Comments on: NowPublic shifts Link Baiting focus to Los Angeles

By: sbdc» Blog Archive » More PR spam, I was right! Thanks NowPublic!

sbdc» Blog Archive » More PR spam, I was right! Thanks NowPublic! — Fri, 05 Sep 2008 15:10:40 +0000

[...] this little back and forth with NowPublic a few weeks back? In that post I noted that the original announcement e-mail had been sent to me by [...]

By: Matt Mason

Matt Mason — Fri, 22 Aug 2008 03:07:12 +0000

Wow, what an interesting exchange. I’ve learned a lot. I learned that Sean has an immense statue. Do I want to see it? No thanks. I learned that there is someone named Leonard Brody who can grant wishes. Do we each get three wishes? I would like to start out with a Bentley Continental GT, or maybe an Aston Martin DB5 c.1964. Oops, is that 2 wishes? And speaking of Anglophilia, I learned how to spell "humour" and "tonne" the British way. That will come in handy as I will need to distinguish my Aston’s bonnet from its boot.

By: mxb

mxb — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 07:59:34 +0000

Hey Sean, I’ve added the links from the member pages to the article itself. I guess this kind of stuff falls to the ones with insomnia, since no one else is around, thank Leonard for keeping me up – as long as he hasn’t bought the abdominzer it was worth it.

As Leonard mentioned, when I pointed out that I didn’t know who you were, it was simply meant to point out that the list (link-bait or not) is meant actually flows both ways… overall the point is taken and we’ll make sure we reformat all of the MostPublic index pages to take in all of the feedback we’ve received here and elsewhere.

By: andy

andy — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 07:20:55 +0000

With all due respect, Leonard, I still find it awkward that those mentioned in the top 20 Most Public were notified not by NowPublic, but by themorris+kingcompany. That’s really set off my skeptic nerve.

No news org that I"m familiar with — whether citizen-generated, professional, or otherwise — employ a third party to notify individuals 24-hours in advance of them being subjects in an article/post.

Where is the line drawn between where a PR firm/consultant is advising and actually creating content?

By: Jason DeFillippo

Jason DeFillippo — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 06:38:00 +0000

Technorati and Crunchbase are totally in the wrong as well but that’s a topic for our SF Metblog :-) You drew the short straw today unfortunately.

By: Sean Bonner

Sean Bonner — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 06:27:05 +0000

Thanks Leonard. That’s fantastic. I’ll update the post to reflect that. I’m glad that you ventured into this mess and I think the outcome will be better for everyone!

By: lbrody

lbrody — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 06:08:54 +0000

It’s 2am…and I keep asking myself why I allow myself to get sucked into this. Short answer…can’t sleep…and I don’t want to buy the abdominalizor currently being sold on TV.

"Linkbait Leonard"…that’s actually kinda funny. Put a smile on my face.

So, let me make sure I understand…your big beef is that we didn’t put the initial links to the profiles on first inbound article? Well, I can honestly say we felt we were doing enough by posting the many links on the profile pages themselves. Honestly, nothing we are doing here is any different that what Arrington does with Crunchbase or Technorati does when you are required to claim your blog.

Either way…I have instructed our team to make the changes based on the feedback here. Will probably take a few hours…but should be up soon.

And wrt "bit off more than I can chew"? If this is the most gravitas I have in the getting in over my head category, I will be a happy man.

This really has to be my last post here as my 7am breakfast meeting is going to be really ugly.

Linkbait Leonard signing off.

By: panasonicyouth

panasonicyouth — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 05:15:57 +0000

Linkbait Leonard, you are truly and utterly clueless.

When is it EVER standard procedure to sign another person up for your website without their consent? Even stating that you want them to "get involved" in an interesting process is still dishonest, especially considering your earlier comments that you are in this business for traffic.

Sean is still spot on. The original links should NOT link internally to your own site. These "influential" people are not being influential on NowPublic. They’re being influential on their own sites. Proper netiquette would be to link to their own sites.

Face it, Leonard. Nrek said it best. You bit off way more than you could chew.

By: substitute

substitute — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 05:00:44 +0000

Wow! It’s the 2008 version of the Who’s Who scam! It had to show up in Scam 2.0 form at some point.

By: nrek

nrek — Thu, 21 Aug 2008 04:47:07 +0000

Looks like Linkbait Leonard got a bite on his line bigger than he can reel in.

Their post isn’t even that great. # of friends on social networking sites = influence? Where the fuck is the logic in that yard of bullshit?