Being An MIT Dropout Doesn’t Save Boutin From Being An Idiot

The word has come down from the mount folks. Courtesy of people like Jason Calacanis and Robert Scoble who have in the words of his eminence of verbal buffoonery Paul Boutin shown that blogging has become the last refuge of cut rate journalists, underground marketing. For Calacanis blogs have become too impersonal which is why he switched to an email newsletter limited to 750+ people but gets posted immediately to 1,000’s of blogs verbatim = clever marketing that. Then there’s Robert Scoble who seems to be more of a megaphone these days rather than a blogger - but then what is a blogger anyway?

According to the incredible wisdom of Boutin it is something that is so 2004 and has been replaced by better things like Facebook, Twitter and other such intellectually stimulating forms of idea sharing. Of course we would never see any marketing taking place on the hallowed ground of Facebook, especially in the “Pepsi Lovers Kill the Coke Lovers” group. Or how about the purity of Twitter were we would never get 140 character invitations to see some pretty girl’s pictures she took just for you. No, it is only on blogs now where you are forced to read such lowbrow dribble of people like Michael Geist breakdown the workings of copyright law in Canada, or fall asleep reading Chris Brogan help us understand the ins and out of what social media is really about. Yup blogging is so much a waste of our time as compared to being poked on Facebook or trying to figure out who said what to whom on Twitter.

But poor litle Paul Boutin only seems to think that blogging has become the territory of the haters of the world who regularily invade these old and tired blogs

That said, your blog will still draw the Net’s lowest form of life: The insult commenter. Pour your heart out in a post, and some anonymous troll named r0rschach or foohack is sure to scribble beneath it, “Lame. Why don’t you just suck McCain’s ass.” That’s why Calacanis has retreated to a private mailing list. He can talk to his fans directly, without having to suffer idiotic retorts from anonymous Jason-haters.

Give me a break - Calacanis retreated to a mailing list because it caused a buzz on the web and he knew well enough that there were enough people out there who hung off of every word he dribbled forth, that each and every issue would get posted and reap him far better Google juice than just him typing on his own blog. The funny thing is that this tiresome tirade is coming from the same slash and burn blogger that ValleyWag loved having on its payroll just because of those very comment trolls - talk about being facetious. This is the same blogger who perfected the one paragraph guillotine post and he talks about blogging as being tired and old. Maybe it’s the other way around - maybe Boutin is just getting tired and old.

As Mathew Ingram wrote today on this

I’m hoping that Boutin’s post took about the same amount of time as it did to come up with that Twitter message, because it has about as much value. Is everyone going to have a blog? No — and they never were. Facebook and Twitter are probably enough for many people. Not writing at all is enough for many people. But why does it have to be all or nothing? What we have now is the option to micro-blog (i.e., Twitter) some thoughts, post others to Facebook, share things on FriendFeed or through Google Reader, and blog things that take longer to think through.

Yup maybe that’s it - Boutin has spent so many years writing slash and burn type posts that he has forgotten what it takes to write anything of substances because if this post on Wired is any example he still hasn’t figured out what substantive writing is all about. Like Douglas Karr pointed out there is a little something about writing good blog posts that seem to have slipped by Boutin in his rush to eulogize blogging - something called supporting data

I read the essay and was not only unimpressed, I was disappointed in Wired for even accepting this drivel as plausible. It really bothers me that someone would take their bully pulpit and write an essay - with no supporting data.

My hope is that Boutin and people like him who have either lost; or maybe never had, the whole idea of what blogging is all about keep heading off to Twitter land because in the end we won’t miss them. As said by Chris Crum over at Pure Blogging

…. Blogs are not obsolete. You know why? Because I still read them everyday. I still write for them nearly everyday. And so do countless others (that probably includes you). If you ask me, blogs are more relevant than they’ve ever been, because they are more mainstream than they have ever been. 

Good bye Boutin and do us all a favour don’t let the door hit your ass on your way out.