Disqus - Latest Comments for Joseph Thornley

Re: » StartupNorth is a year old! How did that happen? | StartupNorth

Joseph Thornley — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 02:11:43 -0000

Congratulations guys. One year!
I won't be in Toronto on Thursday. So I can't join you. But I'll be there in spirit. Party on.

Re: StartupNorth is a year old! How did that happen?

Joseph Thornley — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 02:11:43 -0000

Congratulations guys. One year!
I won't be in Toronto on Thursday. So I can't join you. But I'll be there in spirit. Party on.

Re: Loren Feldman vs. Shel Israel

ryancoleman — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 22:25:50 -0000

Joe: I get the "crosshairs" notion... there's been a few times I've had the back of the mind thought "I'm so glad I don't even appear on Loren's radar" as I've watched some of this stuff unfold.

That said, I largely agree with Matt's sentiment - while it comes across as "mean" Loren tends to keep it at a place where he's only calling people on the points where they're being unauthentic (unauthentic?) to what they preach ... but at the same time he delivers it in his usual style of keeping one last toe on the line so he can claim he hasn't stepped over it (the child hood equivalent of "I'm not touching you!!!).

Sure Loren puts it over the edge from time to time, but that's Loren. Personally I think he's a good barometer to have around the 'sphere to keep egos in check in a edgy & funny way.

Re: Loren Feldman vs. Shel Israel

mathewi — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 22:07:02 -0000

It may be mean, Joe, but it's also funny. And I actually don't think
it's really all that mean -- the puppets lighten things up quite a
bit. As for the court jester thing, I will agree with you that they
were perhaps wittier (or at least so Shakespeare and others would have
us believe) but there was a lot of bawdy comedy and so forth involved
as well. Whether Shel deserves it or not isn't for me to say.

Re: Loren Feldman vs. Shel Israel

Joseph Thornley — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 21:52:05 -0000

Mathew, I couldn't disagree more with you. It is mean to subject someone to ridicule. No one deserves that.

The longevity of court jesters was directly tied to make their point without causing personal offence, by doing it indirectly and with wit. What's going on here is heavy handed and without finesse.

Re: Loren Feldman vs. Shel Israel

mathewi — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 21:42:01 -0000

Joe, believe me -- I have suffered through more than my share of
sustained criticism in the past (although, to be fair, none of mine
involved puppets) and most of it was a lot more unfriendly than I
think Loren's is. I don't think he is being mean at all, actually. I
think it's more like what court jesters used to do -- puncturing
inflated egos, etc..

Re: Loren Feldman vs. Shel Israel

San Diago — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 21:38:34 -0000

I second that, Joseph. I've seen this crap since the very first post and I think that Loren is acting like a chiwawa nipping at heels and defaming his target to get attention. Shel is doing the right thing by staying quiet and not biting back. He's proving to be the real man.

Re: Loren Feldman vs. Shel Israel

Joseph Thornley — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 21:29:16 -0000

"Loren is just having fun with Shel"
Mathew, I hope that you never have the experience of someone "having fun" at your expense in this way. Yes, we should all have a sense of humour. But there's a difference between clever and just plain mean.

I think the silence about Loren's tactics is driven by people's desire to stay out of his crosshairs. And to me that's the real indication that he has gone way beyond a healthy sense of humour. If you make fun of someone and they aren't returning the "humour" in the same way, a decent person would back off, not up the volume.

Re: » friendroll and toplinks - Wordpress plugins from Thornley Fallis | StartupNorth

Joseph Thornley — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 22:59:37 -0000

Hi Jevon,
I'm glad you like the concept. These are first releases. I hope that you'll provide us with your comments on how they work for you and how we can improve them.

Re: friendroll and toplinks - Wordpress plugins from Thornley Fallis

Joseph Thornley — Fri, 07 Mar 2008 22:59:37 -0000

Hi Jevon,
I'm glad you like the concept. These are first releases. I hope that you'll provide us with your comments on how they work for you and how we can improve them.

Re: It’s better than good, it’s Twitterific

mathewi — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 23:33:01 -0000

A fair point, Joe.

To be honest, I would have to say that my view of Twitter -- like my
view of blogs -- is that it's somewhere in that grey area between
marketing and conversation.

Do I want people to know about and read my new blog posts? Sure I do.
Do I want to have a conversation with them about those posts?
Definitely.

Like I said, my view continues to evolve. Thanks for the input.

Re: It’s better than good, it’s Twitterific

Joseph Thornley — Tue, 11 Dec 2007 22:52:45 -0000

Mathew, I personally view Twitter as a vehicle for conversation with the people whose ideas and blogs I find interesting. And this is reflected in the fact that I follow about 80% of the people who follow me.

This isn't a criticism, just an observation. The fact that you follow only 1 in 10 of the people who follow you suggests that you have a different view of Twitter. Combine that with the fact that you tweet about every one of your blog posts and it raises the question: Do you view it primarily as a promotional vehicle - another way to attract attention and promote traffic to your blog?

I'm not suggesting that there is anything wrong with that. But I think that if you look at the follower/following ratio, it's a quick giveaway of whether people see Twitter as conversation or marketing.

Just a thought. :-)

Re: Do blog comments still matter?

Joseph Thornley — Wed, 11 Jul 2007 01:37:35 -0000

Good post Mathew.

I'm stunned by the people who blog, but turn off trackbacks or comments. What is this medium about, if not the opportunity for anyone who reads your post to offer some reaction. That's what separates it from the guys who own the printing presses and deign to publish edited "Letters to the Editor."

I don't want to be snarky. But it seems to me that a good portion of the folks who push "trackbacks are dead/comments are dead" memes are the people who have large audiences. Maybe many of them have forgotten that social media is social because listening is as important as talking.

Re: Showdown: Facebook versus the Internet

Joseph Thornley — Tue, 19 Jun 2007 02:43:40 -0000

Mathew,
As I try to understand the relationship between Facebook and blogging, I come to the realization that SIMPLICITY is the operational factor.

Blogging made authorship simple.

Facebook makes connecting with friends simple.

They complement one another - until the next great development: the open platform that brings the ease of associating with the people you want to OUTSIDE of the closed community.

Just like Compuserve a generation ago...

Re: Great conversation at Third Tuesday

Joseph Thornley — Wed, 18 Oct 2006 12:33:10 -0000

Hi again Mathew,
I realized after the event that Grazr is in fact freezing only the version of FeedDemon that depends on IE7, not Firefox. Gotta love those folks from Microsoft!

Re: Great conversation at Third Tuesday

Joseph Thornley — Wed, 18 Oct 2006 11:14:36 -0000

Mathew,
The questions and reponse to you said to me that the PR community is determined to figure out how to operate within the new rules of blogging in order to develop a positive relationship from the outset. Bloggers and PR folks should have a mutually beneficial relationship - if we work to understand the needs of the bloggers. Your presentation provided us with great insight into this.
Thanks for joining us. You definitely contributed to making the Toronto communications community smarter.