This is what happens when people with limited intellect-hence, the vocabulary-acquire notoriety and, all of a sudden, think their opinion on everything is relevant, acurate and actually matters.

What I find incredible is that Scoble thinks he sits on some moral high ground even after admitting that he accepted several thousand dollars from Cisco to cover one of their product launches — giving them full editorial control over his content.

More info on that here: http://tinyurl.com/djw4qs

So should we really be surprised that he prefers to be “wined and dined?”

Mr. Scoble and the other tech types who think they know what PR takes have a limited understanding of the practice. What I find ironic is that the type of PR he is advocating (people he knows, talking to him at dinner) is nothing but a kissing cousin to that most maligned of professions: lobbying. Seriously, his understanding of PR is akin to someone saying they understand the medical profession because they watch ER and Grey’s Anatomy.

This is the danger of the Internet and blogging–making celebrities out of people who used to be just the loud but kinda interesting guy at the block party. Only now he’s everywhere, and has such an exaggerated sense of importance he thinks his Thoughts Matter.

This is not to say that there aren’t a lot of bad, awful, pitches out there. This happens when clients get hung up on numbers (How hard are you guys working on my account? Why, sir, we sent 2,000 pitches yesterday alone! Ah, great!) and PR firms so intent on pleasing a client they forget they should act as counsel too, and push back (and say no) when necessary.

Lots more to say, but I’ve got to get back to the tasks at hand…great post Mark, and great comments Jason & David.

Jen

I have to chuckle every time I see someone declaring something “dead” – that’s usually when the thing takes off. But if I were Mr. Scoble – and let me stress I think he deserves credit for his entrepreneurship and his outspoken nature – I’d want to make sure I don’t confuse my personal preferences and experiences about receiving communication with what’s appropriate for others and what’s “dead.” Say “anyone who pitches ME on email is stupid,” not “anyone who pitches YOU on email is stupid.

Or perhaps he doesn’t realize there are about a billion people on this planet who have email but aren’t on Facebook, Twitter, or some other thing like that.

Mark (and Jason), you know as well as anyone that the social media tools we all use can make you look more popular than you really are. The Tech marketing/PR crowd tends to be a somewhat fawning bunch, creating celebrities out of essentially thin air. It’s also remarkably isolated. I have to believe Scoble knows who thinks he’s a tech demigod and who has never heard of him, and the relative size of each group.

I’m coming to realize there’s something worse than believing you’re a big deal by reading your press clippings – it’s believing you’re a big deal by looking at the number of followers you have on twitter. I’m not saying that’s where Scoble is, but comments like that don’t exactly convince me otherwise.