Lets look at the positives first: it’s brilliant link trolling. With TechCrunch having covered both Paris Hilton and Big Foot this month, the onward march towards page views at all costs has now passed all sanity in a post that is a brilliant example of how saying something so insanely stupid can be good for business. Maybe I should have written the post, it’s that stupidly evil, but thankfully any mild level of mental retardation left me approximately 4 months ago Sept 5.

Now lets look at the absurdity of what Erick is suggesting: that the United States should introduce the bill of rights filled with every hippy loving loons idea of utopia: it’s the machine man, the machine! Alone some of what Schonfield suggests is responsible in terms of law: free use of purchased media and an expectation to privacy immediately come to mind, but in an age where we are still arguing the merits of a US CTO, what little chance do these goals have of ever being enshrined into a bill of rights? Lets see: rank of importance to the general population…statistically close to zero. Great geek topics, but ones that would never pass mustard in a bill of rights. Instead of rightly calling for some of these points to be better addressed in law, Schonfield takes the Moses parting the sea approach of grandiose delusion.

I’m even going so far as to suggest that Schonfields call is counter intuitive to the cause. The only hope we have of an improved approach is to sell these ideas through a moderate approach, not one of extremism. Still, good link bait Erick, you’ve finally sold your journalistic ethics out, so a 9.5 on the triple back flip from me.

See also Mark Rizzn Hopkins and Steve Hodson.

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The pitch can vary. I have the upmost respect for Andrew Baron for example, not because I like Rocketboom the show that much (it’s ok, but I’m not a regular viewer) but because he mastered the art of distribution in online video. Many may have arguably believed that Ze Frank was better, but Rocketboom had the viewers because Baron mastered the pitch to maximize Rocketboom’s presence on sites and services. In terms of a startup, the concept that you can do it all alone and PR is dead is verging on a joke. PR isn’t dead, it’s the greasy hand that spins the wheels of EVERY MAJOR BLOG ON THE PLANET. Besides, consider it logically: you’re writing for a large blog, you’re swamped with emails and calls, who are you going to pay attention to first, the PR rep you know who delivers you great stories in a format you can work with, or some guy you’ve never heard of who couldn’t write a decent pitch to save his life and is email 512 in your inbox for Monday. Now I’d note that I wouldn’t ignore your direct emails, but I have missed stories in the past based on a poor pitch. If you can’t sell your product, unless it’s the greatest invention of all time, it will never sell itself, at least initially.

Of course the flip side of the spin cycle is that those who truly master the pitch can be rewarded quickly along the way by targeted manipulation. Take for example the folks behind JustHackIt, a Slinkset hosted social voting site for hacking jobs, or as TechCrunch so delightfully described it “JustHackIt: It’s Like a Dating Site For Hackers.” In mastering the pitch, they’ve hunted extremely well. They targeted the author with zero real world experience, knowing that he was incapable of noticing basic things, like seeing the site had no Alexa rating then automatically checking the registration to notice that the site was less that 24 hours old! Better still, the URL resolves to a Slinkset sub-domain, so they’re not evening hosting the site themselves! The site is now for sale on Sitepoint, and you can guess the headline: “JustHackIt – Featured in TechCrunch.” This is proof that it’s all about pitch, where a site thrown together on a whim can get this sort of public attention where others who invest millions and years can’t get a post.

My advice to those working in the startup world, or even thinking of entering it: the moment you delude yourself into believing you don’t need to be pitching your product, you shouldn’t be involved in a startup. You have to sell the idea or product, and you have to do it well so that you’re product or site does stand out in a sea of competition.

(in part via Centernetworks)

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