Blog Schmog (Warning- Ignore this Post)

This blog post has nothing to do with Venture Capital, start ups or anything you are likely to care about; it's a book review.  It is long.  Skip to the next entry. You've been warned.

I'm up here at 37,000 feet bouncing my way to California, I've blown through this book and, yowsa, somebody's gotta do it..

The book in question is Blog Schmog by Robert W. Bly.  Billed as 'The truth about what blogs can and can't do for your business', you get treated to 233 pages of a direct marketing expert's view on blogging.

I'm writing this with no access to the Internet but Bob (may I call you Bob?) did a fairly good job of opening up with his story about how he wrote for a publication, expressing doubts about blogging which promptly got him drawn and quartered in the, surprise, blogging community.  He said to Google em, but I will take him at his word.

He cheerfully says:

"If you are a blogging evangelist or consultant, I guarantee you will hate this book."

Score one for Bob. He should have broadened this group to include breathing humans.

Much of this book is like having to sit through serious finger nails going up and down on the chalkboard. It really is that painful.

We don't even hit the numbered pages before we get things like this:

(Page XII) " To find out, I launched my own blog in November 2004. Within a matter of days, several blogging evangelists reported that my blog came close to setting a record number of 'posts' when it opened. (A post is a comment a reader places on the blog in response to a blog entry made by the owner)"

I thought a post was what I did and readers commented on my post. Who knew. Bob, I'm checking but I'm thinking I'm safe with what a post is. It was a "huh" moment when I read it.  Unfortunately, he says it a number of times in the book, right to the bitter/painful end.

Still hanging out in the Roman Numeral land, Bob says Blog Schmog will provide that unbiased report and answer many questions such as if blogging is a good ROI thing or a complete (utter was his word) waste of time.   Bob views his book as "unique among business blogging guides because most other blogging books are written by blogging consultants, enthusiasts, and evangelists."  Bob claims to be objective but says you are going to read a book "written from the point of view of a blogging skeptic and doubter."  Dunno. I thought being objective was to take no position, exam both sides of an issue and then report those results.  Seems to me, declaring oneself as a skeptic and viewing blogging as a fad (his word), puts a bit of a hurt on the ol word objective.

On to the good stuff.

Bob wrote an article for DM News which took a broad swipe at the blogging community and on page 2, we got a little taste:

"Most of the blogs I encounter are rambling, streams-of-consciousness musings about a particular topic of interest to the author, largely bereft of the kind of practical, pithy tips that e-zines, Web sites, and white papers offer."

and this tasty morsel:

"Most blogs seem to be the private idiosyncratic musings of an individual, without censure or editing of any kind.  And the result is like porridge: a gloppy mess, tasteless, and not very satisfying."

On page three there is the first of the many "I never read blogs" declarations.  Bob gives you the 101 version of what a blog is, quoting notable people like Deb Weil. If you know zero, there is some decent basics in here.  Bob talks about content pollution, noting that with 150,000 books published every year there is too much to read out there.  He worries that he and all you (us) bloggers are contributing to this pollution.  Bob, through his research (comments on a blog post!), Bob narrowed down the answer of why people read blogs to the somewhat obvious, i.e. unfiltered, a way to be heard, personal, etc.

Bob makes liberal use of quotes from folks that commented on his blog as well as emails written back and forth with more notably folks in the blogging community.  He complains most of us need an editor.  I dunno Bob, my english gets gooder over time, so I ain't sure I can agree with you on that one.

Then, on page 22, we are back to warming up the fingernails on the chalkboard. First, a couple of paragraphs on "Why I don't read blogs" (emphasis his).   He talks about the time sink, admits it is largely personal preference as to what you want to read, and then hit the reader with this post thing again.

"For me, the main turn off of blogs is the tremendous amount of time it would take for me to subscribe to, visit, read, and post on blogs of interest to me." (underline mine!)

Commenting, Bob, it's called commenting.

Then we hit the mother lode of huh??

"When you subscribe to a blog through an RSS feed, you are notified via e-mail every time the blog owner makes another post to the blog.  Do you really want to get an e-mail from me every time I jot down a new thought."

Remember, folks, Bob is holding himself up as objective and here to tell you the truth. He declared back a few pages he wasn't really going to get deep into the technical stuff, no no, just cursory geek stuff.  But, to be fair, never once in 233 pages did Bob claim he was going to be accurate.  Paging Dave Winer, Dave Winer to the accuracy ward, STAT.

And wrapping up page 23, Bob reminds he "simply doesn't have time to read blogs."

There are some good stats in the book. 56 percent of bloggers are female. 92 percent of bloggers are under the age of 30, 51 percent are teenagers.  A James Milne apparently wrote a doctoral thesis on blogging and Bob's coughing up all kinds of stats from Dr. (I would think by now) Milne. 

Bob doesn't like anonymous rock throwers, thinks people should pay for content, taking it is stealing and you should be punished.

Bob challenged the blog world to show him one company that was generating $400,000 from their blog (1% of the revenues a client of his more traditional direct marketing stuff was making). According to Bob, nobody responded to the challenge.

The broad swipes at bloggers were pretty amazing and fairly consistent through the book.  Bloggers, according to Bob, believe that online communications is all seeing, all knowing and all good. Period.  Off line stuff generally is old, bad, and not as good.  He continues to mix up the act of posting with commenting for a few chapters but I was getting used to it by now.

Bob disagreed with the notion people were telling him that if you aren't blogging, STFU, you don't know what you are talking about.  And, finally (mercifully) on page 35, Bob tells us that he going to do two things.  He was going to read blogs, "post comments" (!) on blogs, and start his own blog.  I thought that was three things but I'm a VC and we know I'm math challenged.

So, after one blog post, thoughtfully reprinted in the book, we now get treated to the swipes against The Cluetrain Manifesto.  Bob is going to "dismantle the silly Cluetrain notion of conversation later in this book."  Hint: He doesn't. In fact, much of this book is an attempt to explain how to engage people in a conversation which in many ways supports Doc Searl's book.

Throughout this book, Bob takes swipes at "blogging evangelists" and then goes on to declare rules.  His rule 3, for example is:

"Add a new post to your blog once or twice a week. Never go more than ten days without adding a new post."

Gee, let's go to the videotape.  I've been in the same place with Shel Israel, Jeremy Wright, Robert Scoble, Dave Winer and David Sifry, to name 6.  I said I was math challenged.  I've heard these blogging experts, writers, evangelists, all get asked the same question: How often do I post. And they all say the same thing: When you have something interesting and/or meaning to say.  I'll leave it to you to decide who is telling the truth, being objective, etc.

Bob shares his concern about so-called blogging consultants saying all businesses must have a blog and being single minded about blogging will cure all evils of businesses large and small.  Again, refer to the same group of people mentioned above.  They answer the should I start a blog question with "It depends" and then go on to explore the objectives, the reasons, etc.  Shel got asked this question in Europe, for example, and he answered the question with pretty much the same commentary Bob gives us in Chapter 2.  Bob says "It depends."  Bob then goes on to list all the business groups that might benefit with the why. Gee, just like Shel. And Scoble.

Back on page 57, Bob again decides that RSS sends you emails when blogs change. At least on the same page, he admits that the subject of RSS is "mostly above my head."  The next page goes on to try explaining RSS, signing up for feeds as well as explaining Bloglines as a place to sign up/read blogs. He mixes going to Yahoo! with My Yahoo!, but I'm not quibbling.

The mangling of Dave Winer's work goes on for a few pages but I'm assuming few, if anybody, will use this book as a guide to RSS.  The book is a bit out of date as Bob talks about the future of RSS being incorporated into browsers.  I'd take a swipe at the dead tree timing thing, Bob, but, well, there you go.

Bob quotes F. Scott Fitzgerald who said "The cleverly expressed opposite of any generally accepted idea is worth a fortune to somebody."  Bob basically outlines a plan to start your blogging with something controversial or contentious to get readers. Right.  We have a chunk of this book declaring people are churning out content pollution and then this part which basically is a guide to creating more of it.  Bob goes on to give clear guidance on you next 5 posts and why they are critical. Not 2 or 6, the exact number of 5. No, I don't know why 5, he doesn't explain it. But it was in bold print so it is important.

Somewhere into Chapter 7 or 8, Bob appears to have either started channeling other pro-bloggers or got bored and turned the book writing over to somebody else for a spell.  Bob has a whole chapter which raves about great blogs. In Chapter 8 Bob tells us about the blogs he likes. There is pleasure in reading topic blogs; his words.

Finally, we hit chapter 9 which is entitled How to Write, Read, Subscribe To, and Enjoy Blogs.  No, really.

From the opening paragraphs of the chapter:

"I have a confession to make: I don't like to read blogs. Oh, I read plenty of blogs - usually when they turn up in a Google search I am doing..."

"Yes, I have my own blog.  And I read all of the posts [comments, Bob, comments!] other people make to my blog."

As you can see, Bob is back and we've switched from the don't read blogs to don't like to read blogs.  Of course, most people looking for objective and truthful views on blogging will have likely dumped this book by now.  If you've been trapped on a plane, like me, you tough it out, hit this chapter and head for your own blog essentially to urge people to avoid this book as it simply isn't creditable.

The author did a great job of getting me to buy this thing. The title, the cover, words on the jacket, etc.  But it is a mangling of items like posts vs. comments, what RSS does/is, etc, combined with broad generalizations, and numerous contradictory statements ( I don't read/I read plenty) that put this book into the recycling bin when the flight attendants come through making their final safety checks.

The thumbs down logo on the front cover is exactly right.  This is a poor book with very sloppy editing, loose fact checking, and the like.

On the upside, Hugh MacLeod (gapingvoid.com) is on page 126 as "the manager of a high-quality tailoring company in the United Kingdom.."   Well done, Hugh. Even the blog skeptics love you.

Save your money and ask an Air Canada flight attendant to dumpster dive for my copy or a half eaten muffin with lipstick on it.  Both will get you the same results.

[Now on the ground]

I took a quick look for others who have already reviewed this book. I'm a bit late and most people liked it.

Craig Barnes, CEO of Attensa, wrote about it here. He was 1,000 feet higher then me. Funny.

Victor Wong, wrote about it here.

Terri Whalin, a friend of Bob's, an agent, writer, and editor is here. Scottsdate. Great town for golf and writing.

And another one here (Amanda Chapel) gives out the book of the month award to Bob.

Comments

[Jeremy Wright]

Bob wrote a book?!

Holy crap, talk about signal to noise issues, is the publishing industry just accepting anyone without any creds these days?!

Anyways, Bob's an interesting case. In fact, a fairly hypocritical case now that I think about it.

See, Bob wrote this series of brutal articles (effectively rehashing the same article for a half dozen publications). Basically saying blogs were totally useless and had no value whatsoever.

He'd never written a blog. Hell, never even read one at the time.

Anyways, I just love the delicious irony that he says blogs are useless, but then gets a book deal purely because of his blog ;-)

[Aaron Brazell]

The hilarious thing would be if he subscribes to a Google Alert on his name or, worse considering he never reads blogs or RSS, if he subscribes to a vanity search on his name, and shows up here to take you to task.

Classic. :)

[Nicole Simon]

*lol* At least it made for some amusing reading. Your post of course. ;)

[Jim Courtney]

Boy, were you ever desparate for time wasting doing such a thorough review on the plane! Too bad you hadn't taken a Canada -- European flight or you could have watched old (1960's vintage) James Bond movies currently being shown (as the 2nd movie) on Air Canada's transAtlantic flights instead of reading (and reviewing) this book.

But your sense of humo(u)r makes reading your post more interesting than reading the book. Now to look for that lipstick-infested 1/2-muffin; on second thought, I think I'll stop at Tim Horton's for a fresh one.

[Webomatica]

The ultimate irony is that I wish this book were in blog form instead, because then I'd be more likely to read it... and all the comments would be icing on the cake.

[Des Walsh]

I wonder at your perseverance. Thanks for a very entertaining post. Noting the comments about consultants and blogging I thought at first, hang on, that's a bit heavy, who is this guy? The name Bly rang a bell and a quick desktop search found lots of promos for him by others as a copywriter extraordinaire. Then I remembered, from some reading up on "copywriting" (btw, what's the difference between "copy" and "text"?) that one of the most effective "techniques" is apparently to set yourself apart from everyone else in a particular field, denounce them all as misled, ignorant, biased, incompetent or worse and thus give the readers the impression that they must read what you have to say so that they get the truth.

Last time I called someone on that technique - denouncing the blogging evangelists and presenting themselves as the true experts - the response was, in so many words, oh, but of course I didn't mean you.

You've got to laugh or you'd cry :)

[Douglas Karr]

I suppose democratization of the web also has some disadvantages. What really irks me about this is that the guy somehow got a book deal out of it. Wow.

Thanks! This was both funny and very, very sad.

[Douglas Karr]

I'd encourage you to enter an Amazon Product Review on this book. So far the author has 3 reviews with 5 out of 5 stars.

[Bobby Foley]

Thank you very much for the review, in essence being my Ze Frank and reading so I don't have to.

I thought your post (comment?) was interesting and arguments did provide some mirth, but I think the most eye-catching tidbit came from Victor Wong's post, in which he claimed that Bly differed from the MSM for lack of their "agenda of public self-exaltation". Though, comically enough, it would seem as though that statement were very untrue, indeed.

But then, I must presume that being merely a humble blogger myself - topics and content free and unarranged and scattered to the winds of the Interblags - I would have little actual insight. Falling into such an unsavoury category such as I do, I'm going to go and hang my head in shame, all the while devising a new direction and mission for my thoughts and articles.

To think I've been wasting not only my own time, but the time of every individual not in a library (or on a plane) unplugging and indulging in literary wonders, plots and complexities far beyond imagination. My eyes are now open... what a truly ugly world mine is. Praise the day a copywriter came along and opened my eyes.

[Tom Collins]

I'm humbled by your perseverance in reading the whole thing and even more by your detailed review of the many inaccuracies, inconsistencies, and displays of Bob's ignorance of blogging terminology and tools (I use the word ignorance in its precise meaning: uninstructed, unlearned, unaware, uninformed).

I got stuck on the ROI issue and his inability/unwillingness to compare be business benefits of blogging to anything other than his own field of direct marketing campaigns (labeling his condition "Blyopia"). Bob did visit and leave a "post" quoting Lord Kelvin, so here's the permalink if anyone's interested:
http://www.businessbloggingbootcamp.com/2006/11/is_blyopia_cont.html

Then again, we got the book as a free review copy, so I didn't feel such a need to try to recover an "investment"! I'm betting your "return" was in the fun you obviously had with your wonderfully amusing post. Thanks!

[Yvonne DiVita]

Well... I think Bob got what he wanted. People to buy his book. And, I think it bears noting that many, many non-bloggers and legions of the uninformed, believe that blogs are bringing the end of civilization as we know it. Maybe they're right. I don't know. I'm an avid blogger. I make good money using a blog (not from the blog, but from what I do with the blog), and while I think Bob Bly is a poor blogger - I also think he knew exactly what he was doing when he wrote Blog Smog. We're all just playing into his hands.

p.s. he doesn't care how much you hate him or trash his book. he'll just write another.