Just when we thought the mainstream media had finally gotten over its blog bashing and had joined the blogging party, Forbes has bucked the trend and lauched an unprecedented attack against the blogosphere with a cover story titled “Attack of the Blogs.”
In it, writer Daniel Lyons sinks to the bottom of the journalistic gene pool with gross generalisations labelled against all bloggers.
He starts with this paragraph, unsupported and alone.
“Web logs are the prized platform of an online lynch mob spouting liberty but spewing lies, libel and invective. Their potent allies in this pursuit include Google and Yahoo.”
He then goes on to site a few examples of rouge individuals and some cases where bloggers have bought to account politicians and journalists.
As for accuracy, he cant even get his figures right: Myspace in the largest blog host in the United States, followed by Xanga, not Blogger and SixApart.
Those interested can view the story here. Use login/password “forbesdontbug” to read.
What is also disturbing is that it seems Intelliseek, the firm behind the Blogpulse service is also getting into the attack with this quote from Peter Blackshaw, chief marketing officer:
“Bloggers are more of a threat than people realize, and they are only going to get more toxic. This is the new reality”
I’ll leave the last word to Steve Rubel, who was also the source for this post:
“Instead of telling us about both opportunities and threats, [the article] paint the blogosphere as the Wicked Witch of the West..My message to Corporate America is simple. Don’t listen to Forbes. Take a look around the blogosphere for yourself and you will find real humans – good, bad and ugly. What do you know? It’s just like in the meatspace (real world).”
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