very interesting. but sadly you're proving your point with this blog. i just read two older articles on here and both have broken pictures.

In previous times, one could attribute the slowness with which great ideas formed and then disseminated to the media available to them at the time. Now we have instant media, we want instant identification, acclamation and propagation. Yet this media is too effective – too fast and too free – so good stuff is lost in the noise. Yesterday’s gold nuggets are buried in today’s sediment.

Your frustrations are well articulated, and I can see now that I share them. In particular, the relentless emphasis on the “now” versus the “five minutes ago” implicit to the blogging platform needs analysis.

There are several interesting aspects of this MarCom Professional network that are relevant to this topic, and I’ll finish this comment by listing them…

1. The network is populated by real people, not displaynames. That means real people have to live with their posts and comments, and so are therefore more likely to think a bit more before putting fingers to keys.

2. The network is actually a bliki; a hybrid of a blog and a wiki. This enables collaboration on posts / content / points of view, with a sub-community of your choice if you like, and therefore does what you intend to “fudge” on Blogger.

3. As the network continues to grow, I don’t see why MarCom Professional shouldn’t be able to use other non-time metrics for presenting content to members based on things like the degree of collaboration, the number of referring links and pageviews (either originating from within the network and from search engine results), the topic and the authority of the author… although don’t ask me for an algorithm for this one!

You make some really good points. There’s a lot of clutter in online coversations. It just reminds me of how we have to sort through all of the noise with marketing in general, whether it’s online or offline (the web is no different). Regarding the point about asking someone how they are and then answering great no matter what they say…what a shame that people are like this by nature. Conversations online are the best opportunity to really listen, focus and act appropriately. I think what you are saying is really valuable and I will point many of my colleagues to read this blog post. Thanks for always offering honest and candid views.

This is a struggle for me and I take your article as a challenge. Wonderful work!

Blogging and social media are a lot like that: just because a post is written at a single point in time doesn’t preclude it (1) from being a touchstone (a la The Cure’s “Boys Don’t Cry” (2) from being a pertinent voice in the conversation, 11 years later (a la Radiohead’s “OK Computer”). Think about it.