it as a taste thing not worth publicly taking someone to court over. I’m saying that these can be interesting conversations but I don’t like all the personal attacks and negativity. I feel like its the tech blog version of celebrity tabloids except even less intersting and substantial (can you imagine if angelina jolie and jennifer aniston started fighting over whether friend feed is an effective means of garnering a financially profitable audience in the long term? And then jennifer started publicly saying brad pitt should really start a fire under angelina to go back to posting more blogs?…ok…I guess that would be kind of intersting…). I don’t know…I guess I care more about the real meat of the ideas and don’t like the part where people are picking fights about, whether they planned it or not. Maybe if I knew the people personally it would make a difference. In any case I unfortunately probably represent a small minority in this issue, so I will just have to continue to filter through all the stuff I don’t like to find those little gems of substance that I sincerly do appreciate very much.
Sounds like you need to start your own blog to fill the vacuum
This is really good stuff, Mike. I feel like George McFly taking notes from Marty at the cafe. And the Timothy Sykes banter is like a bonus easter egg buried in the comments.
Conversations are nice, at times. But when you’re a leader on a particular topic (tech trends, aircraft engineering, wine, whatever), you’re frequently at your best when you trust your talent and dial back the feedback from others. You might just be spending valuable mind resources on quasi-relevant banter with folks who add little to your day. If that comes off as an arrogant statement, so be it. Those around you can deal with it, or move on. If you’re legit, they already know it.
Again, I’m not calling out everybody on FriendFeed. But I’m willing to bet that you could dial it back significantly and see a return to form very quickly.
Leaders.
Robert subscribed to my friendfeed account, and I thought it would be ‘polite’, so I subscribed to him too.
After and hour it was IMPOSSIBLE to track any friends other than Robert Scoble. He posts on every occasion. “I did this”, “I did that” Actually he posts so fast, I thought he is the founder of Friendfeed or Twitter. After two hours, I unsubscribed, because I wanted to USE Friendfeed. I registered to Friendfeed to follow some good friends, but it became a Robert Scoble show in an hour.
No useful links, no funny pictures, nothing, just twitter messages. “I’ve talked to this guy”, “I’ve talked to that guy”
I’ve only Turkish friends on my friends list, and Robert is subscribed to all of them, even we only post in Turkish. Robert, can you speak Turkish? You can’t even understand what we’re talking about.
so awesome.
“I’ve only Turkish friends on my friends list, and Robert is subscribed to all of them, even we only post in Turkish. Robert, can you speak Turkish? You can’t even understand what we’re talking about.”
I guess you both haven’t heard of translators. If something gets a ton of likes in another language, I just use one of these: http://www.star...to_english.html
I can help out with some German. New business model ff in-line simultaneous translation. We should write a plugin
.
Maybe we can strap in Amazon’s mechanical turk and off we go
It’s interesting to see people talk about Scoble’s noise. I’ve been subscribed to him on Friendfeed for months, and there’s rarely more than one entry from him on my front page. If that. That doesn’t seem overwhelming to me, or threaten to drown everyone else out.
“I’ve only Turkish friends on my friends list, and Robert is subscribed to all of them, even we only post in Turkish. Robert, can you speak Turkish? You can’t even understand what we’re talking about.”
Wow.
Onur: I try to only subscribe to English speakers, but I subscribe to a few who post in both English and other languages. I also subscribe to people who bring me interesting photos, or other things.
You should visit my likes feed. http://friendfe...cobleizer/likes to get a sense of the kinds of things you’ll see me share with you. If you don’t like those, then you won’t like following me.
This thread has the funniest banter I think I’ve ever seen Mike partake in. Sadly it’s mostly about Mr. sketchy who hijacked the intervention. In any case I don’t feel it’s necessary. Robert’s a big boy, knows what he’s doing and nobody is getting hurt. See you over at FriendFeed Robert, I feel out of my element here and have chilled Kool Aid waiting for you
Robert I am following your blog, you post nice things there. But I can’t follow any friends on Friendfeed -sorry but- because of you
I was reading your Twitter posts (which got 69 responses) but when I’m done with you, I lost my attention, so I get back to work
I think you should post occasionally, but not on every occasion. Your blog is much better than your Twitter account.
Onur,
That’s cool. Techcrunch is where I come when I want to slow down and enjoy the flowers too.
I’ll step up my blog a bit and see if we can find a nice balance to life. Do a little more thinking and a little less clicking on “like” kind of thing, you know?
But you really should learn about how to use friendfeed before you go all nuts. Here’s one tip:
Create a list.
Title it “noisy.”
Put me in there.
Delete me from your feeds with your real friends.
Problem solved.
That’s what I do with you. Only I don’t call that list “noisy.” Heheh.
Have a good one everyone, thanks Mike for the intervention, we’ll be back tomorrow with a blog post or two and some nice videos of Loic Le Meur, who, I’m sure, will say something about Mike that’ll start another battle of the web.
manz, Robert, just when the storms almost over, another “battle of the web” brewing up.
I would think Mike meant well too in this post in spotting what might be a small crack which may lead to a larger one. Good intentions.
Robert, glad to know you appreciate Mike’s thoughtfulness too though it may sound abit harsh. *Smiles*
“Techcrunch is where I come when I want to slow down and enjoy the flowers too.”
= Passive-Agressive. Nice…
BTW, it occured to me from further up that Robert’s archetype is The Loyalist (buddy, loyal friend, sidekick, etc.) among other things, so I guess it is only fitting that he is the number one user and evangelist on a service named “FriendFeed”…
Hi Michael,
Just posted this on Robert’s blog, thought you might be interested to read what a supporter for both of you, thinks. *Smiles*
–
Robert
Do take some time to read this, it’s not 140 words. It’s a blog comment
I would think that both you and Mike have your own valid points, and I imagine that neither of you is wrong because each believes in different perspective at this point of time. But both of you are on a common topic, what is a better use of time?
Seriously speaking, I think Mike is trying to advise you to focus on the long term side of the equation minus the short term sacrifice effect (losing some blog readers due to less posts). He meant good, just it’s been made public. Good thinking topic though for the audience by the ringside *Winks*
How does the comparison goes?
It’s not totally comparable, A is A like Ayn Rand’s philosophy.
Blogging is A, FF and Twitter is B.
Blog posts stay for a “very long time” on the web and is searchable, sort of running like autopilot. FF and Twitter posts have a short lifespan, it seems to me more like a Instant Messenge (MSN) on steroids, reaching those online with a single click and message.
Blog posts reaches people who are not (not yet) connected to you on Friendfeed and Twitter. You on the other hand, I would think have seen another side of things…two words, Potential and Enjoyment.
IMAGINE:
Let’s say a person has 50k RSS readers only (without any other social media sidekicks) and he writes a new blog post asking for action on a cause which needs immediate attention, let’s say donate to the Earthquake victims. Would it be useful by the time everyone on RSS (very very optimistic to say “every”, more like 30-40%) decides to read your post and by the time they react, like a week later, the sense of urgency in the post is already gone. Result, small impact.
NOW,
If the same person has 50k RSS readers, 50K Friendfeed friends, 50K Twitter friends and he writes a blog post about the urgency of the Earthquake situation, scheduled Tweets on Twitter around the clock (automated) and asks for action for his Friendfeed friends to action upon the situation. Ask them to DIGG, STUMBLEUPON, Propeller, Reddit and all that arsenal of weapons to up the rating of that post and because that person actually does chat with his friends on Friendfeed and Twitter, established a relationship and trust between a few thousand of his online friends over the years…
WHAT HAPPENS?
Like Warren Buffet’s book title…it snowballs, a small blog post followed by an avalanche of actions, some we may not even expect but because of the genius of one of your contacts, did something totally unexpected.
Using the Earthquake example, he may have a friend whose family in at the Earthquake zone and because he got the information quickly, he could assemble his own superman efforts to bring a whole gang of rescuers (who are not Techfans or use the internet regularly) to the scene. That would make an impact, perhaps save many more lives. (Trapped Earthquake victims need to be saved fast, the longer the delay, the less chance of survival.)
SUMMARY
Think of it this way, a Blog is like a Newspaper, a one way communication for everyone who is interested, Friendfeed and Twitter is like SMS to friends who exchange information, two way communication.
A post from a newspaper is like “Oic, that’s what happened.” while a SMS from a mobile phone is “OMG, let’s do something about it right now!”
To simplify things, I would think it is a wise thing to keep the “blog-newspaper” readership healthy enough to be satisfied, while growing the “Social Media-SMS” relationships close. As friends, we HELP each other, as readers, people tend to be observers and want to LEARN from you.
A solution? Perhaps turn those short Tweets and posts into a long enough Blog Articles at the end of the day as a summary.
So hurray, Robert can carry on doing what he enjoys and thinks if good, Mike can also carry on doing what he is good at and enjoys.
*Big Smile*
Be on friendly terms again my brothers
lolz, it was fun while the “battle” lasted.
Your Friend from Singapore
Maynas Eric
http://twitter.com/maynaseric
(posted this on Robert’s blog.)
–
PS. Shake hands my brothers *Winks*
Please don’t start a competition of some sort to find out who’s right. (not advisable, if there’s a winner, there’s a loser) when the one who loses is going to lose in public, that’s no good for friendship *Smiles*
Maynas, thanks for the nice reply. One thing you got wrong, by the way, is that Twitter and FriendFeed are temporary. They are not. My posts in both are in Google and I can pull them out. In fact, that’s how I found the “future of journalism” conversation link I posted above.
Robert, thanks for the reply
You are right that they can be found on google and can be pulled out.
The “short lifespan” in the comment about FF and twitter is to say that because of the frequent “Tweets” and posts, the messages “expires” very fast by getting pushed to the bottom.
Blog posts lifespan lasts longer because of lesser updates.
lolz, gladed the tone of the comments section has toned down a little here. Was abit nasty up there.
*Smiles*
Actually most of the content on Friendfeed, unless a specific conversation gets a link from a juicy blog with well structured archives, just disappears from Google deep in their supplemental index, or not at all.
Friendfeed does have its internal search, but that often leaves a lot to be desired, especially when the conversations get buried deeply by continued activity.
I actually posted this sentiment tongue and cheek in the comments to one of Louis’ posts on Friendfeed http://friendfe...ect-Scobleizer/.
Mike isn’t entirely wrong here. Friendfeed has addictive qualities …. so does Twitter. Robert spends an enormous amount of time online but adds value many times to my, and many others, web experience … and he does work, travel and do videos for Fast Company. I’d bet this THIS conversation on Friendfeed would have A LOT more participants which, depending on YOUR participation Mike, might be good for TechCrunch. Food for thought?
Charlie, I think you got one point spot on. Spending alot of time online but still able to get lots of things done, that’s something
Good time management.
hmm…I wouldn’t say it’s an addiction…more like a way of life in doing what we like and what we want. Ever since “migrating” to the web, I work 24/7 almost every day and enjoy it. Otherwise previously as an Engineer, 8 to 6 working hours left me shagged at the end of the day and I want my weekends.
I would imagine Mike and Robert love what they do so much too that they don’t mind 24/7 too, lolz.
When two people goes two slightly different ways, and both know what they are doing, the chance of both getting it right while another slightly “right-er”, I would think is rather high
I have been saying it for a while. Twitter less, blog more.
http://www.dail...less-blog-more/
I’m with Mike. Fk FF and Twitter and retain ownership in your works. To say that you’re becoming a thought leader is just bullshit, people have a memory of nothing, and soon they’ll think his name is Roble.
Mike you brought up some important points that all social media junkies need to carefully consider. Using twitter, facebook, myspace, friendfeed, flickr is actually very similar to writing an autobiography with disappearing ink.
Leaving miles of footprints on the sandy shores of toddler start-ups, verses continuing to carve a searchable, monetizable archive into your own stone walls is a mistake most of us do everyday.
I wish I had all that rebellious content of my youth that I pushed into AOL’s chat rooms in the late ’90s… Same thing’s kinda happening here. Every comment you submit, every image you send, every video you upload, every bit you click is subject to elimination and demonetization.
Mike’s not suggesting that Scoble abandon his army of sheep, but that he just take a step back and remember reality.
Reassessing what it is that you’re actually building, and where you’re building it can’t be a bad thing. One day someones gonna trip over that big plug in the sky and this whole game is gonna come to a screeching halt…
Jamie, great points you mentioned. That plug in the sky. Before Myspace got hot, there was friendster and many people flock there, then abandoned it, went to myspace, a number of people I know seldom do myspace anymore and migrated to facebook. Evolution, survival of the fittest it seems works on Web 2.0
And what if a powerful platform like Facebook comes up with a new and much better function that works like Twitter and Friendfeed, the crowd disperses and move to new grounds again.
Those things can virtually “Plug” us out in a matter of months, we can’t do anything much, we don’t own them.
We own our Blogs and Websites, they can’t disappear without our will unless something drastic happens.
More or less, it seems like this equation.
Blogs = Assets.
Social media = Contacts.
oh gosh…choices…
“some important points that all social media junkies need to carefully consider. Using twitter, facebook, myspace, friendfeed, flickr is actually very similar to writing an autobiography with disappearing ink.”
Jamie, point well taken, and I am going to reuse that great evocative quote at some point.
I would add to this that the way to counteract this problem, and to me the overall point of Web 2.0 “properties” one builds out is syndication: By spreading your message accross multiple services at once, you insure that they won’t disappear even if one or more of them do (e.g. even if Twitter were to fold tomorrow, Robert’s Tweets are all stored in FriendFeed, etc.).
Agreed that it is best to insure that all of your prime stuff gets brought back into the fold of your self-hosted content somehow. With all of one’s blog comments, BackType can help in that regard, also by at least spreading those comments to Twitter and from there to other services.
It is completely legitimate to reuse/adapt things you have already written elsewhere, e.g. creating full blog posts from one’s comments written on other people’s blogs, which can be a great way to overcome “writer’s block” BTW since the comment mode typically carries some emotional energy of a dialogue that initially uni-directional blog writing often lacks.
Syndication also allows you to create more presence than you would otherwise be able to do as a solopreneur or smallish outfit. In a way, Scoble opted to spread himself far and wide on Twitter and FriendFeed instead of trying to compete with TC’s (and Valleywag’s, AlleyInsider’s, etc. etc.) small armies of bloggers cranking out hundreds of posts a day.
I’d say he has had a disproportionate amount of impact/visibility this year due to these two tools. Something like being in the story rather than just writing about it. It’s in way like creating a whole new category, a wise move (right out of Ries & Trouts “Immutable Laws of Marketing”) since the “blogging” category has been getting so crowded.
That said, I at times have thought that Robert’s degree of participation on Twitter/FF appears at times almost superhuman. I wonder whether he has morphed into an entirely new form of being, a Web2.0 Cyborg or some such thing.
In April this year, while on holidays and deliberately leaving laptop at home, I calculated how many hours of my own life I was spending getting Scoble’s tweets on my mobile phone! I calculated pretty similar hours as per your observations in this post. I found so much of it empty calories that the value couldn’t justify my own time. These days I still dive into Scoble- when pointed there by others on Twitter…my filters! It works great. Its a question of too much of a good thing…;-)
Picking up on Jamie Park’s comment above, I wish it wasn’t disappearing ink…I think of the work of The Long Now Foundation, and wonder if 10 000 years from now, just one month’s worth of all Twitter content, if preserved, could provide an interesting historical clue to future generations of how life on earth was….like a Pompeii or Rosetta Stone unlocked secrets of past civilizations and languages. And who could blame them upon discovering such a treasure for thinking Robert Scoble the God of the Twitterverse?
“And who could blame them upon discovering such a treasure for thinking Robert Scoble the God of the Twitterverse?”
This is priceless… made my day. Thanks!
I will reblog that part of your comment on Posterous, from whence it will spread as if by magic to the far reaches of the Web 2.0 land, i.e. first to Twitter, from there to Facebook, a Wordpress.com blog, etc. etc.
If each of your Web 2.0 actions has only one effect, you are working way too hard…
I am the next Robert. At least for the next ten months.
http://twitter.com/rizzy81
Posting in a legendary thread.
What he said.
Wondering what has the most value for an effort:
- Blogging
- Commenting
- Micro-blogging
- Friendfeeding
- Video-blogging
- Writing a column
- Writing a book (and getting it published)
A book will probably last the longest and if successful then most income.
Do one or two of them *really* well.
Robert, how about two identities each on FF and Twitter? One pair would be low volume, perhaps two or three posts per day on each, max.
The other pair would be high noise, high volume. Full Scoble.
In a post you made to your blog earlier this year, you wrote about how you like the noise and how you are good at picking out patterns from the noise:
http://scobleiz...s-has-no-noise/
It’s great that you can do that. Not all of us can. In the process of picking news out of the noise, you’ve become part of the noise, at least for some of us.
Your community is attempting to give you feedback on how you can be more relevant and helpful. People that cannot accept and respond constructively feedback often get tuned out. You’re too good for that.
As one who did not know of Scoble until I got into FriendFeed, I am grateful for his active participation. It seems to me that the “thoughtful” person would use blog posts and FriendFeed for different kinds of communication. If anything, I think that Robert’s use of FriendFeed removes some of the clutter from his blog. For myself, I look to Robert for thought leadership on both FriendFeed and his blog… for different kinds of thoughts.
OK, so Scoble might now focus a little more on his blog but he is at least involved in the conversation through FF and Twitter. Arrington’s Tweets push out links to the Techcrunch blog (which I receive on an RSS feed anyway). Surely that is using new media tools for old media ends?
For what it’s worth, I subscribed to Robert’s rss feed several times and I just couldn’t find anything interesting so I unsubscribed. I also tried following him on Twitter a couple times but I couldn’t stand having more tweets from him in an hour than i get from the other 150 people I follow in one day.
Mike, you crack me up. You’re writing and honnesty is just gold.
What I find hilarious, is that it’s taken Robert a year to fingure out what most of us realize overnight. The problem with Robert is that he seems to have very little consideration for others. Is it really neccesary to spend so much time engaged in inane drivel? Mike says you’ve ‘gained’ x number of followers on various services. So what? Cali Lewis is tweet-baiting people with drivel about ‘On this day in history’ facts, what the hell for? You gain a few more followers by accident and then what? You get a gold medal? So what if 45,000 people can see the bollocks you talk about?
If Twitter was used as it was intended it would be great, but Robert doesn’t give sh!t about stuff like that. One person summed it up brilliantly “Robert Scoble is the worlds biggest Twitter whore”.