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I swear, it's like the universe is trying to turn me into the "Taseinator" or something, and they've hired Gruber to be my personal trainer. Once again, thanks to Daring Fireball for the targeting assistance.
Robert Scoble is having a full-blown "Where's my fucking latte, it's been 30 seconds", overprivileged yuppie larvae, princess two-step fit because his Macbook is kernel panicking on boot. He ran an upgrade, and now it's going nuts. Of course, this is not the real problem. Sure, kernel panics after upgrades suck ass, but there's a clear and reliable method for taking care of them. This isn't really about that. This bitchfit has nothing to do with his Macbook. Robert knows more geeks per square inch than anyone. He knows that all he has to do is get on Twitter and and say "OMG, MY MACBOOK IS SICK, HELP ME MAKE IT BETTER", and there will be a miles-long line of free support practically killing each other for the privilege of fixing the Scoblebook.
No, it is not computer problems that are the cause of Le Scoble's tears and chest-hitching dramatic proclamations. The cause is something far worse. It is something that is so awful, so wrong that I hesitate to mention it. Apple has committed the ultimate sin, taken the unmentionable action, done something so callous, so evil, so unbelievably wrong that I urge those of you with delicate constitutions to please, for the love of $DEITY$, find another site to read.
For those brave souls who rush in where angels fear to tread, for those Daniels who will brave the lion's den, for you, my gallant brigade, for you, there is only the horror of Apple's crime against humanity, nay against the very universe itself:
Quick man, can't you see it was too much for him? Fetch the smelling salts and my scotch. You, out of that chair, the lad needs to sit and recover his constitution!
That's right. Apple PR has gone and once again, refused to join the rest of the tech community in rimming Le Scoble. Hell, they won't even give him a kiss on the cheek. I know, it's such an improbable idea, that the mind beggars even to suggest it as a flight of fancy, but look, read Le Scoble's own words:
What’s ironic is lots of other computer companies would LOVE to give me free stuff (I don’t take it) but Apple is the only company that’s never raised a PR finger to help me. Instead I feel so honored to spend my money on this crap. Why? Just to have a shiny machine?I know how shocking this is to all of you. I myself was initially unable to read that paragraph without a terrible attack of the vapors.
Okay, enough, this level of sarcasm is starting to make my bowels cramp. Just how out of touch do you have to be to start acting like you have the right to special treatment. What level of entitlement do you have to possess to think this way? Make no mistake, that's what this is: the pouting of the biggest, most spoiled entitlement queen in the "blogosphere". This is what happens when you start thinking of yourself as better than everyone else. This great swollen ego is what happens when you start believing the sycophants who tell you that your shit really doesn't stink, and that anyone telling you different is just a "hater".
It's bullshit and it shows his moral posturing, (I don't take free stuff), to be utter hypocrisy. He's every bit as bad as those he infers lack trustability for the crime of taking free stuff. Sure, he doesn't take free stuff. But if you don't kiss Scobleizer ass, then you gets what you gets. Fight the bull, you get the horns. (insert inane "horns" hand gesture here)
Someone tell me how demanding that you be treated as better than everyone else is more moral than taking review copies of stuff? Because i'm not seeing it.
For the record, yeah, I get free stuff. I get a lot of it. I don't do a lot of reviews, not in the usual sense, but I get review copies of software on a regular basis. What I get more of are free copies of things I beta test. I'd rather do it the beta test way, because then the company gets my feedback in time to maybe fix some things. At least that's the theory. Besides, I prefer seeing a product get released and knowing that I had something to do with it. Or as George Marshall said:
There is no limit to the good you can do if you don't care who gets the credit.
But I never, for a minute, think I'm better than anyone else with a web site, or writing for a magazine. I'm not one tenth the writer that Gruber or Ihnatko are. I can't program to save my life compared to Dori Smith, Daniel Jalkut, or Michael Tsai. I've never come close to putting together a community the way Rob Griffiths has. No matter where you look on the Mac web, or the tech web, you will find better, smarter, more well-spoken people than me. If I have one advantage, it's that I can type fast, and read faster, and I'm a decent sysadmin.
Any time someone asks me to review software, or to write an article for their site, I feel privileged. I may hate the product, and the fact I got a free copy of a turd won't make it any less of a turd, but if I get that consideration, I feel lucky. I don't like asking for free stuff, it always feels so presumptuous.
The idea of pulling a Scoble, and calling a company out for not fellating my ego? Dear god, I hope I've never even come close, and if it ever appears that I have, then it was either unintentional, or the stupid made me do it, and I apologize.
I will say that if Apple is bound and determined to shit on Scoble's ego parade that way, then there's only option left for me:To buy as much Apple stuff as I can possibly afford.
Technorati Tags:
Blogosphere = Stupid, Crackheads, Robert Scoble, TEH STOOPUD, WTF?, Entitlement Queens, Le Scoble, Whining at the speed of light, Dumb is faster than light
Posted by John C. Welch at 19:59 | Permalink
Comments
Amen brother, can I get a witness? My only conundrum with Scoble is this; how can a person so self absorbed and full of hubris look like this?
Posted by: Patrick | November 17, 2007 8:35 PM
Surely, you must be exaggurating. Scoble probably was only mentioning Apple's PR practices in passing...
[clicks on link... reads Scoble's post...]
Oh crap. He WAS that bad.
Two kernel panics, and his next impulse isn't to boot from an install disk or a backup, but to lash out at Apple and, irrationally enough, its P.R. department.
Compare with Jeff Jarvis' infamous "Dell Hell" posts which was all about his experience with Dell's tech support and repair services.
(http://www.buzzmachine.com/archives/cat_dell.html)
Jeff talked about his experience from the perspective of a customer. He never played the "I'm a member of the press" card, or the "I'm an important blogger" card. He only played the "I paid for this extended service contract" card.
He still caught flack from some people who thought he was trying to get special treatment from them. Which why I was about to give Scoble the benefit of the doubt, until his own words removed all doubt.
Posted by: Shawn Levasseur | November 17, 2007 9:04 PM
That Scoble guy sure is amusing. Always good for getting himself in the 'news'.
And I'm sure that Apple would kiss whichever body parts he wanted kissed if he had something to offer for them. But I guess it's much more profitable for them to suck up to the 'journalists' writing for actual Journals.
Posted by: ssp | November 17, 2007 9:11 PM
John,
The bitter irony here is that Scoble is whining about not getting free stuff. He should have bought AppleCare, and presumably didn't. That gets you better treatment, although it doesn't guarantee anything. So does paying http://www.apple.com/support/products/payperincident.html for a support incident ($49 for a personal Mac, and calling through this channel should raise the response level, even if it is or should be covered through warranty -- but perhaps he has bad third-party RAM -- we don't know). PodTech.net could purchase an AppleCare Help Desk Support http://www.apple.com/support/products/helpdesk.html contract.
So Apple premium support isn't a tangible item that comes in a box (actually it comes on paper). Demanding that Apple give you premium support which you haven't paid for is, despite the denials, demanding free 'stuff'.
I want to know how immature it is for a "thought leader" blogger to resort to "Screw you. Screw you. Screw you." in the most public and visible way he can manage for a support issue. You say that under your breath, or you curse loudly at home. Broadcasting it on a blog is an attack, which was the idea of this whole post.
Here we go:
What’s ironic is lots of other computer companies would LOVE to give me free stuff (I don’t take it) but Apple is the only company that’s never raised a PR finger to help me. Instead I feel so honored to spend my money on this crap. Why? Just to have a shiny machine?
So he's not really complaining about Apple Support (the ones responsible for dealing with this problem), but about Apple PR, the ones responsible for keeping "important" people happy -- this syncs up with the public ranting, above.
Posted by: Chris Pepper | November 17, 2007 9:22 PM
Damn... well said.
Generally I take Scoble with a grain of salt, but his little fit really did get under my skin. How can someone who spends so much time around computers not know that whatever happens with his particular shit is in no way representative of the company/brand/people, etc?
He can't. He does know. And you nailed it on the head - he's whining to glorify himself and, ideally, to get Apple to kiss his ass some.
I think you really nailed the proper attitude to have regarding all this as well, and personally, I appreciate it. When I was doing this blogging thing marginally successfully I always felt the same way - and I think that's really the way to be. Nothing soils a person worse than an overwrought sense of entitlement...
Posted by: Gideon | November 17, 2007 9:32 PM
Even more sad irony: Scoble writes a lot of posts about having interviewed people whom he says are a lot smarter than he is. Likes to mention how much he learned from a particular interview.
I'd guess he's being very selective about what he retains. I'll also bet his hits are up. Mission accomplished?
Posted by: Maurice Kessler | November 18, 2007 12:57 AM
Maurice:
BINGO...Scoble plays the "I'm just a big doof", but it's all bullshit in the end. If you read his shit long enough, and I don't recommend it, you realize there's a very specific cycle to it. Slam apple, praise apple, kiss some blogger ass, whine about bloggers, and on a regular basis, you'll see him cry about "mean comments", and how he's not going to take it anymore.
He'll also use major personal events for SERIOUS hit fodder, like when his mom died, he said he was going to be offline to deal with it, then posted like a motherfucker, with a large amount of it being about the quality of Verizon EVDO cards. His post rate didn't fucking blip. Then, when some poor pr schmuck calls him, he REAMS them for not "OMG" reading his blog and realizing he was in the midst of a tragedy. When I pointed out that reading his blog would not have prevented this, since he was posting like a motherfucker all throughout it, oh.my.god, was I just the devil incarnate? Hell yeah.
Whatever. he's really nice in person, and if you can get him to stop being Le Scoble, and start being Robert, he's an interesting guy. But Le Scoble? Whiny bitch fucktard persona to the max.
But then again, his livelihood requires him to be in the public eye, or rather the "blogger eye" constantly, so he kind of has to set aside any consideration other than attracting attention to himself.
He'll probably be at macworld this year, and oh, won't that be fucking surreal.
Posted by: John C. Welch | November 18, 2007 1:13 AM
So if Apple has to give him free stuff every time he has a kernel panic, that means Microsoft must give him free stuff every time he gets the Blue Screen of Death. So the question in my mind is: why doesn't he own the world by now?
Posted by: Arvid | November 18, 2007 1:18 AM
John, thanks for adding some balance to yet another episode of Scoble's foolishness. And thanks for bringing some humility to the situation, something we see enough of in the blogosphere.
It would be fine if Robert comes to Macworld, but if Le Scoble, shows up, it won't be pretty...
Posted by: Al Willis | November 18, 2007 2:39 AM
"He should have bought AppleCare, and presumably didn't. That gets you better treatment, although it doesn't guarantee anything."
Mmm, now that sounds like a GREAT deal! So I pay several hundred pounds in order to MAYBE get some extra help on the whim of Apple... yeah, uh huh, I'll have some of that... :)
Chris, a word of advice: never become a salesman ;)
"Whatever. he's really nice in person, and if you can get him to stop being Le Scoble, and start being Robert, he's an interesting guy. But Le Scoble? Whiny bitch fucktard persona to the max."
Totally. I like Robert a lot, but sometimes it's like some EvulBlogger version takes over and... boom! Where, as you say, is my fucking latte.
Posted by: Ian Betteridge | November 18, 2007 3:10 AM
The idea of pulling a Scoble, and calling a company out for not fellating my ego? Dear god, I hope I've never even come close, and if it ever appears that I have, then it was either unintentional, or the stupid made me do it, and I apologize.
Never fear John. We've got your back on this one. If you ever stoop to this level, we'll be sure to keep you honest. Keep fighting the good fight. Batteries and moleskin are on the way.
Posted by: Jeff Berg | November 18, 2007 9:46 AM
Ian, yeah, that did show a rather odd view of what AppleCare is for. I *think* they meant ProCare, which does get you to the head of the line in the Apple Stores, etc, but is considerably cheaper than AppleCare, and not an extended warranty at all.
Jeff, I fixed your tags, (there's no BBCode, just html), and yeah, I figured that should I ever start pulling a Scoble, I'll have people buying plane tickets to come out and mock me relentlessly...and my wife will be leading the pack ;-)
Posted by: John C. Welch | November 18, 2007 10:05 AM
Although I agreee with most of what you have written, Apple does give out the marketing that the MAcIntosh is so much more reliable than the PC. Having worked in a company who had both, this is not true. They are as good or as bad as the other depending how you look at it.
John, good to see you have't lost any of your sarcasm.
Posted by: Jonathan Sutherland | November 18, 2007 3:42 PM
Jonathan...of COURSE they do, it's called "Marketing".
What, you expect them to say "Macintosh...even though we suck as much as anyone else, we're prettier"? The difference is, people with a clue understand it's hyperbole and blow it off. Scobleites insist it be the god's honest truth.
Posted by: John C. Welch | November 18, 2007 8:44 PM
Well, truth be told, many more near-illiterates than Scoble - or Scobleites (love the term) - think it to be true too.
Bottom line is that he had a pint which got lost in his hyperbole.... Leopard was released a couple of months too soon.
Enough Mac users are waiting to upgrade that it makes any honest "fanboy" (as opposed to "fanboi") cringe over those last 3 Mac v PC commercials Apple released last week.
Admit it John - those IN YOUR FACE ads that have "the PC" guy admitting he reverted to XP make you just a bit uncomfortable in light of how barely acceptable Leopard is today - 4 months later than the original release date.
That was Robert's _real_ point... until Le Scoble (love that term too) emerged.
Posted by: DaveD | November 18, 2007 9:54 PM
Dave, why would ads bother me? I don't personalize them, and honestly, unless it's coming from the Wii or my DVD player, the amount of television I watch can be measured in minutes per month.
Secondly, the "Mac OS X 10.5 was released a couple of months too soon" has been said about every release. Mac OS X 10.4 was unusable in my world until 10.4.3, Mac OS X 10.3.0 was odd, so was 10.2, 10.1 had a "HFS+ routines randomly truncate big files" bug, and so on, going back through every iteration of the Mac OS *ever*
I can say the same things about Vista, XP, Windows 2000, NT4, NT3.x, and so on.
You only get 'uncomfortable' over those ads if you take them as gospel. I don't, so I don't.
Actually, there's two features that make leopard a real bonus in my world, the fixes to mobile directory services, and the SNMP improvements. There's a few others, but those are the big ones. Our only reasons for waiting are some third party issues that are getting resolved by and by.
On 10.4.11, I've upgraded every Mac OS X 10.4 machine to it, no problems at all. But then, I'm a bit more sensible about upgrade planning than technophiles like Le Scoble.
Now, if we get into 200*9*, and people are still refusing, in huge numbers to upgrade, ala Vista today, that's more of an issue. But less than a month after the release? Please.
Posted by: John C. Welch | November 18, 2007 11:15 PM
Well penned, man!
I never comment... but you whipped yurself up a beauty of a retort. Thank you for penning a nice little balloon popper!
Posted by: Tommmy | November 20, 2007 8:39 PM
"If I have one advantage, it's that I can type fast, and read faster, and I'm a decent sysadmin."
That's three advantages. (Sorry, I had to.)
Posted by: pgl | November 21, 2007 4:44 AM
