Self:

An Email to RW/W

May 25, 2008 by Kyle Brady
Tags: Annoying, Email, Opinion, R/WW
As required by the FTC, a Full Disclosure is available - this piece adheres to the Code of Ethics

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I just fired off an email to RW/W about a certain problem I've noticed... and, well, I'll let the email speak for itself:

I've mentioned that I prefer RW/W over alot of the other competitive blogs because of the more thoughtful posts/articles, and diversity of content (comparatively).  So I feel obligated to share this with you:

I removed TechCrunch from my Google Reader list a few months ago, for two main reasons:

• I have a personal dislike of Mike Arrington, how he runs his operations, and the manner in which he conducts himself on a professional level.


• TechCrunch has a tendency to promote only things that Mike has personal investments in, what Mike is in love with at the moment, or repeat things that are already getting massive (and most times unwarranted) coverage.

The second point is why I email you:  I've noticed in the last week or two that RW/W is (to my eyes) degrading.  I *cannot* open up Google Reader without seeing a mention of FriendFeed and it's "wonderfulness" at least 5 times across my whole feed subscriptions, but RW/W is covering it often.  Too often.  Yes, they released some new feature called "rooms"... but does that deserve a huge writeup?  How they might take over Twitter?  What's next, how FriendFeed is the future of the world?

I don't mean to belabor my point, but even in non-FriendFeed writeups, it still gets mentioned, and many times unnecessarily.

This is very annoying to me.  I understand I have a small bias, but it still brings up a question of journalistic integrity when something is repeatedly covered just because everyone else is talking about it.  You don't see the NYT covering Apple and their world-takeover attempts every day... why should a blog?  It's not just a problem at RW/W, but it's a problem with the legitimacy of the journalistic blogging world, and I'd hate to see RW/W suffer for it.

And, keep in mind, I'm a fan... I'd hate to think what newcomers or "haters" think.

[Disclosure:  I'll be posting this on my blog (http://www.kyle-brady.com) and I am part of OneSwirl, a semi-competitor to FriendFeed]

Self posts are about me (Kyle Brady), in one form or another.
Kyle can be found on Twitter and MySpace, or reached via email.