Scoble Just Doesn’t Get It

February 18th, 2009, by The Angry Drunk

Yeah, I know, it’s not exactly a shock­ing rev­e­la­tion; but every now and then Scoble comes up with some­thing that makes even a bat­tle hard­ened vet­eran of the New Media Douchewars like myself sit back, shake my head, and go “huwazat?!?”

In this par­tic­u­lar instance it’s a bit that Robert wrote regard­ing the Facebook Terms of Service Copyright Landgrab. Linky here. Here’s a quick review, for those of you with actual things to do with your time. Recently Facebook posted a change to their Terms of Service that said, in essence, you are giv­ing them a per­ma­nent and irrev­o­ca­ble license to all con­tent that you post to Facebook and that Facebook can effec­tively use that con­tent in any way they see fit.

I’m not going to com­ment on the specifics of the sit­u­a­tion; mainly because I don’t care, and this sort of crap is exactly what I expect of an out­fit like Facebook. But I am going to com­ment on Robert’s reac­tion; because I think that reac­tion is a prime exam­ple of what most of us already know: Robert Scoble is com­pletely out of touch with reality.

Robert’s reac­tion can be summed up in one quote from the article:

Truth is it doesn’t matter.

Robert’s inabil­ity to grasp the issues here is man­i­fest in two dis­tinct ways. I’ll address each separately.

Social Networking Does Not Equal Marketing.

Social Networking is not Marketing; but the inabil­ity to grasp that fact is the defin­ing char­ac­ter­is­tic of the New Media Douchebag. To a NMD like Scoble, every inter­ac­tion; from post­ing a Twitter update, to talk­ing to a per­son in a bar, to upload­ing a pic­ture of their cat is an oppor­tu­nity to pro­mote the semi-mythical “per­sonal brand” that they’ve built around them­selves. This is some­thing that makes the New Media Douchebags almost tragic fig­ures to me; and is the main rea­son why I don’t bag on them as much as I could.

See, what the Robert and The New Media Douchebags never seem to get is that, for every one of them, there are mil­lions of peo­ple using ser­vices like Facebook in order to do mun­dane things like recon­nect and keep in touch with friends and fam­ily. These are peo­ple who are upload­ing con­tent to share with the peo­ple that they care about and who, rightly, balk at the idea of a cor­po­ra­tion assert­ing own­er­ship of that con­tent in order to make a buck.

Scoble’s advice to these peo­ple; which essen­tially boils down to either give up your own­er­ship or host your own con­tent is far­ci­cal when you con­sider his needs and resources as opposed to the needs and resources of the actual aver­age Facebook user. It may be easy for Robert to relin­quish con­trol of his con­tent in his over­whelm­ing quest to push his per­sonal brand; but I, and the major­ity of Facebook users have no brand to push; and no desire to use my snap­shots to push it if I did.

Not All Marketing Is Created Equal.

The sec­ond way in which Robert misses the point is, hon­estly, not one that occurred to me as I read the ini­tial arti­cle. It was some­thing that was pointed out in this com­ment by Jim Goldstein. Here’s an excerpt:

I am con­tin­u­ally per­plexed by your stance on issues such as this. Your needs and use of social media sites are not one size fits all and your approach of guid­ing oth­ers to do the same of giv­ing every­thing away for free is trou­bling. If it were so sim­ple FastCompany wouldn’t be so con­cerned about pro­tect­ing the work you do for them. Individuals who strive to lever­age social media to make a name for them­selves, mar­ket and pick up clients as a sole pro­pri­etor­ship or LLC suf­fer from such a blan­ket recommendation.

I’ll admit that this argu­ment doesn’t res­onate with me since I’m not inter­ested in mar­ket­ing; but it’s valid nonethe­less. Unfortunately for those who are attempt­ing to mar­ket them­selves via social media, the sort of advice offered by the high priests of New Media Douchebaggery only really applies to other New Media Douchebags. Unless you’re will­ing to become a full-on Scoble; this sort of advice will hurt more than it will help.

More to the point; this atti­tude exem­pli­fies one of my biggest crit­i­cism of the New Media Douchelite. They are inca­pable of under­stand­ing that they are in no way rep­re­sen­ta­tive of the aver­age user of the ser­vices they pro­mote. They peer into the crowd, and see only their own face shin­ing back at them. It’s no won­der that I some­times pity them.

42 comments - (Comments closed)
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  • http://www.bynkii.com/ John C. Welch

    that’s the most per­fect analy­sis of Scoble I’ve ever seen.

  • http://www.bynkii.com/ John C. Welch

    that’s the most per­fect analy­sis of Scoble I’ve ever seen.

  • Anonymous

    Another strong indi­ca­tor of a New Media Douchebag is their for­mer obses­sions — while they might now be grind­ing them­selves beneath the ‘social’ mill­stone, in the 90s they were all wrapped up in Macromedia Director, ‘CDROMs’, VR, ‘mul­ti­me­dia’ and cyber-anything. By tying their buzz-whoring lifestyle to their past blun­ders, it makes it much eas­ier to con­vince peo­ple of the retar­da­tion of their cur­rent meme, and you don’t even have to mock Second Life!Having any­thing but dis­dain for Dave Winer is also a bad sign.

  • Fred Blasdel

    Another strong indi­ca­tor of a New Media Douchebag is their for­mer obses­sions — while they might now be grind­ing them­selves beneath the ‘social’ mill­stone, in the 90s they were all wrapped up in Macromedia Director, ‘CDROMs’, VR, ‘mul­ti­me­dia’ and cyber-anything. By tying their buzz-whoring lifestyle to their past blun­ders, it makes it much eas­ier to con­vince peo­ple of the retar­da­tion of their cur­rent meme, and you don’t even have to mock Second Life!Having any­thing but dis­dain for Dave Winer is also a bad sign.

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  • Brian

    These peo­ple are noth­ing new. Calling it “per­sonal brand­ing” is just a new term for the same old self-promotion There’s noth­ing more annoy­ing than a glad-handing sono­fabitch whose only con­cern is that, at the end of the con­ver­sa­tion (no mat­ter what is being dis­cussed) you remem­ber his name, and his face. For pref­er­ence, you’ll also regard him as an expert on any­thing and every­thing, the PR researcher’s “opin­ion leader” for your lit­tle circle.They’re always about them­selves. Always the first to feign knowl­edge and the last to admit igno­rance. Rarely con­fronta­tional, always ingra­ti­at­ing, and always out to weasel their way into the head of any­one who isn’t imme­di­ately put off by their greasy smile and oily conversation.They aren’t a recent inven­tion, and they aren’t even orig­i­nal in their approach. They just have a new an wider vec­tor for it, and a big­ger swath of gullible mopes con­vinced that they’re “in the know.”

  • Brian

    These peo­ple are noth­ing new. Calling it “per­sonal brand­ing” is just a new term for the same old self-promotion There’s noth­ing more annoy­ing than a glad-handing sono­fabitch whose only con­cern is that, at the end of the con­ver­sa­tion (no mat­ter what is being dis­cussed) you remem­ber his name, and his face. For pref­er­ence, you’ll also regard him as an expert on any­thing and every­thing, the PR researcher’s “opin­ion leader” for your lit­tle circle.They’re always about them­selves. Always the first to feign knowl­edge and the last to admit igno­rance. Rarely con­fronta­tional, always ingra­ti­at­ing, and always out to weasel their way into the head of any­one who isn’t imme­di­ately put off by their greasy smile and oily conversation.They aren’t a recent inven­tion, and they aren’t even orig­i­nal in their approach. They just have a new an wider vec­tor for it, and a big­ger swath of gullible mopes con­vinced that they’re “in the know.”

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  • Wrinkle in Time

    “They peer into the crowd, and see only their own face shin­ing back at them.“Pure poetry, man. 

  • Wrinkle in Time

    “They peer into the crowd, and see only their own face shin­ing back at them.“Pure poetry, man. 

  • http://theprogrammersparadox.blogspot.com phomer

    Well, I was going to call you drunk and angry, but I think you have very valid points (you’re not drink­ing enough?). However, I think the main point that is get­ting missed is: it doesn’t mat­ter to most peo­ple because most of their con­tent has a neg­a­tive value (it’s not worth the bits it polar­iz­ing). There’s noth­ing Facebook can do with all of the ‘data’ they have col­lected (other then stream a few more annoy­ing ads your way). Pictures of a birth­day? Your three best friends? Paul.

  • http://theprogrammersparadox.blogspot.com Paul W. Homer

    Well, I was going to call you drunk and angry, but I think you have very valid points (you’re not drink­ing enough?). However, I think the main point that is get­ting missed is: it doesn’t mat­ter to most peo­ple because most of their con­tent has a neg­a­tive value (it’s not worth the bits it polar­iz­ing). There’s noth­ing Facebook can do with all of the ‘data’ they have col­lected (other then stream a few more annoy­ing ads your way). Pictures of a birth­day? Your three best friends? Paul.

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  • reader

    Angry Drunk,Semicolons are reserved for those who under­stand their use. Please don’t touch the semi­colons. Simple com­mas are for you.

  • reader

    Angry Drunk,Semicolons are reserved for those who under­stand their use. Please don’t touch the semi­colons. Simple com­mas are for you.

  • Guest

    The prob­lem that I have with Scoble is akin to the prob­lem that Giles Bowkett has with Cory Doctorow: most of what he pro­duces is an utter waste of my time to read, watch, or lis­ten to, but there is an occa­sional gem. How to fil­ter it is the problem.

  • Mayson Lancaster

    The prob­lem that I have with Scoble is akin to the prob­lem that Giles Bowkett has with Cory Doctorow: most of what he pro­duces is an utter waste of my time to read, watch, or lis­ten to, but there is an occa­sional gem. How to fil­ter it is the problem.

  • Anonymous

    While the prin­ci­pals at boing­bo­ing and their close friends are the né plus ultra of New Media Douchebaggery, Giles Bowkett is a NMD too.

  • Fred Blasdel

    While the prin­ci­pals at boing­bo­ing and their close friends are the né plus ultra of New Media Douchebaggery, Giles Bowkett is a NMD too.

  • Anonymous

    How do you spell cunt? Oh that’s right S C O B L E !

  • indiana61

    How do you spell cunt? Oh that’s right S C O B L E !

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  • http://arcticghetto.blogspot.com Greg Burkman

    Love your site, came to this par­tic­u­lar com­men­tary via Welch. Thank you! For help­ing to dis­en­fran­chise the blowhards.

  • http://arcticghetto.blogspot.com Greg Burkman

    Love your site, came to this par­tic­u­lar com­men­tary via Welch. Thank you! For help­ing to dis­en­fran­chise the blowhards.

  • michael

    what the hell is a scoble ?.…and I’m not sure you used douchebag enough in this post.

    • http://www.theangrydrunk.com The Angry Drunk

      When spank­ing New Media Douchebags, you sort of have to use the word “douchebag” a bit.

  • michael

    what the hell is a scoble ?.…and I’m not sure you used douchebag enough in this post.

    • http://www.theangrydrunk.com The Angry Drunk

      When spank­ing New Media Douchebags, you sort of have to use the word “douchebag” a bit.

  • Wrinkle In Time

    The fol­low­ing YouTube clip is not specif­i­cally related to New Media Douchebags, but is related to Douchebag Entitletards in gen­eral. May I please present to you Louis C.K. with ‘Everything’s amaz­ing, nobody’s happy’And if that link gets borked, try http://​www​.youtube​.com/​w​a​t​c​h​?​v​=​L​o​G​Y​x​3​5​y​pus

  • Wrinkle In Time

    The fol­low­ing YouTube clip is not specif­i­cally related to New Media Douchebags, but is related to Douchebag Entitletards in gen­eral. May I please present to you Louis C.K. with ‘Everything’s amaz­ing, nobody’s happy’And if that link gets borked, try http://​www​.youtube​.com/​w​a​t​c​h​?​v​=​L​o​G​Y​x​3​5​y​pus

  • http://ripragged.blogspot.com Anonymous

    You for­got to men­tion one small, but impor­tant, tid­bit. Without it, your whole post becomes, some­how cheapened.That is.“Fuck you, Scoble. Your writ­ing has value than an equal mass and vol­ume of ratshit.

  • http://ripragged.blogspot.com Anonymous

    ooops. that should be “less value“dammit.

  • http://rip-ragged.com/dross Rip Ragged

    You for­got to men­tion one small, but impor­tant, tid­bit. Without it, your whole post becomes, some­how cheapened.That is.“Fuck you, Scoble. Your writ­ing has value than an equal mass and vol­ume of ratshit.

  • http://rip-ragged.com/dross Rip Ragged

    ooops. that should be “less value“dammit.

  • Pustoolio

    Spanking New Media Douchebags? Angry Drunk, you just gave me wood!

  • Pustoolio

    Spanking New Media Douchebags? Angry Drunk, you just gave me wood!

  • Some Guy

    “there is an occa­sional gem“

    Only in the com­ments on his blog, never in the blather that Scoble writes himself.

  • http://www.thisblogismyblog.com larzini

    I’m not really adding much to the con­ver­sa­tion, except that it is refresh­ing to hear some com­men­tary about “new media douchebags”, because the lev­els of douchebag­gery is more likely what’s slow­ing up twit­ter these days no mat­ter what I hear about a poten­tial virus. In a sec­ondary account, I’ve been exper­i­ment­ing with adding every­one who fol­lows. The speed at which fol­low­ers are increas­ing is sur­pris­ing to me, but the amount of them that seem to pro­mote them­selves as new media experts, social media gurus, brand builders, Internet mar­keters and the like is stag­ger­ing. Typically there’s noth­ing to back it up, except for an auto-DM about increas­ing your twit­ter fol­low­ers, a link to a site to by an e-book on Internet mar­ket­ing secrets, yet noth­ing to back up what they claim. And although I don’t like to judge a book by it’s cover, the pho­tos and the back­grounds that accom­pany these folks tell me I wouldn’t use their advice to cre­ate a pho­to­copied flyer to hang in the local cof­fee shop to find my miss­ing dog. There’s no doubt that there are peo­ple that are intel­li­gent, and are using social media to build some­thing use­ful, and per­haps mon­e­tize it, but there’s a lot of chaff to sep­a­rate from the wheat. You know, maybe I added more to this con­ver­sa­tion than I thought I was going to, but maybe that self-realization might be my inner-NMD talking.

  • http://www.lornefade.com/ Lorne Fade

    I cant help but chuckle, great syn­op­sis of Scoble.

  • http://www.lornefade.com/ Lorne Fade

    I cant help but chuckle, great syn­op­sis of Scoble.