DISQUS

thanks guys!

Robert,

My goal isn't to be discussed more. It's to launch ideas and to make a difference. Other people are doing a great job of spreading those ideas into media that they enjoy and I think that's fabulous.

As Gregory pointed out, I'm in no need of more dissing.

Some people are very good at short and quick bits of feedback and interaction with small groups of people. I find I do better when I'm a little longer and a little slower. And some of my colleagues need a month or a year between bursts. Different strokes.

You should be flattered by the people who want you to write more. We miss your bold leadership--leaps, not just increments.

Sorry I made you angry!

It's not the marketers who don't get it as much as the CEO and the board and the investors. They're the ones who insist on big and boring, and on not changing what they do.

"How much more" logic is what gets you a $4,000 barbeque, Chris.

The fanfare was ego, nothing but ego. The shareholders should be annoyed.

Raw produce!

thanks for the shout out. I'm blushing.

Thanks for being there, and thanks for the great review!

can't wait!

Thanks for writing this up. I appreciate it.

The only thing I want to take issue with is one of intent. I know people continue to find this difficult to believe, but I'm not trying to hype the book and I'm actually not trying to sell the book. I'm trying to get people to read it and talk about it, and that's a different posture.

I think that when you set out to hype something, you're manipulating a system. Movie PR people hype their movies, because they know that next month, they'll have a new movie coming. That's what they do...

In my case, the only reason to write a book (instead of just blogging) is that I want to make something easy to share. Authors that are in the hype business almost always fail, because there just isn't enough money in books to justify the hassle.

In my case, I'm really lucky that I've found a group of people who enjoy what I have to say, and more important, want to do something about it.

Seth Godins last blog post..Do you know about twitter search?

Layoffs are like surgery. It's hard to imagine doing one without an emergency.

If you've got people who are underperforming, who aren't as good as you hoped and who you can't lead to better output, then you should fire them, not lay them off.

If you have great people, amazing people with vision, and you have venture money designed to help you grow, how dare you lay them off. Isn't that what the money was for? And when better to grow then right now, when everyone else is getting quiet and selfish?

I've been through a lot of ups and downs over 25 years and never once did a lay off. To do it with millions in the bank is a true shame.

Great post, Chris.

I know I've written a good post when readers send me thoughtful email! I don't know what I'd do if I got as many emails as you get comments, though.

Thanks for reading, and for such kind words.

In the meantime, at least my blog is free.

Great point.

I think this is going to cause enormous disruption and dislocation. I'm not lobbying for it, just predicting it.

It's up to us to make it worthwhile, not dangerous.

I'm guilty of being way behind on approving friend requests, but if it was the real me (I don't know which eric you mean), it was only because someone had friended me first!

Thanks for reading, Tony. I really appreciate it!

Seth

¡Gracias!

Thanks for reading my blog, and I'm so sorry that you completely misinterpreted my post. Of course, it's your right to read it any way you choose, but that's not the way I wrote it.

I've read just about all of Fisher, and I relish books like Think Like a Chef or Paul Bertolli's Cooking By Hand. But those aren't "cookbooks." They are books about cooking.

My distinction is that there are plenty of fields with 'cookbooks' in them, but business books tend to go the other direction. I wasn't saying one was better than the other, merely that reading for recipes isn't particularly productive when it comes to business.

Thanks for reading my blog, and I'm so sorry that you completely misinterpreted my post. Of course, it's your right to read it any way you choose, but that's not the way I wrote it.

I've read just about all of Fisher, and I relish books like Think Like a Chef or Paul Bertolli's Cooking By Hand. But those aren't "cookbooks." They are books about cooking.

My distinction is that there are plenty of fields with 'cookbooks' in them, but business books tend to go the other direction. I wasn't saying one was better than the other, merely that reading for recipes isn't particularly productive when it comes to business.

I'm in the minority here, Chris.

He sent me precisely the same note. It's spam.

Spam because I don't like pitches, spam because I didn't ask for it and spam because even though he wrote it nicely, when 1,000 other PR "professionals" do the same thing, I'm toast.

It's simple... manners are nice, but spam is not. It wasn't anticipated, personal or relevant, at least not to me.

Hi Derrick
If you drop me a note, I'll try to get you into our virtual internship program.

Wow. Thanks for such an incredible review. It's really appreciated.

Seth

Paul,

Comments are always a bad place to have a thoughtful discussion, as it's too easy to read things into posts that aren't there. But here's my best shot.

My definition of spam comes from this page:
http://www.google.com/search?q=define%3A+spam&a...
I see dozens and dozens of people who agree with me and not one that takes the definition you're using to accuse us with.

Every single commercial page on the Internet has ads on it. Web ads aren't spam. Irrelevant ads are a waste of time. They don't work very well. Adwords, on the other hand, work really well because they're relevant.

The affiliate links on Squidoo have never been called spam before, and that's because they're not. If someone is reading about an author and there's a link to buy her book on Amazon, even the strictest critic wouldn't call that spam.

Sure, there are matters of degree here. I apologize if I'm overreacting, but fighting spam has been a bit of a religion for me for a decade or so.

Hi Paul.

Where's the spam? Randy built a page about Jessica Alba. It's good. If you want to build a better page, you can, and then Randy's page won't be found in the first level of search.

On his good page he points to auctions of stuff about Alba. Why wouldn't someone reading all this other stuff about her want to see the auctions?

Spam is the act of sending unsolicited, impersonal, irrelevant ads to people via some sort of interruption, like a phone call or an email. This isn't spam.

Randy has put a lot of effort into this and other lenses, and people like them.

If he starts emailing his lens to people who don't ask for it, we'll shut him down. But right now, where's the spam?

You have my apologies, Benjamin. I certainly didn't mean my piece to be interpreted the way you did (thousands seemed to get my point). I find the tragedy of the abused worker to be one of the greatest sins of our time. My point was that only recently, people have had the opportunity to build a different job for themselves--if they were willing to take a different sort of risk.

So, if I appeared callous, I'm sorry.

Here's my take on the issue.

http://www.squidoo.com/blog/?p=158