It's not Social Media - it's SPAM.

@JPTrenn and @ckieff have been having this great discussion about flogging and astroturfing. According to a focus group (of one) the decision was reached that we shouldn't be upset because it's just advertising or marketing (depending on if you choose JP's or Chris' side of the argument).

From there Chris arrived at the conclusion that because we - the digerati - are purists about our social media - we get offended at these marketers and advertisers but really we need to just get acclimated and learn how to recognize them. All (including the first part of the argument) to which I say

BOLDERDASH!

What a steaming pile of spare parts that is! (of course, I don't mean that in a *bad* way*) And to think, they almost had me taken in too. HA!

So, why are they wrong? What is the fatal premise? Simple. It's the premise that these floggers are advertisements. They are not, they are SPAM.

I know, you may be saying that I'm a purist so I don't want these marketing and advertising type people on. WRONG. I know a LOT of people on twitter that are on there *AS* their brand. I'm grateful for it, I appreciate their contribution. Yes, everything they say comes through a filter - which is OK because in reality we have a filter on everything that everyone says to us anyway.

BUT these floggers, these so called advertisers are not those things. They are simply SPAM. I've already decoded which accounts these people have. There are several tells that give it away. And for those lucky people that make the mistake of following me - I block them. I know - I'm a cold hearted SOB ain't I? I mean, I'm blocking these people even though they're just trying to make a living right? They're just trying to drive traffic to their site in hope of getting sales, or ad-clicks or whatever. You can't blame them, they're just trying to make a digital buck!

WRONG people. WRONG! They're spammers! And in fact they are such annoying damn spammers that I think they have as a group done something that Seth Godin never anticipated - they abused his permission marketing platform so thoroughly they've have permanently associated his Squiddo brand with SPAM in my mind. Way to go!

Wait though. I've made an assertion and I've ranted about it, but I haven't provided the reason *why* I think these people are spammers. And the answer is... Because they are NOT permission marketing, because they certainly are not part of the social media discussion. What they are is a bunch of accounts that do nothing but follow thousands of people in the hope that the people who follow the link back to their page to see who they are will click on their sole tweet to whatever their product is. Sure, some people create a feed to their twitter page that tweet every link they put up on their sites creating a mini link-farm. Again, they follow thousands of people (with next to no followers) and they only thing they're doing by following you is hoping that you'll click on their link.

THAT boys and girls is spam. Mass quantities of unwilling participants being hit with a message that they do NOT want. Bingo! We have Bingo!

So, with respect to my friends JP and Chris, it's not advertising or marketing. I *don't* need to get used to it. I need to block as many of these annoying twits (and I don't mean that in a twitter sense) as possible, not give them access to have my content draw people to their streams, and hopefully have them shrivel up and die as soon as possible (was that harsh?).

Hey, I may be The Most Enthusiastic Person on Earth (tm) but that doesn't mean that I have to allow these booger-heads to waste my time with their spam. I am however looking forward with great enthusiasm and delight to the solution of being rid of them while other people with brand integrity continue to tweet, blog, ping, plurk, pownce and friendfeed about their services and create the village square of the internet.

Yahoo! I can fit into my shirt

Yes, I know I promised pictures (and I have them), and I even threatened to start a new blog for this (and I haven't), but I figured I do an update (for both of you that are reading this...)

Good news! I've lost around 6-7 lbs and my waist is down to 39" (don't ask me why I fit in size 34 pants - but I do - and no, they're not all under my belly. Anyway, it's awesome and I'm making good progress. The most fun is the fact that I can fit into a couple of shirts that I got at Christmas and now the buttons don't pull across my tummy! Yippee!!!

I'll keep more coming.

Ann Coulter and the Hypocricy of the Media

Listen, I'm not going to say that what Ann Coulter said was polite. It wasn't. And I'm not going to say that I haven't called someone a faggot in my lifetime because it ain't true (for it to be so, you'd have to delete my four years of high school at an all boys school where you called people a douche-bag, faggot or slooon (fat whale) at least half the time) and to say so would be a lie.

Here's a link to the video at CNN

What I am going to say it that the media in general is composed of a bunch of hypocrites. These people say the politically correct thing in front of the camera and they're just as bad as anyone else when they are off the air (camera or mic) as anyone else is. Just look at all the crap they gave President Bush I when he called someone a "chicken-shit" at a time he didn't think the mics were on. Like NO ONE in the media has called someone a chicken-shit or anything else - probably worse - when they were off mic, right?

Again, it wasn't polite. It certainly wasn't PC. But it isn't something that people don't do on a regular basis. To blow it up like this is ridiculous. Ironically enough, I think that the perfect result is coming of it too - the target of the remark John Edwards (whom nobody thinks is a homosexual to the best of my knowledge) is making political hay and campaign $$ out of the whole thing. So, main stream media - stop making believe that your undies are all clean and let's be honest about this. You're just as bad as Coulter, you just don't want to admit it.