Google announced this morning that they are going to provide limited commenting capability over at their news page – the limited part means limited to the subjects of the news, and or their agents. When I first read the “news, ” (no pun intended) which came via TechMeme in the form of these three stories….
Google News To Newsmakers: Send Us Your CommentsGoogle News Adds (Special) CommentsFreedom from the press: Google News lets newsmakers comment on stories…my first inclination was so what! I used to have Google News as my browser home page – then RSS came along. Google was late to party with respect to integrating feeds into their news page, and I’d since found other sources that sliced and diced things more to my fancy.
My second inclination was…damn, that is going to be a lot of work. Who is going to sort through all those comments, trying to figure out which are legitimate and which are coming from some public relations firm trying to do damage control? Mike Arrington (along with some others) had the same idea.
Then my third and final thought hit…this is going to be great fodder for bloggers! Just imagine a whole bunch of “interested parties” emailing Google with comments meant primarily to “correct” factually inauspicious information and/or debate the facts as presented. A whole lot of emails are going to come in attempting to “re-spin” every news item. Journalists themselves are likely candidates to join the fun.
Bloggers are going to pounce on this – they’ll be linking to scurrilous commentary like white on rice. Now, not only are the news folks themselves going to take heat – the subjects of the news (at least those that lack any sense of self-control) will too. As the de-facto editor-in-chief, Google should get used to ducking – it could get very ugly. For the bloggers’ sake, let’s hope there is no comment retraction function!
Rather than just rain on the parade with gross speculation that will likely wind up completely and utterly wrong, I’ll end with a suggestion for Google – call the guys at Intense Debate and let them help you with the implementation bit. I saw a presentation they did last night and was impressed. While they could use a little polish on the public speaking front, they explained their technology sufficiently and answered a few tough questions to boot. What really hit me, however, was their humbleness. They didn’t have all the answers, but certainly seemed enthusiastic enough to go find them. That I really liked.
Now if I could only be that way myself.
UPDATE: More from Mike Masnick, with some alternative thoughts.
UPDATE 2: And still more from the other Mike…on the crawling restrictions at Google News. That won’t stop people from linking (and berating), will it?
Fly Rod Warranties: Not Really Open for Discussion
A few weeks back an independent trade magazine for the fly-fishing industry, Angling Trade, published an editorial on fly rod warranties penned by the proprietor of a fly shop. The piece, which you can find via web search using the term “rod warranties anglingtrade”, does not merit linkage1. It is in my opinion muddled diatribe which attempts to foist blame for a struggling business model at the feet of fly rod manufacturers.
That editorial generated a significant amount of commentary, over several days, which as someone interested in the subject I monitored. Opinions were, at the outset, supportive. Then several more saavy consumers, as well as what appeared to be some “industry insiders”, chimed in and the comment thread turned negative. Some retailer/manufacturer economics were exposed; several customer-types even declared outright they simply would not buy a premium fly rod that didn’t have a lifetime warranty.
Uh oh. Disagreement. Discontent. Then the comments were gone. Deleted.
The manufacturer penchant for offering lifetime warranties on fly rods has long been a source of controversy. Some opine that separating warranties from the rods (or eliminating them altogether) would result in lower prices and therefore more sales. Others say that if fly rod warranties go away, so will the finer brands, as the high cost of getting that [inevitably] damaged rod repaired will drive purchasers down to the low-end “disposable” bracket of the market. I’ve yet to see a rigorous analysis, steeped in manufacturer cost structures and supply/demand curves, supporting either point of view. Certainly the above-referenced “editorial” didn’t come close.
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October 14, 2013 2 Comments