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Rahsheen ™, Coach Rah

I liked it, so I finally put a ring on it. - http://pikchur.com/Fz2

August 23 - Comment - Like - Share

Paul, Renchin(Reina), Victor Ganata and 139 other people liked this

Congratulations!! (if I am interpreting this correctly) - joey

72 more comments

Yeah. LOL. I just made it official, like in the Thriller video...except that I didn't turn into a werewolf and chase her through the woods.... - Rahsheen ™, Coach Rah

Congrats!! - Chrimmus Tad

Congratulations Sheen. - Tsega Dinka

congrats - MiniMage TKDteacher of FF

Congratulations to you both! - WorldofHiglet

Congrats!!! - RAPatton from iPhone

Very good, my dear Rah! - Derrick

Super wonderful congrats to you both!!1 - Helen Sventitsky

Congrats, Rah! - Pete Delucchi

Congrats to both of you, Rah! - ha3rvey (Ho)^3

Congratulations! - Spidra Webster

Congratulations!!! - Michael Fidler

Congratulations, Rah! - Micah Wittman

Congrats Rahsheen! - Hutch Carpenter

Congrats to both of you! - Jandy, ConcertMaven of FF

Way to go Rah! Congratulations! - Steve

Nice work. - Louis Gray

Awesome... don't know her from Eve... But from what I've gleaned from you online. She's got a good guy. Congrats! - SAM

Congrats! - imabonehead

congrats then :) - webosapien (Burcu Tüzün)

Congratulations man :) - LANjackal

Congratulations, Rah! :-D - Kol Tregaskes

Congratulations! - Anne Bouey

Congratulations! ^__^ - अभिषेक(Abhishek) Das

"it" ? ;) Congratulations though ! - Thomas Bøhm

*wonders if he should put on leotards, a metallic hand and run up the wall...* Congrats man! - Johnny Worthington

Congrats man!!! - Marco(aureliusmaximus)

Congratulations!! :) - Emma

Congrats! - Laura wishes you peace.

ویدا بیا برات حلقه ازدواج خریده دوستت :)) - Mil∂d

congratulations to you and, um, "it" ;) - Call me Bronco

Congrats! - jbrotherlove

Congratulations, dude! - Daniel B. Honigman

Woohoo! Congratulations! - Ladybug Heather

Congratulations !!! - Eric Logan

yay! - esther ♥ ♫

Congrats! - Shevonne

Congratulations! :) - JA Castillo

Congrats. :) - Kevin Winn

Congrats! - MASTER OF THE OBVIOUS

میلاد :)))))))))))) انگشترش رو دوست نداشتم نامزدی رو به هم زدم :دی - Viva Vida

Oh that's awesome!! Congrats! - Nurse Katie

Congrats! - anna sauce

buahahaa!! you stoopid. - Baroness Von SmashAHomie

Yay! Congratulations!! - Yolanda

Congrats, happy for you Rahsheen!!! - YoYo_P

Congrats, Rahsheen!!! - Live4Emma (L4S) from iPhone

Congrats :) - Rodfather

Not fair that the lady gets to wear a fancy ring before we even do the church thing. What's the point of being engaged if you can't flaunt it? LOL. Thanks everyone :) - Rahsheen ™, Coach Rah

Woot! Congrats. :) - Jen (SquirrelGirl) from iPhone

Congrats! That's fantastic news...! - sean808080

Congratulations! Welcome to the ranks of those of us promised and intended to the love of our lives =) Aloha! - Arleen Anderson

woohoo! congrats! - Leslie Poston

Congrats, Young Sheen! - Bryan R. Adams

CONGRATULATIONS!!!! :) - Susan Beebe

congrats and good luck! :) - Tim Hoeck

Alright, Rah! Happiest best wishes to you both! - Ayşe E.

Congrats! - xero

Congratulations, Rahsheen and Trail! - Admiral Anika

Congrats Rah! - Justin Korn

woooooo hooooo! - metalerik

CONGRATS MAN! - Merry Xmas FFeeders - AJ

So very nice. Congratulations! - Martha

Hey, I just now saw this! Congrats to both!!! - MVB (Grinch of FF)

Congrats! - Nicholas James

Congratulations!! - Erica Thompson Briggs

CONGRATS!!! - David Cook

Congratulations!! - Harold

Congratulations, Rahsheen! I had a similar thought for Harold when he gave me my ring: "Gee, kind of unfair the guy doesn't get to wear something too until the wedding." - Kamilah Gill

Congratulations! - Tracy Benham

Way to go... May you have a wonderful life together. - Mitchell Tsai

bump. - Rahsheen ™, Coach Rah

bump^2 - imabonehead

Jesse Stay

So my wife gets lists before I do. We know whose account will get used as my test account now :-)

Screen shot 2009-10-29 at 12.37.24 AM.png

October 28 - Comment - Like - Share

Geert CONARD, Hutch Carpenter, Susan Beebe and 15 other people liked this

What's funny is I have 6 accounts of my own and she gets the lists. - Jesse Stay

15 more comments

You are blacklisted. - Louis Gray

I guess so. Time to change Twitter identities? - Jesse Stay

Seriously, Louis? - Rahsheen ™, Coach Rah

I thought everybody got lists yesterday. I did. So what was the selection criteria do you suppose? - Melanie Reed

Ryan Sarver told me it was completely random, no selection criteria at all. They couldn't even put me in as a developer until my number got picked. (which is BS because I know developers "chosen" for the developer beta) - Jesse Stay

Well,Jesse, if I could give you mine, I'd do it. I'm not particularly ready to play with it yet as I have other things I'm concentrating on at the moment. - Melanie Reed

Melanie, the only reason I want it is for development. I'm much more enthusiastic, from a user perspective, about Facebook. I do see ways to incorporate this into SocialToo though so I want to play with it to do that. Also, Facebook doesn't yet let you group fan pages into lists or anonymize lists like Twitter does so I might find some benefit there as well. - Jesse Stay

Actually, I'm wrong - I just realized I can add fan pages to lists. Cool. Wondering if I can do some stuff from an API perspective now. - Jesse Stay

So it looks like in Facebook the only capability I need now is the ability to share my lists with others. Ideally those that I share with should only be able to see those with permissions set to be visible to others. This would include all fan pages (the equivalent to a Twitter profile). - Jesse Stay

Which I can already do via the API - Jesse Stay

Jesse - with your brilliance a) everyone -even Twitter - knows you've been doing your own "lists" for a while! b) you'd test it so heavy the system would blow up! *giggle* - Arleen Anderson

Arleen, lol! In all honesty, I have been doing lists for awhile via FriendFeed and Facebook, so you're right there. The only reason I really want to test it right now though is for SocialToo - for those that prefer Twitter I really see some potential for lists to remove the need for unfollow. - Jesse Stay

Keep in mind I'm in this as an entrepreneur, not to necessarily find news. I can find news, but it's not my sole purpose or mindset right now. - Jesse Stay

I am still waiting for lists myself, - Rob Cairns

Can I share FriendFeed lists on SocialToo? I can imagine API calls to dump list data there and subscribe to others. - Bruce Lewis

I finally got lists, so I've finally stopped complaining (at the end, I begged @twitter on bended knee). Once I got lists, the first thing I did was create my big NaNoWriMo list which is probably the biggest one built so far. When I saw how many lists I was on, I found out that I was on just about everybody else's NaNoWriMo lists already. So I'm pleased, though I might now complain about how hard it is to create big lists out of my nearly 1,500 followers. So it goes... - Dennis Jernberg

April

Cloud Jacking: 7 Steps to Dominate Your Niche - http://www.viperchill.com/dominat...

October 27 from Google Reader - Comment - Like - Share

Arleen Anderson liked this

L Stephen Cleary

I turned around to see where I had been - wait a minute - who is that following me?

October 21 from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

Arleen Anderson liked this

Hey miss your tweets Arleen - Twitter is less interesting without your wit ----- - L Stephen Cleary

manielse (Mark Nielsen) to manielse's feed, Foods

Dulce de Leche Flan - http://thecookieshopinenglish....

September 29 from Bookmarklet - Comment - Like - Share

Navid Ht, Citronella, Raffaele and 16 other people liked this

This looks so decadently good! Can I lick my computer screen PUH-lease? - manielse (Mark Nielsen) from Bookmarklet

one of the most heavenly desserts! - magali

I died and went to heaven only after bookmarking your cookie page for my fiance to enjoy upon my demise. - Arleen Anderson

Leo Laporte

You're invited to my Windows 7 Launch Houseparty - October 22 10a, at the TWiT Cottage. There will be cake and balloons!

Leo — Fastmail (39204 messages, 4238 unread).jpg

September 21 - Comment - Like - Share

Bryan Lee, mahjongmi, Javi Díaz and 54 other people liked this

Congrats Leo - couldn't be anyone better - Jesse Stay

37 more comments

Will you broadcast it? - nick

Oct 22 it is - Peter K

Yeah, Leo... you should set up a webcam or something. - Ken Sheppardson

oh well as long as there will be cake - Mr. Erv Server

I don't think Leo has a webcam - Jesse Stay

I'll have some virtual cake please. :) - Daynah

looks like i need to clear my schedule - Bryan

I'm sure he has an old Soundblaster mic in his closet - Eric @ CSTechcast.com

*ding dong* ... Daaaaad, the Internet is here!! - Andrew Skretvedt

What should I bring? - Sean Montgomery from iPhone

Hey, save me a slice of that cake! Lorraine B - lorraine boot

Congratulations Leo! You're the perfect choice. - Martin McDermid

Oh noes...the cake is a lie - Jeremy Heslop

What about the napkins? - Manuel Mas

Imma happy for you and imma let you finish, but Mac had the best OS *evah*...*evah* - Jesse Stay

Windows 7? I thought they were up to version 2008 by now. - Vermyndax

What's about shrimp?-) - notagolfer from iPhone

I am so tempted to make the 1700km drive to Petaluma for this - Jon Poeschek

Well, hot dang, Leo! Me too!! In fact, I just got my notice AS I WAS READING THIS ENTRY!! Awesome!! - WazNeeni

Wish I could be there! Unfortunately, the distance along with the fact that I have to work, since it's a Thursday, prohibits me from attending... Live streaming I hope...! - Chris

We're gonna take over Petaluma like Woodstock!! - Sean Montgomery from iPhone

I'll be there! :) - Kim Fong

*looks over at canoe*... If I start paddling now... - Johnny Worthington

Heh, that has to be the nerdiest thing ever. And what will you do at this Launch party? Install Windows 7? Oh, Bravo, Microsoft. Great marketing strategy. LET'S PARTAY AS THE LOADING BAR FILLS UP! OH WEWT! ...I bet it'll be a blast with Leo Laporte, though. :D I would totally go. But I'm in Kansas, where nothing happens, except the occasional tornado. Yee-frikin-haw. - Danny Minick

Congratulations Leo. - Sandra Large

Live stream it and we can all join in!! - Roberto Bonini from iPhone

"The cake is a lie!!!" - Lukess Eckley from iPhone

The perks of being a student. It launched last week. - Matthew Allen Horton

I wonder if Paul Thurrott got his party too. - Willem (@wim66) ☠ from iPhone

I wish I could go, Leo, but I'll be at my own party. Have fun! - Eric Geller

You think I'd drive all the way to Petaluma for Windows 7, are you crazy? Oh wait, there WILL be cake, well then, THAT is different (in best Rosannadanna voice). - Richard Bitting

I'm in, but it make take a while to get there from London - James Tenniswood

James: you still got a month, use it wisely... :) - Holger Eilhard

I love how the image title reads: "Leo — Fastmail (39204 messages, 4238 unread).jpg" Good luck with inbox zero, Leo! :-) - Holger Eilhard

I was going to invite you to my party like you said on the radio show. Now who can I get? Any other tech-related celebrity radio hosts I can call? I wonder if Kim Komando is hosting her own party... - David Sheneman

Hey Leo I got my Finalist note. I'll invite you and we can set up a skype link. You can be a hub that shows not just your party but connect to other parties around the world. - Paul Wirtz

The balloons are a lie - Chris Shearer

my unboxing is here: http://bit.ly/4iHJfP - Ernest Lehmann

Jesse Stay

Who has both a Twitter account and a Facebook Page that they manage? I have something for you to try.

August 23 from Twitter - Comment - Like - Share

motownmutt, Kevin Whalen, Penguin It's Cold Outside and 12 other people liked this

I do !!! - Eric Logan

30 more comments

That would be me... - Megan Fitzgerald

Me too. I'm 'managing' posts thus far via Seesmic Desktop. What you got Jesse? *intrigued* - Kate Foy

Sending DMs to those that comment here on how to get set up with the new thing I want you to try - Jesse Stay

Oh, and we're going to try an experiment - if you get instructions, please feel free to share it with your friends if you like it! - Jesse Stay

Present. - Micah Wittman

I try....and I mean try.....to manage Twitter and Facebook posts on TweetDeck. - Bonnie Foster

I do - steven healey

I do - Melanie Reed

I do as well. - Rob Schieber

I'm game - Rob Michael (Atmos Trio) from iPhone

I do! - Laura Norvig

My fb page (one of them) is named after my blog: http://facebook.com/interaw.... I also help manage http://facebook.com/eduify and just started http://facebook.com/newfb for meeting new people. (Does That Count? :) - Garin Kilpatrick

Okay, for everyone else wanting to try it, wait until tomorrow morning and we'll post how you can try it and use it on http://blog.socialtoo.com - Jesse Stay

I do, I have a few Twitter accounts. - Kol Tregaskes

I do, I do. - Gary Walter (gwalter)

It's live now - go and try it out!: http://blog.socialtoo.com/2009... - Jesse Stay

BTW, I've got one more feature I'm holding back on you'll see in the next day or two. :-) - Jesse Stay

Sounds like me, too. - Jason Miller

Jesse, I'm interested and would be glad to do review for you. I could also use your help weeding out some (spam) followers on Twitter. - Jason Cronkhite from iPhone

Jason(s) - it's live now - go check it out at http://blog.socialtoo.com/2009... - Jesse Stay

I enter the game ) - massagin

Me! - Carter Rabasa from iPhone

Me!! - Adam Clarke

Pieso, Carter, Adam, it's all launched now - just go to http://blog.socialtoo.com/2009... for the details. - Jesse Stay

I have both. - Anurag Bansal

Lay it on m,e Jesse!!! Put it to the test! - Arleen Anderson

I do:-) - anjelina

Arleen, Anurag, anjelina, be sure to check out the links I posted above - all the instructions are there! Let me know if you have any troubles. - Jesse Stay

I do too. - Martha

I manage a page as well as a Twitter account. Happy to help. Twitter account is @thejeffbrown. - Jeff Brown

Jeff, please see the blog post link above - it has all the instructions. - Jesse Stay

Robert Scoble

Because @jowyang didn't tell me where he's going and I learned it anyway I am very tempted to tell the world to mess up his launch. :-)

August 24 - Comment - Like - Share

A Mitchell, Bert DuMars, Roger Jennings and 56 other people liked this

so a startup then.. - Zee.

81 more comments

But I won't, because he's my friend and so are the other people involved. :-) - Robert Scoble

Thanks for the tease anyway. :) - Steven Walling

Hmmmm... - Simon Young

I hear he'll announce it "within days" and it's a pretty interesting gig. - Robert Scoble

When will we find out Robert? - Dave "Freedom 35"

friend = somebody reliable. keep it secret. keep it safe :) - Alex 'BuckyBit' Covic

Are there cameras involved? - Simon Young

Funny. He didn't tell me because he thought I would tell everyone. :-) - Robert Scoble

so go ahead and tell us! : ) - Teri Gidwitz

Teri: believe me, I'm tempted, just to teach him a lesson! :-) - Robert Scoble

Rob you're such a trouble maker hahaha - Jeunelle Foster

What I want to know: Who will replace him at Forrester? - Dave "Freedom 35"

BTW, I dig the new avatar, glad the green is gone ;) - Keith - @tsudo

Will he be interviewed on Building43? - Simon Young

Dave: not possible to replace him, sorry. - Robert Scoble

Well, payback is always worse. They're recruiting for a replacement at Forrester. Go look at his "former" blog; HR guy posted. - Teri Gidwitz

Same here. Green was getting a bit putrid. - Dave "Freedom 35"

Simon: nah, it's not a building43 kind of thing. - Robert Scoble

Big shoes indeed. - Dave "Freedom 35"

Oh. Interesting! - Simon Young

Robert - you post on the race for real time web is amazing - I really want to know where you see real time TV fitting into this? - James Stewart

Don't pull an Arrington, man. Be cool. - Daniel Fath

Nice going Robert, we all are looking forward to knowing when the time comes. - courtney benson

Damn... I got excited for a second that I may be among the first to know what he's up to. I guess I'll wait to find out along with everyone else! - Jodi Echakowitz

Daniel: it could be "JeremiahGate!" :-) - Robert Scoble

I think you guys are already breaking the ground by using Kyte etc and I tune in, but as a business channel in NZ I believe we need to be out there every day interviewing amazing people, streaming it live, enabling real time chats via FF and the Ustream intergration with facebook - I see facebook as the new TV platform that most people spend their time hanging out on and if they see an... more... - James Stewart

FF is pretty cool for these kinds of flash news teasers. :) - Dave "Freedom 35"

James: real time TV: http://friendfeed.com/search... Heheh. - Robert Scoble

haha oops - didn't know about that! - James Stewart

James: FriendFeed's real time search engine has a lot of cool features that never were explored. I really hope that's what they are going to do for Facebook. - Robert Scoble

thx Robert ....thats super cool - Johni Fisher

The problem is that most people that use the internet are still just getting on facebook, I am 25 and I only have a handful of people friends my age that twitter as they don't have a community on there they can identify with - I like what you said about Facebook Public - that is definitely where I see them going with some serious live streaming intergration. Facebook will win because... more... - James Stewart

Robert: True man, since I saw this partnership happen my head has been whizzing with ideas for the implications of it. >> Most of the people in my age group watch videos that have been shared on facebook by their friends and favourite groups. Definitely some new stuff with video on it's way - keep us posted! Thanks for the replies :) - James Stewart

Amazon? - Jesse Stay

Jesse: no and not Facebook either. :-) - Robert Scoble

Either your going to be a big tease or a tattle tale either of which will get you beaten up on the playground, so stop it (: - Kim Landwehr from BuddyFeed

DBAD - Josh Haley

Kim: heheh. - Robert Scoble

Robert. You're a friend, but you've a habit of breaking news --sometimes when folks aren't ready. It's not personal, but I just know your traits. I'm going to brief you in detail on Wed. We can do a video if you'd like --I'll come to you. Hugs? - Jeremiah Owyang

awww... ;-) - Chris Heath

Robert - hug Jeremiah, do the video - but insist he brings that little dog with him. IT is cute :) - Rob La Gesse

Will Robert put away his (fake) wounded pride and interview Jeremiah on Wednesday? Oh yes, he will - and now we have a deadline. Good work Robert! - Kami Huyse

bring @goodboyrumba along for the video! :) - Rachel Luxemburg

"Be excellent to each other." - Steve Rubel

Jeremiah: :-) - Robert Scoble from iPhone

OK, can we flashmob to celebrate Jeremiah's new gig right after the interview? - Elliott Ng

Jeremiah: here is the deal. I am not under embargo but already know the news. So I think I will call Arrington because you didn't embargo me. Oh, and I +do+ keep embargoes. I am even keeping a secret about two things you will learn in the morning. - Robert Scoble from iPhone

I still struggle with my 7 year old son to not steal his siblings' thunder in matters important to them. It's not easy for him. - Josh Haley

I know those two things, Robert. - Louis Gray

I know a lot of things, not even just two, but maybe not the two you are thinking of - Jesse Stay

Kami, I saw Robert yesterday, and I asked him if I'd hurt his feelings, he said "yes". Robert and I go back, there was a time (ustream launch) where we well, didn't coordinate on news. He's truly a friend, and someone I respect as a media trailblazer --but I need to get everything coordinated. To be clear, he was on the list of folks I'd brief in detail --others just got cursory info. - Jeremiah Owyang

Here's a long discussion on where Jeremiah Owyang will be going next. Interesting discussion developing on embargoes and 'bloggers' - Drew B

Lets figure out where he is going. Who is in most need of Jeremiahs incredible intelligence on social media? - Nisse

Drew, is it interesting that Robert is threatening me that I didn't tell him? Should bloggers assert themselves to get news? (it's a bit fun watching him get antsy) - Jeremiah Owyang

Jeremiah, I find the continual embargo deiscussions fascinating. I hope your trust is respected here. - Drew B from email

Is he going to disneyland? - Cliff Gerrish

Jeremiah: my feelings were hurt because you told pretty much everyone else in the industry other than me. Here's a hint: they can't keep their mouths shut either. But I will. You will know tomorrow that I actually do know the news. But the other deal is that you're wrong. I've kept hundreds of embargoes over the past year and haven't leaked them to anyone. If you weren't a friend and... more... - Robert Scoble

So they want the publicity you can bring but want to control the timing and message. I would be inclined to not agree as well. Sounds like you are being used. - Brian Sullivan

I hear news all the time about people who aren't necessarily friends but would generally want the news quiet - does this mean I should start leaking those details? I'm not sure the right answer to that. The problem though is often the way I hear about that information is through other friends who were trusted to keep the info private. Is it worth betraying the trust of those friends as well? - Jesse Stay

The problem comes maybe when you are "friends" with everybody but also are trying to be a legitimate reporter at the same time. We criticize television and newspaper reporters for this all the time but tech reportage seems to get a pass. - Brian Sullivan

Jesse, yeah your situations seem tough because if you leak, you're a jackass because someone else can't keep their mouth shut. - Chris Heath

Brian: everyone uses me, I'm used to it, it's part of the role I play in life. :-) - Robert Scoble

Robert, I was planning on telling you before the announcement --and the offer still stands. I'm sorry I hurt your feelings, that wasn't my intent. - Jeremiah Owyang

What's the point here?? - Andru Edwards

nothing really andru, I say we just move along and let Robert and I handle this offline. Clearly, we need to work this out. - Jeremiah Owyang

Talking to Scoble now, I apologized. I take back what I said above, he's not broken any embargos in a while and I take that charge back. I also briefed him, as a friend, and more. Sorry Robert, I crossed the line. - Jeremiah Owyang

I'm going to guess Jeremiah will join Dave Armano and Peter Kim and work for Dachis. - Ari Herzog

Ari - that's my guess too. - Hutch Carpenter

Now watch Scoble jump to Streamy right now to tell what Jeremiah is doing next. Ha! - Bryan R. Adams

This is funny! "JeremiahGate" got love it :) - Susan Beebe

Scoble is very good at keeping secrets and creating Buzz! :) - Susan Beebe

Thanks Jeremiah! Excited for you. - Robert Scoble from iPhone

I want a "Gate" named after me :-) - Jesse Stay

Robert, excellent start at creating the "buzz" for @jowyang 's launch LOL - j damon brown

Link Baiting 101: Start a fight with Scoble. - Jason Calacanis

Once again, calacanis ftw - Chris Heath from iPhone

Dude, why would you do that? I knew where you were going both times, and I kept it to myself. I coulda broken it, but why violate trust. - Jeremy Pepper

Jeremy: who you talking to? No one has violated any trust. We're all cool now anyway. - Robert Scoble

Jeremy: and when I left Microsoft someone DID violate my trust and leaked it within hours. So what? It all works out. Coordination is overrated. - Robert Scoble

LOL Jason. But Robert is right, co-ordination can be overrated. - Ian Betteridge

Group hug. - Jeremiah Owyang

Jeremiah - your recognition and classifications/categorizations of trends and strategies is truly unique. Thank you for all you've done at Forrester. Whatever your new role is, I hope you'll continue to share your thoughts. - A Mitchell

Louis Gray to Louis's feed, Mike Fruchter

FYI - The Ten People to Follow on FriendFeed Monthly Feature is Suspended, Failing Future Announcements.

August 24 - Comment - Like - Share

Michael Fidler, Richard pancakhaus Walker, Jérôme Flipo and 40 other people liked this

Given the changeover to Facebook, Mike and I have talked and decided we will let the community shake out before we think about continuing to build it more. - Louis Gray

38 more comments

Uh oh. - Akiva Moskovitz

Mike and I are champions of what has been built here, but we are going to be watching the changes closely to see if it makes sense to continue investing the efforts we have each month. Hoping something comes to change our mind and returning to normal, but we're being realistic. - Louis Gray

Yep. - Louis Gray

this may sound stupid....keep in mind im new to FriendFeed...but what is the ten to follow on FriendFeed monthly Feature....? - Marissa

Marissa: http://friendfeed.com/search... - Louis Gray

Well, if nothing else, I just realized that I wasn't subscribed to Mike. So that's something, I guess. - Akiva Moskovitz

Louis, what are your secret plans and your roadmap? I'm super intrigued by your desktop at this moment. - Jimminy Fuller

whoa... now it's getting serious. - michael sean wright

oh. okay. thank you. =]] - Marissa

It was a great run. I agree with Louis, until we have a clear understanding of what the future has in store for FriendFeed, it's not beneficial to anyone to keep the list going. - Mike Fruchter

When Louis starts losing faith, we need to worry. I thought your and Robert's conversations with Paul made you think things were good? - Jason Huebel

Akiva, same here. It was never on purpose though :-) - Mike Fruchter

Jason, I think that we have been reassured that the site will be kept alive. We have been encouraged by the recent introductions. But the last two videos have been more disconcerting, talking more about FB, and showing less clarity into plans. So I think it is safe to assume, until we hear otherwise, that the bulk of work will be for the site with millions of users. There has been no official update from the team yet, so we'll wait cautiously. - Louis Gray

Until then, consider this a "feature freeze" on our behalf until we get word from higher up that the project is still a priority. - Louis Gray

I agree its best to sit and wait in building the community any more, as oppose to build on what appears to be a rocky foundation that could be pulled from under us at any time without notice. Then again this could be just left to run as the bastard child, forgotten on the internet highway. - Uncle CW™

I don't think Louis is loosing faith. I think he is just realistic.He is not abandoning the site he championed the masses so hard for. It's a simple "feature freeze". Personally, I'm optimistic but also very cautious about the future of this site. Lets see what happens. *Hopefully* Facebook will make a public announcement at some point, the question is when? The fact that they have not, two weeks after the acquisition, makes you really wonder what their plans are for FriendFeed. Time will tell. - Mike Fruchter

So 10 to follow in Google Reader coming next? - MaryAnn Chick Whiteside

MaryAnn, that would be an interesting thing. I believe some of the best Google Reader sharers are here on FriendFeed. :) - Louis Gray

Much easier to see the whole list here: http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub... Hopefully you won't take that spreadsheet offline, as I am using it for some research and it does have some merit beyond friendfeed. - April Russo (app103)

April, I would never take that doc offline. I don't even think I am the owner. :) - Louis Gray

BUT I NEVER MADE THE LIST OMG SO SAD :( :( LOUIS - Andrizzle Gizzle

ANDREA YOU ARE OBVIOUSLY ONE OF MY FAVORITES AND EVERYBODY KNOWS IT. - Louis Gray

I think the list could be kept going, but expanded in other directions to include more than just friendfeed, so anyone added to the list, it would also give info on how to follow them elsewhere, like twitter, facebook, Google Reader and other sites...not just friendfeed. This way, the list continues to be of value, no matter what happens. I believe that anyone that made that list for... more... - April Russo (app103)

here comes the Facebook changes - sucks! - Mekkar

April - is that list up to date? (I vainly checked for my name and didn't see it :) ) - Jeff (the マクダジ of FF)

Wow. That comes as quite a shock. - Derrick

Louis, Mike, maybe just switch over to a monthly list of what order we should start unsubscribing. <--- Being cheeky, but it gave me a serious thought: List of of people to follow in other contexts—those who are FF alumni (whether active on posterous, greader, or what have you). Just a thought. :) - Micah Wittman

@Jeff I think June may have been the last time it was updated. - April Russo (app103)

"Ten People to Befriend on Facebook (If They Accept your Friend Request)" - bleh - Ahsan Ali aka. Slick

[sad face] I realise you are adopting a very prudent "wait and see" policy but this still feels like the beginning of the end. Or the end of the beginning of the end. It's almost more shocking than the FB announcement itself. I shall have to ponder this further. - WorldofHiglet

Interesting move. - Kol Tregaskes

Perhaps the any new top 10 should be posted on All Wordy and Junk? :-) - Kol Tregaskes

That would be one option, Kol, and a good one. - Louis Gray

Bummer, but it is a pragmatic decision for the two of you to make. - DGentry

I guess I can suspend my devious plan to send massive bribes to Mike Fruchter, then. He probably wouldn't have taken it, anyway. - DGentry

sad, but probably a good decision as well. It would be great to keep FF as its own domain, but without any information coming out, it is difficult to commit to FF as a social network, or spend a lot of time on the site. - Dan Morrill AKA Techwag

Damn! And I thought I was next!! - Dave Hodson

that's too bad... i wonder if you guys have some inside info on FF's future? I just spent the last week on Facebook instead of here - to get used to it. and it sucked. sucked a lot. - andy brudtkuhl

DO ANYBODY NO WHY MAFIA WARS IZ POKING ME? I SCARED - Richard pancakhaus Walker

Paul Buchheit

I'm trying to find a formula for generating the perfect tweet (then I can automate it!). Here's what I have so far: Statement of fact (preferably one that shows how awesome or lame your life is) followed by witty insight or observation.

August 23 - Comment - Like - Share

WCM, ninka, Lode Nachtergaele and 63 other people liked this

Apply the formula here, or propose a better formula. This was inspired by a discussion of what my brother's dog would tweet if he had a twitter account (and could tweet). It started with "Just got neutered.", but then we had trouble coming up with the witty insight or observation part. - Paul Buchheit

25 more comments

'RT @scobleizer [whatever he said]'. Seems to work for a lot of people. - Akiva Moskovitz

dim statement = 'Unwillingly, unwittingly sycophantic to a fault, but with backbone. Life is like an ashtray.' ; - Rob Schieber

[Statement or question] + [derogatory or self-derogatory co-fact] + [#ididntmeanit or #itotallymeanit or #spammingthetrendingtopics] - WorldofHiglet

Personally, I prefer '[excerpt of content] + [http://ff.im link]'. - Akiva Moskovitz

Oh, I read that as [exempt of content] + [http://ff.im link] - WorldofHiglet

People seem to be big fans of pithy observations of life phrased as a rhetorical question followed by the phrase "just sayin'" and an irrelevant hashtag lately. Another one to add to your generator would be a 3 sentence verbose response to the topic of the day, but with the vowels taken out to fit in a 140 character tweet. - Mark Trapp

[Current event related snippet] followed by [applicable proverb, idiom or combination of the two] #hashtag Plz RT - Eric Logan

Is this going to be the "I'm feeling lucky" button on FriendFeed? - Jesse Stay

{situation|product} is {overrated|underrated}. It's like {verb}ing in a {place} with a {object}. - Francesco Balducci

best "something" EEVER"!!!! "link" - Chris Hofmann

'Something [awesome|terrible] happened and that's all I'm going to say about that' or some variant thereof. - Akiva Moskovitz

"RT @paultoo [whatever y'all figure out]" - Ken Sheppardson

{oath of fealty to Friendfeed}.{parting words}."That is all." - Josh Haley from iPhone

The perfect tweet is Twitter tweeting back to me to inform me they'll fix the DM bug on my account ;) - Nicholas James

Rhetorical question? ANGRY SOUNDING ALL CAPS ANSWER, WHETHER AFFIRMATIVE OR NOT. #threewordhashtag - Chris, Taskerrific Guy

Here is the issue: A witty insight or observation is not made witty by the creator but by the observer. So, unless your automator will tweet and laugh at itself or somehow guess the minds of your audience, it might have issues. - Aditya Mittal

The problem with a purely structural approach is you can either end up with "perfect" or http://tweetingtoohard.com/top - Ken Sheppardson

Start with Fark.com headline generation rules and then remove the news story subtext ;) - Robert J Taylor from iPhone

I prefer Tweets with links to valuable resources and opinions. - Garin Kilpatrick

How about 'Bacon - what's your favourite ?' - Andy C

i know this is true (this sentence manages to be both parts). - kosmar

For me, the perfect tweet is a link to a high-quality document, accompanied by a terse summary of its core content. Those are pretty much the only tweets I pay attention to. - Sean McBride

Ironic statements are good - CoreyTess Trujillo

My favorite tweets say just enough to make you sooo curious you have to follow the "in reply to" to know what the heck they're talking about! In other words... it's real & witty conversation. =) - Arleen Anderson

Sounds like you have a 50% winner. "How about "I hope you humans are happy with your life!" - Houseofmax

I, for one, welcome our new Twitter overlords! - Bill Sodeman

Robert Scoble

I wish Twitter would sell to Google so it would die like Jaiku and Dodgeball. But I won't post this over on Twitter. I really don't have much love for the service, even though I know I'll be stuck using it for the indefinite future. Jesse Stay has it figured out. It's a horrid place to try to communicate anything other than a bit of self pimping.

August 19 - Comment - Like - Share

Anthony Citrano, John B. Osborne, Ozer Wrzl (EN) and 164 other people liked this

Here I can write the equivilent of an entire blog post. And even make changes. And even have a conversation. And use it as many times an hour as I want (Twitter rate limits my apps after a while cause I'm too heavy of a user). - Robert Scoble

143 more comments

werd. - imabonehead

I can sense already that FriendFeed is slowing down now that it is joining Facebook, while Twitter still has the best flow (and best system for following people and best mobile clients). So, we're stuck with Twitter, which is too bad, because the technology here is a ton better. - Robert Scoble

Twitter is a piece of crap - BUT it's where the audience is (currently). - Jim Connolly

Now it is starting to feel like FF again with you bigging it up again Robert ;) - Travis Koger

Twitter is the new MySpace. - imabonehead

Maybe google wave will change the way we use twitter, etc. again. Haven't tried it yet, but it might succeed where friendfeed "failed" - getting enough people to use it. - Frank S.

Travis: I had to go and clean out my Twitter and Facebook accounts and spread out my usage. - Robert Scoble

Agreed! - Friendfeed is so much better (for as long as it really lasts in Facebook world...) - Matthew Blaisdell from iPhone

Robert: I'm thinking of setting up a facebook account for my Marketing blog - what do you think? - Jim Connolly

@Scobleizer I don't think Friendfeed would be quite so popular if it weren't for twitter - Prolific Programmer from IM

Twitter is the new Myspace - HAHA - this quote made my day. For me it is just becoming a multiplicator for my friendfeed but it is important for that! - Sascha Pallenberg

Prolific: I'm not so sure. Blogs made Twitter. So, what if there were no Twitter? We would still talk up something else. But maybe FriendFeed wouldn't have thrived anyway. Twitter hit a sweet spot with its easy to program API, it's easy to use interface, and its cute name and branding. - Robert Scoble

Twitter works extremely well on mobile devices. I constantly see people tweeting whereas it's more difficult to do with FriendFeed's interface for a typical user. - imabonehead

Really think that Twitter is annoying it's users too much. There's some problems out there that are really being ignored. Here's an example of a problem that could be solved very simply, but no action is being taken (if it was solved it'd create a lot of goodwill) http://getsatisfaction.com/twitter... - Edd McArdle

Robert, now that FriendFeed's people are working for Facebook, and since Facebook has already been making changes to make it more "open socially", do you think eventually that Facebook will become the best place to have serious conversations? - Carlton Hackett

Carlton: yes. - Robert Scoble

I've been thinking so too. Although, I wonder how the non-Soc/net junkies will respond to that? - Carlton Hackett

Robert, two thoughts. #1 - do you think Google really would let it die? Acquiring Twitter would be more like its YouTube acquisition than Jaiku (in terms of price and # of users). Secondly, what would Twitter have to change for you to change your opinion? - Ben Parr

I really, really, really want Twitter to work out is the thing. It's just a pain in the neck to communicate without either losing the conversation or spamming useless banter over multiple Tweets because you can't fit it in 140 characters. That's just my experience. Those still spending most their time there don't mind it I guess. - Jesse Stay

I like Twitter. The conversation flows pretty well for me, and to be fair, I get more @replies there than I get replies here to my posts. - Chris Nixon

I think a combination of the Retweet API and a true threaded replies architecture and UI could change some of my opinion on that though if they do it. - Jesse Stay

Jesse: It's NOT just your experience. Twitter is getting less valuable the bigger it gets. The spam / porn / bots issue is insane and ruining the experience. - Jim Connolly

Chris: I have a twitter account with over 20,000 followers and get ten times as many replies here as I get there. Here I only have a small following. The calibre of people I connect with here is better too. - Jim Connolly

Jesse, have Twitter improved their communication with developers since you wrote about it in April? - Edd McArdle

Edd, over the last week I have noticed a difference, yes, but it's hard to tell if it will remain that way. They now seem to have a project manager over the API dev team (Ryan Sarver). He seems to be putting a filter on some things and keeping devs updated elsewhere. They're still learning though, much slower than FB or FriendFeed. - Jesse Stay

agree on spam and bots, but it still is a nice little thing, if it remains what it was made for! marketing and reviewing thing isn't/shouldn't be there, true friendfeed is more effective as a tool for sending your message across, it is simple and strong - testbeta

Testbeta: ... and FF works. - Jim Connolly

Jim, Jesse, Robert: Value varies. For me, Twitter value continues to increase. I use it to find out what's happening, meet up with people, get random insights into how people are doing, find new people. It all works well. There are many different use cases and one tool does not have to do them all. - Rachel Clarke

i couldn't agree more! - lilian

Rachel: "It all works well"? Really? Twitter? - Jim Connolly

Rachel, I agree with you. I just don't think Twitter works well for conversations, that's all. I use FriendFeed and Facebook for that. I use Twitter for different purposes, and I agree it does still have value. - Jesse Stay

sometimes i think of Automattic's intense debate, but well friendfeed is intense debate, such a experience was never had on blogs, the commenting, liking, and so fast it propagates, even disqus commenting systems can't achieve what we have here on friendfeed, but i can't just throw away twitter, twitter still is good, true for the serious types it's word limit, reply system is a bit of... more... - testbeta

I would love to have FriendFeed as the commenting system on my blog. - Chris Nixon

Chris, there are a few plugins that do that. I haven't tried them though. - Jesse Stay

Chris: Check out what Scoble's doing with FF on building43.com - Jim Connolly

Jim: yes. It works well for what I want it to do (I'm ignoring the ongoing issues with the DDOS). It's a free tool that adds far more value than it costs me to wait for odd outage. - Rachel Clarke

Just checked your Twitter account and now understand exactly what you are saying. - Jim Connolly

Jesse: agree, I use Facebook, Friendfeed, blogs, comments etc, all for different things. I even use the phone as a phone occasionally to talk with people ;-) But the assumption that one tool/service can do everything - and should do everything - is something I have a problem with. If something does not work for a person, don't use it. - Rachel Clarke

The twitter ecoverse is cool, can do Psychological Profiles, can do Social Network Analysis. All those services that spawned as a result are amazing. I am also amazed at how dense Asians Languages are on Twitter, think about it they get about 60% more per tweet. - Robert Higgins

Ben: at this point I am not sure what Twitter could do to win back my love. I will use it just like I use AT&T and United Airlines. I have very little love for those even though I use them frequently. Twitter wins because it is simple and flat and has great clients. I wouldn't cry if it disappeared, though. - Robert Scoble from iPhone

So why do you hate it? - Raanan Avidor

You are a hypocrite! I remember you use to sing the praises of Twitter all the time. Another toy comes along and you start bashing it. If I was Friendfeed management I would cancel your account now before you start bashing them. Robert Scoble is nothing but a follower of crowds anyway. - Paul L. McCord Jr.

You want it to die? Such an odd statement. I have met so many great people through Twitter, and the news information I can find through search or news agencies or even people who are newshounds are amazing. I know it's not perfect and the last few weeks have definately proved that, and the spam is just awful. But to want to kill it, what a strong statement. - PC Easy from twhirl

Twitter is not abot writing blog posts or having conversations, its about small pieces of information being communicated to anyone who wants to listen. You do not have to listen, if you want a conversation use a forum or FriendFeed, use WordPress for blog posts. Stop trying to make Twitter into something it is not designed to be. - Darren Rollett

I really used to like Twitter, still do sometimes. What I don't like is the Twitter hype. I don't seem able to turn on any media channel these days without reading/hearing or watching about it. Even the BBC reported that Twitter was under attack recently on the main BBC news. FFS come on, there must be more happening in the world than a micro blogging site with a few million users... more... - Nick Bristow

If you owned twitter would you sell to google? - cheapsuits from iPhone

Robert, Atleast something positive could come out of it. If Twitter sells to Google they might(though its not guaranteed) make it opensource and then a federation of twitter server(ala wave servers) can co-exist happily and that way we'll own our stuff(as Anil Dash and other points out). Or they might integrate it in Wave framework. Not that people are not gonna complain about it but thats a different topic. - Abhishek

Surely an improvement in the service would be a more positive wish? - Chris Nixon

Say what you want but something with the architecture of friendfeed is far more conversational then twitter could ever be. - cheapsuits

I don't know why people think Twitter is the place to converse. It's really not built for that. I find myself enjoying the flow of conversations more on Facebook and FriendFeed. - Naomi Williams

Self pimping? Hmmm... Perhaps not for all of us. And besides, self-pimping isn't limited to twitter. - @JonAston

PS - Maybe it's just me, but you seem bitter lately. Hope you turn that around for yourself. - @JonAston

Jon: You are right. People pimp on FriendFeed too; as I say in my new book.... :-) - Jim Connolly

@jim, they will do anywhere, this is human nature, they do even in real life, so why not in virtual one? - abdellah

Abdellah: Absolutely. - Jim Connolly

"(Twitter) It's a horrid place to try to communicate anything other than a bit of self pimping." AMEN - Alejandro

Personally I wish Google would buy both Facebook and Twitter so they could both die. - Brian Sullivan

@brian, hey where could I read to you then?!! - abdellah

@Frank S. Google Wave will only be valid if you actually have other friends/collegues who use Google Wave. Otherwise you'll be using it with the *crickets* - Naomi Williams

Oh yeah -- forgot that due to circumstances beyond our control FF is now Facebook. ;-) - Brian Sullivan

oh yeah , they share the same vision, they got the same perception... - abdellah

It's the ff interface (developers) that make it great, but it's really you guys and gals, the people friendfeed attracted that make it valuable to me. Let's consider a real migration to a more reliable long term social media. It has to be open (data portable, unsellable) to get my trust - Mark Essel from iPhone

I hope the FaceBook people will take comments like these to heart. I do like twitter but the functionality FriendFeed brought was the next generation in stream notification. - Chris Jackson

Ohh time to pimp Jim's new book on Twitter ;) - Mark Essel from iPhone

Mark: Yeah - all I need is a title. Oh, and a book....and the time to write one....then I will be pimping like a pro! - Jim Connolly

Wow Robert, I was thinking this the past few days and could never bring it to words...well done - Braden Douglass

Jim: I'm time bankrupt but love sharing and collaborating. Let's hire a ghostwriter to capture our best ideas in an intelligible manner :). Joking of course, there's no easy way to spread our thoughts but doing it ourselves - Mark Essel from iPhone

I was gonna call the Funky Phantom. (That really dates me.) - Jim Connolly

Robert, I challenge you to stop using Twitter for a month and then blog about the experience. And that includes hiding all Tweets in FF. - Mike Doeff from iPhone

Lets face it, Twitter was built as an update service - a big Internet megaphone. The natural transition has been from update service to marketing service. Big Internet Megaphone. It's good at that, but it's not at conversations nor at discovery. The larger problem is people still approach Twitter like a true social engagement tool - and it's simply not. The disconnect between perception and reality results in the poor adoption numbers and other soft metrics. - AJ Kohn

twitter is noise. filter it and you can find some gold. imho, that's beyond mere self-pimpage - Rob Schieber

Agreed Rob. I'd prefer semantic algorithms applied to all tweets. I'm interested in real time search and datamining. And semantic extraction on all status would allow for real time "sorting" - Mark Essel from iPhone

i'd love to meetup with fellows and see what api scraping is going on - know where threads are for that? - Rob Schieber

Idk, This seems so much better then twitter. - SeanParnell

It does have a lot of noise, granted - but if it went away now, I'm not sure where everyone would run to. Facebook is too silly, Linkedin is too stolid, and everything else is too fractured for me to communicate with all the people I want to in a single shot. Guess I'd end up doing everything through ping.fm after all. - Ciaoenrico

Wow, Isn't online chit-chat such a fuss? :) - SeanParnell

Robert, just a week or two you were saying that Twitter is beating FriendFeed because of scanability http://friendfeed.com/scoblei.... And you had lots of complaints about the FriendFeed user interface. You also talked about how Twitter was much better after you un-followed everyone and hand picked who you're following. I have to ask, what has changed in the past few days to make you say that the service should die? Feels like you're flip flopping. - Mike Doeff

Can't you apply for extended API limits? - Tristan Seligmann

love the single post/status page, i mean like this: http://twitter.com/twitter... - testbeta

I noticed that in the past two weeks, the tweet intensity has greatly decreased from all my follows in Twitter. Granted, I'm not following too many, but the ones I do follow have traditionally tweeted a lot each day. Is this a trend (has Twitter become a has been) or is this simply a coincidental anomaly? - Jeff Sayre

Robert I find myself on friendfeed more these days - (jeff)isageek

@brian would you consider myspace if both facebook and twitter die?!!(ps: sorry I forget the LOL) - abdellah

Myspace -- don't know. I haven't really tried or paid attention to it. But probably not -- isn't it Facebook like? Maybe usenet? ;-) - Brian Sullivan

brian, let forget all those techie and go irc :) - abdellah

IMO, people who don't like the limitations of Twitter and whine about it hampering them are using it wrong. Twitter is not a place to pimp your blog or drive traffic to your site. It is not an SEO tool. It's not a place for you to compete in order to get more 'followers'. If you've ever tried to do any of these things, or if you ever followed more than a few hundred people, then yes, no... more... - Otto

Well said Otto - Chris Nixon

Jesse Stay: you should stop complaining so much about twitter when you build an entire business based on their lack of functionality and other issues. - Mihai Secasiu

Mihai, I'm not complaining - they can do what they want. As I said I really want them to succeed. It's a matter of fact that they do have their flaws - I'm hoping to help them fix those, assuming they're listening at all. What are you doing to help Twitter get better? - Jesse Stay

it is like twitter if for what,where, when and friendfeed is for why, how - testbeta

Mike: just because I use a service doesn't mean I love it. I use ATT and United all the time and they suck too. - Robert Scoble from iPhone

And yes Twitter has some good things about it. Doesn't mean it is all good. Personally it is overused and overhyped and YES I am partially responsible. - Robert Scoble from iPhone

Apostol I get value out of Twitter. You aren't listening. I get value out of AT&T too but it COULD be so much more. Chris I tried to be positive but Twitter just doesn't respond to positivity. Plus they are cynical AT BEST about their users. Read the Twittergate documents to see just how cynical they are. - Robert Scoble from iPhone

Twitter was just there at the right time. It's not the best solution to the problem (microblogging), but it's good ~enough~. - Trent Hamm

You seriously think Twitter will die once it gets bought by a 'bigger' company? - Mike Shields

Mike: do you use Dodgeball? It was bought by Google. So was Jaiku. - Robert Scoble

Trent: did you just call Twitter the Microsoft of microblogging? Yeah, that's sorta what I was trying to say too! ;-) - Robert Scoble

I just find it amazing that all the early adopters get really snobby about Twitter now it is getting more mainstream. There is something snobby about people's attitude to Facebook as well. I'm not a fan of Facebook but I know more people who use Facebook than use Twitter or Friendfeed combined. Even my mum has a Facebook account but she'd never be on Twitter or Friendfeed. Twitter... more... - Paul Nash

I liked Pownce. I wonder what SixApart has cooking up for them. So there's really no chance for Plurk to make a comeback and take back the community? With all the outage problems Twitter has, I would think Plurk would try to capitalize on that. Guess not. - John Wang

now if the Google Reader team could just get their new commenting system streamlined and real-time ... :) - Peter du Toit (S.Africa)

Paul: it's not hard to understand if you are in our shoes. Here's why. When a company is young and struggling to get noticed, they love having early adopters. After all, that's the ONLY WAY a company gets to the next stage. I've never seen a company go straight to Oprah stage without getting early adopters excited. Then once the company gets enough traction they usually start mistreating the early adopters. In this case Twitter stabbed them in the back. Leo Laporte, for instance ... - Robert Scoble

...got me excited about Twitter and was THE REASON it was the big huge deal at that 2007 SXSW. He had more followers than Mashable last year. But did he get put on the Suggested User List? No. So now Mashable has more than a million and Leo has a knife in his back. And you think it's amazing that early adopters turn their backs on Twitter? Really now. - Robert Scoble

I don't see how Leo has a knife in his back. There was no preconceived notion that anyone would be added to that list. Who cares? He was fine before that list was created, and he can be just as fine now, and just as engaging. - Andru Edwards

Andru: when he was hyping up the service and telling his users to use it, he was getting something in return: being at the top of the follower lists. When Twitter artificially put its own people at the top of the follower lists, and handed out grants of followers (worth many hundreds of thousands of dollars, by the way -- Mashable has changed its entire business to be Twitter centric) they specifically dissed Leo and many others. Most of whom won't point it out in public. - Robert Scoble

Sadly true. I'm in much the same boat -- Twitter is a necessity for professionals and bloggers to stay on top of things, but other socialnets like Brightkite and FF are light years beyond it, which doesn't look to be changing any time soon. Don't even get me started on the spammers and the get-rich-quick'ers. - Ryan Meader

But before the SUL was released, didn't Leo abandon Twitter in favor of Jaiku, due to Twitter having "Twit" as part of its name? Just saying, if I owned a list that I had complete control over, and someone showed that behavior towards me (whether it was right or wrong, I am not judging), I would think twice before putting them on a list that will result in many people seeing they they... more... - Andru Edwards

I can't agree with you more, Robert. - Jon Ursenbach

Scobe: I very much disagree that it is about self pimping. Perhaps your senses are mush because you follow too many? I absolutely love getting that link to a new article or research, or to get a tweet from that celeb that makes me think and provides insight into a new world. I also use it as a research tool, for exploratory purposes. Twitter, as you know very well, is about what you make it, and that is a tenuous notion that really is influenced by who you follow. - Chad Gesser

Andru: again, the list did NOT exist in the days when we were hyping up Twitter. So, there was a "promise" to early adopters that if they invested time in the service they could be at the top of the follower lists. Sort of how PlayFoursquare is today promising users that they can become mayors of places they frequent more than anyone else. What Twitter did was the equivilent of PlayFoursquare telling everyone that their "mayorship" doesn't matter anymore and that Oprah is now mayor of everywhere. - Robert Scoble

Chad: one thing you have to remember about me is that I see that Twitter has 1,001 uses. Stop seeing the world as black and white. This is one post I'm making about Twitter among thousands. Translation: I already agreed with you. But you have to admit that many people use Twitter for self promotion. - Robert Scoble

Andru: and anyway, the SUL is hardly the only reason to diss Twitter. Twitter still goes down all the time, it still has stupid rate limits. It still can't block spam effectively. It still has no friend management. It still has no features that didn't exist a year ago. And it is, in many respects, behaving worse. I'm hearing from developers that Twitter is becoming more closed, not more open (to monetize) and we're seeing them pick winners before the marketplace is done (bit.ly anyone?) - Robert Scoble

The nice thing about Twitter is that it keeps your message short and to the point. Friendfeed is great but it doesn't lend itself well to an external app out of the browser. Also FriendFeed and any of these services you don't own your content - Seth Goldstein

Seth: bing! So, back to the blog we will go. Except, why are we still here? ;-) - Robert Scoble

Awww Twitter the "me" network :) - Wayne Sutton from iPhone

Anyone tried Streamy? - cheapsuits

because the interraction is in real time - abdellah

Wayne: retweet me. :-) abdellah: I thought it was because of all the sex. ;-) - Robert Scoble

that was my expectation too ;) - abdellah

I like friendfeed because of its realtimeyness, but I like twitter because it requires you to be concise. I have seen some brilliant tweets done in 140 characters or less. I think that's always been the allure of twitter, its sheer simplicity. How many features can you add to twitter without actually changing the core of what twitter is? - Tomy Thomson

Robert: But what do you want from these companies ? Chaps like you give them the oxygen of publicity they need and they court you and then when they become successful you suddenly start to criticise them. Friendfeed has become successful (in great part to your endless plugging of it) and the founders will now go on to make money through their company being taken over by Facebook. You,... more... - Paul Nash

Scoble: no doubt....I can deal with the self promotion, the e marketing and spam garbage though to me is what has gooootttt to go - Chad Gesser

Paul: my role in life is to use what will be, not what is. I don't turn on many companies, but Twitter isn't one that dealt with early adopters on good faith. - Robert Scoble

nick: I explained why above. - Robert Scoble

Is there a "social media" company that has dealt with early adopters in "good faith"? Facebook, FriendFeed, Flickr I suspect don't qualify ? Any that do? - Brian Sullivan

all platforms seem to have self pimpering styles, why so passionate against twitter? Objectional question, not one of rhetoric. - nick tadd

Brian: I didn't know that any of those have actively dissed their best early adopters. Facebook kicked me off, but only because I broke the TOS. It's always been straight up with me. Same with Flickr, although I do watch Thomas Hawk's talk about their censorship. - Robert Scoble

none as brian says, they all deal with them, and "the earlier adopter" contribute to their evolution until they sell (sorry) - abdellah

nick: because it's so prevalent there. "Look at my blog post about xxx" is almost a staple on Twitter. It's a new RSS reader. Which is fine, I use it too for that! :-) - Robert Scoble

Robert, I think you may have the makings for one of your future blogs here. Perhaps you do it for that reason? ;) The thing about Twitter is always going to be its LBE. It's a mainstream LBE to Social Media. For that very reason its perfect for business, government, and non profit to take public temperature and promote. The other "noise" is the "MV", the "mainstream voice". The conversation is 4 way.(and yes sometimes only 1 way) but there it is and its not going to go away any time soon. - Melanie Reed

Yes, indeed, Twitter is the Microsoft of microblogging. It's good enough, but not the best - but it has the huge advantage that everyone is using it, so you have to use it for compatibility reasons. - Trent Hamm

I still use Twitter for more than just updates. I converse, I crowdsource, and I read through to see what other people are thinking and talking about. FriendFeed is the one that I have a difficult time finding use for, but I'm trying. - Dave Huston

DAMN Robert I HATE that you are right on this one!!!!! - Arleen Anderson

Hopefully you use it for positive self pimping and not for negative pimping... which is inevitable - Kevin Burrell

If FF would have taken mobile seriously, the game might look different right now - Alex C. Williams

Alex, they are taking mobile seriously - they sold to Facebook. :-) - Jesse Stay

I can't see how Twitter can survive Facebook now. FB will bring Twitter down, the only chance they got is to sell to Google. - Patrik Johansson

What makes people think Facebook or Twitter is all-conquering? There's a new generation coming through, and they aren't using these services. It's very important not to get sucked in by the hype of a service you use. Fanboys will talk up the positives and ignore the negatives, giving you a skewed message. The truth is somewhere in the massive grey area in between. - Chris Nixon

The new generation uses Facebook a lot, but not Twitter. - Steph (sh_skew) from email

Let me say that it is not twitter per se. It is the population of twitter to make it the place it is at the moment. Whenever there is a (free entrance) place crowded of people, there will be spambots to pollute it. - funkyboy from Posty

Twitter is just a temporary solution for a quick mixture of instant messaging + status updates + chat forum. - Bora Wiemann

Just having a discussion today that Twitter will eventually go bankrupt when the hype is over - Khuram Hussain

I don't agree with you Robert. Twitter is easy to use, succinct and versatile. I've made multiple very meaningful connections through my use of twitter. I do like friendfeed's threaded conversations which are great but in a way it only helps those who have big followings like yourself, because people are more apt to comment on your thread than say mine because they know the conversation... more... - Lon Cohen

For example - how do I message you directly so you know I'm speaking to you (i.e. Twitter @ reply) but all your followers and my followers know that we're having a conversation in Twitter back and forth so that they can follow and interject when they want. Everytime we do that we have to start a brand new discussion thread and I have to "tell" you somehow that I'm talking to you. Twitter is like email/phone conversations and friendfeed is like collective blogging/commenting. - Lon Cohen

Amen, Robert. - Fa La La La Lindsay

The power and beauty of twitter originate from limitation. Think of it as conversation haiku. - Brendan

Brad Williamson to Brad's feed, Media News and Analysis, TV Talk

TV News Giant Don Hewitt Dies At 86 - http://www.cbsnews.com/stories...

August 19 from Bookmarklet - Comment - Like - Share

Ayşe E., Jason Huebel, Alonis and 6 other people liked this

"Don Hewitt, recognized as a father of modern television news and the creator of the medium's most successful broadcast, 60 Minutes, died of pancreatic cancer Wednesday. He was 86 and had homes in Manhattan and Bridgehampton, New York, where was with family at the time of death. Hewitt was executive producer of CBS News, the title he took when he stepped down from his post as executive producer of 60 Minutes in 2004. Hewitt's remarkable career in journalism spanned over 60 years, virtually all of it at CBS. As a young producer/director assisting at the birth of television news, it was usually Hewitt behind the scenes directing legendary CBS News reporters like Edward R. Murrow and Walter Cronkite, using a playbook he had to write himself. He played an integral role in all of CBS News' coverage of major news events from the late 1940s through the 1960s, putting him in the middle of some of history's biggest events, including one of politics' seminal moments: the first televised presidential debate in 1960." - Brad Williamson from Bookmarklet

Mr. Hewitt came to visit my electronic media course while I was going to school at SMU. He was a kind and absolutely fascinating individual. I remember wishing that he could keep telling stories all day long. - Brad Williamson

Don was a genius that enlightened us. - Arleen Anderson

Alex Scoble

Dead people shouldn't have copyrights...it's stupid.

August 17 - Comment - Like - Share

John E. Bredehoft, Stephen Edgar, Jason Nelson and 71 other people liked this

Dead people don't their estate does. - Chris Greene

161 more comments

Yeah, that argument makes it less stupid? Not. - Alex Scoble

+Chris. Or companies which may have invested in the intellectual property. - τorƍue

@Alex - Sure it does. Tolkein's kids have a right to everything their parents left them. - Chris Greene

Copyrights is like an inheritance to the kids, but rather than estates being given, they are giving their intellectual property. - Wizetux

Alex, I agree with the sentiment, but if a copyright is invalidated upon death, then a sufficiently valuable copyright would provide incentive to off the owner. :P - Tanath

Like hell they don't...They have a right to the money/property he bequeathed them at death, not to keep on making money based on his works. That's not how copyright is supposed to work. It's supposed to grant a limited time for which a creator can recoup the costs of their work. It's not supposed to transfer to their children and to their children's children. It should be a lot closer to the patent system. - Alex Scoble

I think it's stupid that copyrights last much longer than the average human lifespan. I think it actually does a lot of hamper innovation. - Victor Ganata

Why are patents for 17 years but copyrights are effectively without end? It's stupid, that's why. It's all so Disney can continue to make money off of Mickey Mouse without coming out with new content. - Alex Scoble

The patent system is borked too... - Tanath

@Alex -According to you argument intelliectual property shouldn't be transferred. If that's the case, then why does a company get to maintain ownership of IP after the creator passes? - Chris Greene

Because they bought off Congress. - Alex Scoble

@Alex - Adding to that, then if the company is passed on to realatives they no longer own that IP? - Chris Greene

LOL, blunt & to the point. :) - Tanath

@Alex: copyrights have an end: in the US it is 70 years after the death of the creator. - Wizetux

@Alex - So a company is not property then? - Chris Greene

That would certainly provide incentive to innovate... - Tanath

The whole point of the patent/copyright systems are to spur innovation and the creation of new works. The current system actually runs counter to this goal. And no, copyright is not property. - Alex Scoble

I didn't say copyright, I said a company - Chris Greene

I don't care about companies. This conversation isn't about companies, it's about copyrights. All arguments that don't deal with copyright, but with other ideas other than copyright and patents will be ignored by me. - Alex Scoble

By the way, a company's copyrights now last for 95 years. - Alex Scoble

It is. I asked if a companies IP (and copyright) is transferrable once the originator dies. As such, is the company transferrable? - Chris Greene

Wouldn't copyrights force people to not copy off others work, and come up with something of their own? I don't get how they inhibit innovation/creation. - Heather

The original U.S. Copyright Act granted rights for 14 years with a 14 year extension. Now it's 70 years after the author dies, or if it's a work-for-hire, 95 years after publication, or 120 years after creation. - Victor Ganata

But it would force creators to come up with new stuff every few decades, instead of milking their one good idea for the rest of their life. The current system encourages mediocrity. We shouldn't be surprised that that's what we get. - Victor Ganata

Patents do stifle innovation: http://www.physorg.com/news167... I think the argument generalizes to copyright as well. - Tanath

Heather: If you and someone else are both offering the same service/product, which one are people likely to choose? Without the copyright/patents, it forces competitive innovation on everything, including existing products & services. - Tanath

Alex, what have you done to try to change the Constitution? - Mistletoe Glen

Copyright law isn't spelled out in the Constitution. :) And I've done plenty posts about it here on friendfeed :) - Alex Scoble from IM

So I come up with a great book and publish it a month before I die and never personally benefit from its greatness. It's stupid that benefit can't go to my estate for a reasonable time. - LogEx

Yes, copyright law has been mutated into something ugly, but that doesn't mean we should swing the pendulum all the way the other way. As usual, the right answer is somewhere in the middle. - LogEx

Yeah...17 years should be the answer. :) - Alex Scoble from IM

Oh and I wrote a letter to my state senators and my congressman to not pass the DMCA once...they just told me it was in my best interests...yeah right - Alex Scoble from IM

Lindsey: "Just because I'm dead doesn't mean they stop being mine." It kinda does, since you don't exist anymore... - Tanath

IMHO I'd rather see lifetime+17 years instead of lifetime+70 years FWIW. Could still be inherited, but you wouldn't necessarily have a whole generation or two of people that make their living off their parent's work. And it would force businesses that owned IP to innovate instead of perpetually litigating over it. - Mistletoe Glen

Logical Extremes: Public policy is supposed to be about what benefits society, not individuals or companies & corporations. - Tanath

I'd rather see a fixed period like how the patent system is. Problem is that big companies like Disney just pay off congresspeople to extend the rights. - Alex Scoble from IM

I'm surprised that they haven't been able to do so with patents - Alex Scoble from IM

I always thought that an intellectual property, whether it is copyright or patent, should be moved permenantly into the public domain unless an effort to bring to market is displayed by the owner within a predetermined period of time( <5 years). - Geoff Schultz

That would be a step in the right direction. - Tanath

I'd like to see lifetime + 21 years or 70 years, whichever is greater. Maybe nudge it to 80 out of respect for expanding lifespans. Actually, my idea would be a fixed cap of, say, 20 or 40 years, but small steps, y'know? - Roger Benningfield

The world isn't restricted to changing in small steps... - Tanath

It's probably too much to ask that the pendulum go back to where it was originally, but at least the pendulum should start shifting in the other direction of decreasing duration. 120 years is a ridiculously long time. - Victor Ganata

Alex: What do you think about eliminating copyright and/or patents? - Tanath

I don't think that would be a good idea...I think that would have the same effect on innovation that having copyright/patent periods too long does - Alex Scoble from IM

How so? - Tanath

For instance, drug companies wouldn't bother spending the billions it takes to get new drugs made unless they got the guaranteed exclusivity that a patent brings - Alex Scoble from IM

I don't know about that... and there are other ways to deal with stuff like that. Public funding is one option. - Tanath

Tanath: Short of full-scale, violent revolt, yeah, the world is generally restricted to small steps. And I don't plan on offing anyone just to get Warner Bros. to surrender Superman to the public domain. - Roger Benningfield

copy rights should be timeconstrained, thats it (like 20yrs) - chaz2b

Roger Benningfield: I disagree. The advent of the internet for instance has changed & will change things rather quickly. Change is accelerating. And while you may not be one to off someone, the incentive would still be there, and from time to time it would happen. - Tanath

You know, if we adhere to cavet emptor, and choose not to protect the consumers from bad purchases, why should we protect the rich companies from bad investments? If they invest in something that everyone else duplicates (right away) isn't that called competition? - Paul W. Homer

So your against inheritance - why should a copyright expIre ? - Nicholas Paul Gordon from iPhone

Copyright still expires, just not within our lifetimes. The original intent of copyright was never to provide indefinite protection. - Victor Ganata

The U.S. Supreme Court rejected the idea that copyrighted works should have the same protections as physical property in 1834 http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki... - Victor Ganata

I agree with you, Alex. The current system of copyright is completely borked & totally driven by megacorps like Disney. We should go back to how it originally was in the US. - josh neff, geek at large

Just for the records, it's not an issue only at the US level. Since the Berne Convention, a lot of these questions are discussed at an international level (look for WIPO, ACTA,...) - Laurent

Dead people have descendants! And they SHOULD have rights! Dude... Dad up! - Arleen Anderson

Given the time frame they first specified, it was totally not the intention of the founding fathers to let copyright pass into the next generation. - Victor Ganata

Luckily for Disney, the strict constructionists of the Republican party saw through to the true, *hidden* intentions of the founding fathers! - Andrew C

Even better, they've managed to criminalize infringement. - Victor Ganata

Man, you are soooo onto something screwed up about this perpetual copyright concept. - Jason Nunnelley

I'm finding this discussion very interesting, although it seems that everyone knows a lot about copyright that I don't so I'm a little behind. But I would like to contend that the intentions of the Founding Fathers (dun dun dun and lightening) aren't the relevant concern. - Heather

Can't blame the GOP entirely. The Dems were still responsible for the 1976 act, which extended it to 75 years or creator's life+50 years. - Victor Ganata

I don't know. I still believe the purpose of copyright is "to promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries", and not simply to allow people to ride the gravy train into infinity and beyond. I suspect I'm not the only one who believes similarly. - Victor Ganata

Interesting use of "to infinity and beyond". ;) BTW, I can't figure that Wikipedia link out, I think my brain has melted but I don't know what it means. - Heather

I'm in favor of prohibiting "authorship" transfer. And, the original term was 15 years - Now, it's 70 years after the death of the author, and transferable to holding companies and trusts. Not to mention, Disney's artists are "work for hire." Copyright has become the tool of corporations and investors. - Richard pancakhaus Walker

IANAL, so the case write up itself is pretty opaque to me, but going by the summary, one side of the case contended that copyright is a natural right of a creator of any work, and that it should last in perpetuity, and that a copyrighted work should have the same protections as real and tangible property does. The case went to the Supreme Court, and they said, no, copyright can only exist as decreed and enforced by the state and it isn't the same thing as real and tangible property. - Victor Ganata

Oh yes, except China. They don't have to comply for some reason - perhaps because we can't make them pay, perhaps because they haven't signed any treaties. But maybe, the complete absence of "regional pricing" that makes sense is yet another problem with copyright today. - Richard pancakhaus Walker

I agree 100% http://www.youtube.com/watch... - Geo Meek

I'd be all for a fixed term like 15 or 20 years or something like life +5 years. - s t e v e

Oooh, thinking about Alex's original post I'm coming up with a great near-future sci-fi story where anyone who comes up with a hit song or story or movie immediately has hire serious bodyguards to protect themselves from the IP assassins who try to have them rubbed out so their copyrights will expire. - s t e v e

I believe Microsoft Office would cost a small business in China their entire budget for a year.. A CD would cost one family's income for a month. Or thereabouts. - Richard pancakhaus Walker

Ah . . . the Mickey Mouse clause - every time the copyright on Mickey gets close - the 'fixed term' gets extended. Copyright is driven by American capitalism ?? - Chris Loft

I'm not a capitalist? - Alex Scoble from IM

Because I don't believe in unfettered capitalism, doesn't mean I'm not a capitalist - Alex Scoble from IM

How is that not capitalism? I believe in responsible capitalism. Fettered capitalism is what we have now...more or less. :) - Alex Scoble from IM

Trading in knockoff goods should be analogous to illegal music downloads, meaning that cheap handbag should cost you literally millions, according to the Jammie (Jamie?) Thomas disaster. - Richard pancakhaus Walker

LOL Dave, and this is where we obviously diverge in opinion. Business has been allowed to run so rampant over society in the last 20 years that it's caused a lot of problems. - Alex Scoble from IM

curious Alex: so the family of an arist should've benefit if a work is published posthumously if the work was finished on his deathbead? - Bastard Operator From FF

Yeah, I think if you read my comments, I'd like to have a fixed period of ownership (no longer than 30 years) rather than the system we have now...This would give families in the situation you propose some benefit from the works of a loved one. - Alex Scoble from IM

Sorry Alex missed it scrolling through... we're in agreement. - Bastard Operator From FF

Patents without an intent to market are even worse - Alex Scoble from IM

What is it Warren Buffet is doing he's left his kids "Enough money to do whatever they want and not enough that they can do nothing" - Bastard Operator From FF

Yeah, in my mind, corporations living off the teat of the dead is even a bigger problem than the "welfare rich" - Alex Scoble from IM

I feel like if *poof* all copyrights were over after 30years from origination there would be a lot of shitty movies in production in a year or two. Plus, I understand Disney is the devil and whatnot, but if a character (like Tinkerbell maybe) is still popular and stuff involving the character are still being produced, shouldn't that reinforce the copyright? Going back to Tolkien, LotR... more... - Heather

Heather if Popularity is a factor in copyright then Shakespeare and Dickens are still under copyright - Bastard Operator From FF

Heather, I think a law against shitty movies would be a great thing. - s t e v e

Hate to break it to you, but there are already a lot of shitty movies getting made. - Alex Scoble from IM

Do we need more? lol - Heather

And one could argue that new works that are derivative of previous works would be protected under new copyright - Alex Scoble from IM

LOL - Alex Scoble from IM

I'm all for peeling away copyright laws. In a totally unregulated world, copyright would not exist. - Victor Ganata

Apparently I thought this thread was dead, while y'alls comments were queuing up. My bad, I don't mean to talk AT the thread LOL - Richard pancakhaus Walker

Heather, just a bit of background on why Disney deserves derision - Mickey Mouse was ganked, cribbed, stolen, from Steamboat Willie, and much of their huge money makers are derivative of the Brothers Grimm, H.C. Anderson, etc. etc. Song of the South, though, is entirely original I think :) And what others have said about Mickey driving copyright extension is true. So, the fact that none... more... - Richard pancakhaus Walker

Heather, I think you're mixing trademarks (like the characters of Tinkerbell, Mickey Mouse, etc) with the copyrighted works they appear in. I don't think anyone is saying Disney should lose their trademarks, but IMO old works very well should have copyright expire. - Andrew C

Heather, 30 years from publication solves your problem nicely. A derivative work can get its own 30 year term, paying as appropriate to the work.it derived from - Richard pancakhaus Walker

By the way Alex, you've hit on my preferred solution exactly, with one small addition: rights of "authorship" can't be transferred meaning Yoko can't prevent a derivative Lennon work. That is Lennon's call only. Not inherited. The heirs to "Gone With the Wind" attempted and failed to prevent publication of a re-telling from the slave's perspective, "The Wind Done Gone". I know my Lessig :) - Richard pancakhaus Walker

Arleen, you should concede that you missed the point, that inheriting the right to profit from a REASONABLE copyright is not the issue. Lessig has written extensively on why the ridiculous, RETROACTIVE copyright extensions have perverted the intent of copyright, and created a monster, namely effectively perpetual copyright bought and sold by holding companies, trusts, and media conglomerates. And occasionally a Michael Jackson. - Richard pancakhaus Walker

I love this thread! by the way. - Richard pancakhaus Walker

Good for bringing up this important topic Alex. Copyright lasts way too long. Disney and mega corporations ought not hold sole creative license to remix these important works from the past. Copyright should not last past your death. That's just wrong. - Thomas Hawk

Why is it "just wrong"? There is as much to justify copyright being passed on to estates as chattel or property, Maybe copyright shouldn't exist at all? - Brian Sullivan

It's wrong because art needs to be recycled and prohibiting past creative efforts from becoming part of new creative efforts is harmful to art and the creativity that is possible. It puts limits in place that the artist has to deal with unnecessarily. Copyright is put into place as an incentive for people to create art. There is no need to extend that incentive on to the artists' children, grandchildren or businesses. All copyright should die with the artist. - Thomas Hawk

Copyright law needs a complete overhaul. Or more accurately, to be thrown out and rewritten wholesale. - Jim: Dead Like FF

well, some sort of right to the proceeds generated by one's efforts is warranted. If that could be accomplished without a set of laws, fine (I didn't read this whole thread... maybe something like that was proposed). - Jim: Dead Like FF

I agree. I also believe that once you are dead, your image (publicity rights) should belong to the ages... in other words, public domain. Amazingly, in Tennessee, publicity rights last forever... literally. - Mitch Featherston

Thomas -- your statement offers no argument -- just sentiment and bafflegab driven by emotiion. If intellectual property ownership exists at all as a concept there it seems most logical to treat it the same as all other property. Do people need incentive to create art? I think it is one of those have your cake and eat things. Basically you can't. - Brian Sullivan

Copyright ceases to be meaningful when it is allowed to be sold, assigned or passed to abstract entities - corporations with no accountability and a very long lifespan perspective. There are companies out there that do nothing but milk old pieces of music - they are ought of copyright in normal use, but the rights of use in film etc. are still held and charged at a premium. These companies are specialist at snatching those rights from failed projects, estates, and individuals and milking them. - Joelle Nebbe (iphigenie)

Intellectual property simply isn't the same as real and tangible property. At least, that's how the law stands now. - Victor Ganata

That's how it works now, but there's a bunch of authors who -more or less respectfully - dissent. This debate is as old as the public domain. - Laurent

Well, wouldn't someone just kill you to make your copyright expire then?? - Dave Hodson

Making intellectual property equivalent to real and tangible property requires state intervention, requires writing new laws. Copyright and patent rights don't exist without the government backing it up. This is clearly not laissez-faire. - Victor Ganata

The best solution is still probably a fixed term. Something like 20 years, regardless of whether the content creator is dead or alive. - Victor Ganata

Dave: you should write a book about this :) - Laurent

I have yet to see a convincing argument that copyright or "intellectual property" should exist at all. - Tanath

Sure it does Brian, my statement does offer an argument. I'm arguing that intellectual property should be treated different than tangible physical property. Ideas are just that. And I don't think that an idea ought to be transferable after someone's death to the detriment of the rest of society. That the benefit of transferring ideas intergenerationally is less than the benefit of allowing ideas to freely flourish unbridled by ownership for society as a whole. - Thomas Hawk

You seem to support the intergenerational transfer of copyrights Brian. Should copyrights be transferable intergenerationally forever if not why not? - Thomas Hawk

I think we should release this thread into the public domain. Because if you don't say otherwise, std. "all rights reserved" death+70 copyright term applies. Some legal minds think you can copyright as little as 5 words strung together. Now, does anyone still think copyright today is reasonable or sensible? - Richard pancakhaus Walker

This is the internet, remember? US law doesn't apply globally. :P And actually, common law copyright was thrown out in the US (see earlier in thread). - Tanath

Tanath, I realize that. But I'm not going to take your word for the second part. That is NOT my understanding of current law. You do not even need the little (c) anymore. - Richard pancakhaus Walker

You don't need the (c) but you DO need to register a work in order to properly pursue infringement cases. - Mitch Featherston

Common law copyright is the notion that copyrighted works ought to be treated the same as real and tangible property, which the Supreme Court repudiated in Wheaton v Peters in 1834. Common law copyright is also not valid in the UK, from what I understand. - Victor Ganata

Yes Mitch, my point. If we do not release this thread into the public domain, someone can steal it and register it. I'm just pointing out how ridiculously things have been stacked against common sense and the "public domain." - Richard pancakhaus Walker

Tanath, the thought is that if copyright and patents didn't exist, no one would ever feel compelled to publish anything. Scientific endeavors would slow down considerably as the flow of information would be hampered, and there'd be no way to get anything peer-reviewed. - Victor Ganata

Victor: How do you justify that claim? - Tanath

Tanath, I can't prove that it's true, but that's the idea behind it. But if there were no protections, I really do think the sharing of research would slow. It would be way too easy to steal someone else's ideas without crediting the originator, and credit for original research is basically the currency of academia. - Victor Ganata

Simple proof of "prior art" would fix that problem. Not that the copyright & patent system works perfectly for that function either. It was Tesla that invented the radio for instance, and only recently that it was acknowledged in court. - Tanath

Thomas -- I don't support any specific amount of time or number of generations a copyright is to apply. Once the principle of intellectual property is established in law as it is in western countries-- it will be subject to variances. Arguing for one length or another then becomes an emotional rather than a factual issue. I am thinking that the abolishing of the principle of intellectual property might be the ultimate solution. - Brian Sullivan

Tanath, it's true that copyrights and patents won't really deter anyone who is intent on stealing someone's idea, but without them, the aggrieved party would have absolutely no ability to attempt to gain redress. - Victor Ganata

Unfortunately, Lessig's supreme court case about copyright terms Eldred v. Ashcroft failed to impress the justices. http://www.wired.com/wired... I'm not very hopeful any of this can be remedied frankly. - Richard pancakhaus Walker

Here is a good TED video "Larry Lessig on laws that choke creativity" http://www.ted.com/talks... - Richard pancakhaus Walker

Brian, I doubt you'd ever see copyright abolished. I do think that someone ought to be able to exclusively earn money from their idea for a limited amount of time. But I think that a reasonable amount of time has been pushed to excessive lengths by big business copyright protectors like Walt Disney. I spent a summer working in Walt Disney's corporate legal department which was eye... more... - Thomas Hawk

I highly recommend Matt Mason's book The Pirate's Dilemma to almost anyone makes (or wants to make) a living from intellectual property http://thepiratesdilemma.com/ - Richard pancakhaus Walker

Victor: I don't think "stealing" is the right word. That applies to physical property where something is lost. What's wrong with letting everyone make use of everyone's ideas? I'd also recommend looking at The Pirate's Dilemma and Lessig's talks. - Tanath

Thomas - I had no idea you spent time in the belly of the beast. That's complete vindication of my suspicions. Thank you! - Richard pancakhaus Walker

I think one of the funny things about this conversation is the constant usage of Disney as the worlds worst offender here. For those of you who didn't know the character of Mickey Mouse was created by Ub Iwerks (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki...) and his rights owned by producer Charles Mintz. You could also say that Ub and Walt co-founded the Disney studios back in the day after... more... - Chris Greene

Yes Chris I mentioned Mickey being ganked in the "background on why Disney deserves derision" - Richard pancakhaus Walker

I just don't agree with the negative press they get. It's a two way street. If I create a character while working for Disney I expect them to own the rights to it. It's the price I pay for a regular paycheck instead of forging out on my own. John Lassiter isn't complaining that he doesn't own the rights to the "Brave Little Toaster" after he was fired from Disney for suggesting that... more... - Chris Greene

A lawyer working for a RIAA file sharing defendant recently made news with a radical challenge - "file sharing IS fair use" - Lessig thinks that's going too far - I'll follow up later if I find anything. - Richard pancakhaus Walker

Chris - you also are confusing copyright and trademarks. - Andrew C

Chris, I don't have a problem with "work for hire" - but people should be educated on what's theirs and what's the employer's, and what can be negotiated in the employment contract. - Richard pancakhaus Walker

"Copyright is a form of protection provided by the laws of the United States (title 17, U. S. Code) to the authors of “original works of authorship,” including literary, dramatic, musical, artistic, and certain other intellectual works."Firstly, copyright is a body of work so Steamboat Willy would be copyright, correct? That lead to the creation of the character and the trademarks that... more... - Chris Greene

No, the design of a character and the name is a trademark...that's a separate issue, however, I find it odd that I have no problems with a company or family being able to protect their trademarks in perpetuity. - Alex Scoble from IM

Richard - I am a working artist and I am very aware of what rights I have to property (intellectual or otherwise) I create under my current contract. If you are not aware of those rights you shouldn't be working for someone else. - Chris Greene

I'm skipping most of the comments, but tell me if this is right. 30 years after a book is written or movie is made, someone else could redo the work (changed names ect) and it would be legit "recycling" of art? So it's not really about Mickey Mouse, it's about the cartoons containing Mickey? - Heather

Chris - yeah, what Alex said. Steamboat Willy the cartoon is copyrighted. Mickey Mouse, the character appearing in that cartoon, is trademarked. - Andrew C

Andrew - That's what I said, not Alex. Look above. - Chris Greene

Alex, trademarks have to be defended, where copyrights don't, and trademarks can't be transferred. So it's not that odd, really. - Richard pancakhaus Walker

I'm glad to hear that Chris. Good for you. I suppose you have nothing to say to people contemplating such a line of work. They should just "know", hmm? - Richard pancakhaus Walker

Chris, my point is that copyright has always had a finite period, whereas trademarks can last in perpetuity. So just because the work has passed out of copyright doesn't mean the trademarks that came out of it have to as well. Also, preserving trademarks doesn't mean the associated works' copyright needs to last in perpetuity. And no, I was referring to Alex's comment that starts "No, the design of a character..." - Andrew C

Well if you;re asking for advice I can put a couple of things out there. First, make sure any original work you create on your own you copyright before you submit to anyone else for distribution marketing etc. As an artists you should know that any work you do while under contract to an employer or as a supplier becomes the property of the employer (or vendor). - Chris Greene

One of the research projects I worked for Disney on (now this goes back almost 20 years ago during college) was to research copyrighted works that had trademarked characters in them. I think copyright at the time might have been 50 or 60 years but trademark was 75 I think. Companies were releasing the oldest mickey mouse films and Disney was trying to argue that even though copyright... more... - Thomas Hawk

That's helpful, Chris. - Richard pancakhaus Walker

Fascinating, Thomas! - Richard pancakhaus Walker

I used to have to send out cease and desist letters also everyday from Disney. They would send them out over the stupidest little things. I remember having to send one out to a guy with a little tree cutting business. A solo practitioner who had put Mickey Mouse on his business card and someone had turned him in. My cease and desist letter would include an acknowledgment form that... more... - Thomas Hawk

Tanath, yeah, maybe stealing is the wrong word. I'm not trying to equate intellectual property with real, tangible property. I'm not sure what a good turn of phrase would be, though. In an environment where only original work can really guarantee your livelihood (i.e., tenure), I just can't imagine too many people wanting to freely share their ideas without any protections. The concept of prior art doesn't really exist without copyright and patent law. - Victor Ganata

That's very true, Victor - I was able to put some stuff in Creative Commons only because of those protections. I can share "non-commercial" rights and keep the other. - Richard pancakhaus Walker

Well, they vote! - Kreg Steppe

I agree! Apparently they can also be sued by the RIAA. - Logan Lindquist

Responding to a quote wayyy back in this thread (I had to leave for an hour or so, and things really kept rolling!): Tanath said: "Logical Extremes: Public policy is supposed to be about what benefits society, not individuals or companies & corporations." Actually, that's not quite true. (I know because I spent many many hours in seminars discussing writings and supreme court rulings on... more... - Mark "DerBingle" J

-cont.- Libertarians would have you think otherwise, of course, as though any 'public interest' is allowed to dominate. There are two flaws with that logic: First, the libertarians equate 'public interest' with 'government control' when, in fact, they can be diametrically opposed to each other; and second, the 'public interest' is often times best represented as a 'collection of... more... - Mark "DerBingle" J

Here's an article that's relevant: http://techdirt.com/article... "Why Virtual Property Doesn't Make Sense" - Tanath

FFing Enigma (aka Tina)

Why I love FriendFeed: I've gotten to see my friends fall in love, get married, and have babbies. I've tried to comfort friends who've lost those they love, and those battling for their lives. You are awesome people who just happen to post interesting stuff from around the web, not the other way around =)

August 16 - Comment - Like - Share

ravi karandeekar, Amy Flynn, Laura wishes you peace. and 84 other people liked this

Tina, wow. I've never really thought of that way before but you're right: we ARE awesome! - Akiva Moskovitz

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Please note: I said "awesome people", not "awesome sheep"... ;-) - FFing Enigma (aka Tina)

[crying while self-shearing] - Akiva Moskovitz

baa? - Tom Horn

Tom: hover over Akiva's name =) - FFing Enigma (aka Tina)

Ahh :). I was mostly being silly. Actually, I am mostly being silly. - Tom Horn

LOL! That's ok, because silly is also one of the reasons I love FriendFeed. And since Akiva is self-shearing I suppose he would make it into 'awesome' under the silly clause. - FFing Enigma (aka Tina)

As a self-shearing sheep, Akiva has guaranteed employment. - Spidra Webster

well said tina - (jeff)isageek

Tina, FF the awsome people's 'watering hole" :)- we share, just about everything, I think ! - Peter Dawson

That's why I love FriendFeed, too :D - joey

:) - Josh Haley

Ohh thank you :) - Melissa Taylor

Totally agreed, Tina. Just want to thank everyone again for all the well-wishes for Harold's & my engagement. The response went far beyond what I expected :) That's part of why I love this place, too. On Facebook, I barely caused a blip of response (granted, I spend very little time over there). Even the GReader people that just met me were supportive! I love all of you guys! *group hug* - Kamilah Gill

You too, Tina! *hugs - Shevonne

Kamilah, I loved that you and Harold both posted the announcement at the same time. It was like your own personal moment of win =D - FFing Enigma (aka Tina)

Hooray for us! - Mark Essel

Tina, you nailed what it's all about Girl!! The world is better because we share more, communicate more... we love more... more different people we've come to know, love more deeply those we already know, and know one another to levels that were previously not possible. Aloha! - Arleen Anderson

:) You and FF are the best! - Tracy Benham

Yeahhhh for Tina ,,, !!!!!!! - johnpiercy

Group Hug indeed!! <3 - jcunwired

Myrna to Myrna's feed, Foods, friendf00d

The Rubix Cubewich (via http://friendfeed.com/foods...) cute idea

August 6 - Comment - Like - Share

Mustafa ♮ Sadedil, mahyar, welee and 65 other people liked this

Very interesting :-) *now me thinks: how to make it without meat*...hm...? ;-) - Hanna Wiszniewska

21 more comments

I'm about to vom-bomb. Going to hide this entry. - Johnny

more different cheeses, but please please do'nt ruin the beauty of it with *shudders* tofu.. - Rasmus Lauridsen

you can also add more colours with some vegetable (spinach, potato, peppers, etc.) frittata/omelette cubes. The original is really nice & yummy though :-> - Stefaniav

You could make that with tofu or jello too. - Adrian

The cubes are perfect, I'm still astonished - Stefaniav

Thanks for the suggestion Adrian :-) - Hanna Wiszniewska

Hanna, what about switching meat for tempeh? Wonder if Rasmus shudders from tempeh lol but anyway, its your cubewich to do with it what you want. :))) - Myrna

beautiful - sorina_gt

Looks awesome although you will need a very big mouth in order to eat it :-) - outofmyarse

Very classy. I could spend hours rearraging the cubes. Hey! New dieting idea. - Bob

I can help solve this puzzle! *pulls all the ham pieces out* - Daynah

LOL Daynah, what about the other meat. It has the chemical preservatives...ugly causes cancer. And what to put instead? - Myrna

Never tried Tempeh, I might have to go hunting for it. Anyone know a store in Denmark that carries it? - Rasmus Lauridsen

Try an Indonesian, Malaysian or Thai market. - Bob from email

Awesome! - Mitchell Tsai

Do I detect some Spam in that? - Arleen Anderson

Rasmus, you know what tempeh is, yes? Of course you have health food stores? - Myrna

Yeah I wikipedia'd it :-P So yeah I'll have to try the local health food stores - Rasmus Lauridsen

رونوشت به خودم :) - 1Fathi

Great idea! I would love to make this with vegetables!! I don't now how though:) - Konstantina (exei gousto)

or with fruits?.. - AgentRouge

Konstantina, I can think of boiled sweet potatoes and pumpkin as some of the vegetables that can be cut in such cubes O_o also carrots maybe... and definitely more cheese. plus some mangoes?.. - AgentRouge

Louis Gray

I used to always hide Tweets unless they had likes or comments. Today I unhid them in FriendFeed. Let the noise ensue.

July 11 - Comment - Like - Share

Alex Scoble, Mac Sharp, Aviva Gabriel and 46 other people liked this

Why did I do this? Because I was missing the occasional nugget from people I like hearing from. Now, we'll see if this helps or hurts. - Louis Gray

24 more comments

Overall, I've enjoyed the random bits of fun that pop in from the noise by not hiding anything. I kind of dig letting all the information just wash over me. - Jon, the Chilled Beartato

I've gone back and forth over it but I eventually decided to let tweets in and then began permanently hiding the irritating ones. After a little tweaking, it ended up being a better experience for me. I've actually quit Twitter entirely now thanks to some suggestions from Johnny Worthington: I subscribe to a feed of any @replies I get and pipe them into FriendFeed's IM alerts so I can respond to them if I want to. - Akiva Moskovitz

i'll give it a shot... ;) I had 14 hidden entries on my home page feed, now none. We'll see how it goes. #IBlameLouisUnhidingInFriendFeed - Nathan Chase

I wish you luck, Nathan. - Louis Gray

I let the tweets stay in. Well over half are @ replies which are nonsensical out of context, but there is the occasional gem. Unfortunately most of the time if I comment on the gem, the original tweeter never responds the comment. There are a largish number of neglected friendfeed accounts. - DGentry

Well I had them hidden, had not even been allowing my own to show, but after a conversation with, ahem, someone else, I changed my tune. Then I started paying attention to others twitters too! - Sheryl

I'm so active on Twitter that I don't pay attention to whether or what comes to FF really. I see tweets from people here after I've responded to them there. Some of my tweets come here and some don't. Not sure why, but not a big enough deal to investigate either. I get lots of stream lots of places. - Ken Camp

I let them stay in as well. Things go by quick enough they don't bother me. Plus the top stuff moves to the top naturally. That's the beauty of ff! - tomit from iPhone

I recognize that intelligent comments worthy of discussion can be tweeted by people who don't wish to type (or in my case, since I use a Tablet PC, write) things twice. This is why I have never automatically hidden tweets. - MiniMage TKDteacher of FF

Is there really a difference between a tweet and native FriendFeed post? - Hutch Carpenter

:0 - chaz2b

Hutch, there is typically a massive difference between a tweet and a native FriendFeed post. In this example, there is less, but native FriendFeed posts are geared toward conversation starting, while Twitter updates are for conversation ending. FriendFeed native posts also contain images, and show the person is here and active on the site, not just broadcasting. - Louis Gray

sounds like some good information. - Ray Marr aka Knatchwa from IM

Guess it depends on the person if they're doin' some conversation ending. Do they end tweets with kthxbai? Glad you're not doing a blanket hide on tweets though. There's some good stuff out there. - Hutch Carpenter

I use Twitter as a conversation starter: I guess I'm doing it wrong. I'm not convinced that the difference between Twitter and FriendFeed posts is that massive now: with the removal of service icons, it's very hard to tell which is a regular FriendFeed post and which came from Twitter, and a lot of people don't bother putting in pictures or other rich media with their native FriendFeed posts anymore. - Mark Trapp

same thing here. should be a default in friendfeed - Ouriel Ohayon

Mark - those are good points. The @reply tweets can be annoying, but generally there isn't a massive difference between a tweet and native post. Is there an option to not see @replies? - Hutch Carpenter

Not currently, but people are always requesting it in FriendFeed Feedback. I bet you could use a saved search to filter out @replies. Edit: never mind, it looks like searching for @ either is ignored or breaks search. That stinks. - Mark Trapp

@Louis: I'd actually like to start conversations with my tweets. Doesn't really happen, though. - MiniMage TKDteacher of FF

MiniMage stole my thunder. Although, I am more and more starting the conversation from Friendfeed and then bouncing to Twitter and back to Friendfeed. - Mathew A. Koeneker

And so it begins... FriendFeed will truly compete with Twitter! When Robert Scoble told me I shouldn't turn off my Twitter interface... I hesitated and often did, until last week. Hope I don't drive everyone here crazy! Big Mahalo for support and encouragement on FriendFeed! (and Louis For God's Sake... show me your web interface!) - Arleen Anderson

Arleen, how can I show you my Web interface? You mean lists and what friends are where? What I use to find the best data? - Louis Gray

I think the speed of the realtime friendfeed makes noisome feeds such as twitter far less intrusive. What once was perceived as noise now forms part of the shape of the stream. - Slappy Line

Yay! Twitter is really my only way to post in FF these days. Once school is done, you can re-hide Twitter, Louis. ;-) - Lisa L. Seifert

Wondering how to hide tweets directly in Twitter...I use Twitter's web interface (not third-party interfaces) most of the time... Anyone know how? - Aviva Gabriel

Leo Laporte

I left Twitter for Jaiku. Then Jaiku left me for Google. I moved in with Pownce but it died. I went back to Twitter, but flirted with Plurk, Identica, and Rejaw, and even tried doing it myself with Laconica but it was Twitter I really loved. Twitter finally broke my heart so I left it for Friendfeed. Now Friendfeed is leaving me for Facebook. No...

August 11 - Comment - Like - Share

Christine Chan, david beckwith, Adnan and 437 other people liked this

It's like the internet version of Days of Our Lives - Jon, the Chilled Beartato

94 more comments

HAHAHAHAHA.... - David from IM

Haha. ROFL - Roberto Bonini

is friendfeed going anywhere or will it just get better? - Craig Shipp

I'm with you Leo. - Oracio

It reads better than Soap - my roadmap is very similar but I'll forgive FF and live happily ever after with it (for the time being, anyway) - Nicholas Paul Gordon from iPhone

You're the best Leo. Canadians are the funniest people. - Dan Lessard

I'm betting they'll slowly digest it into the Facebook news feed. They claim that Friendfeed is staying put for now, but that won't last. - Ken Bauer

And we keep following Leo all over the place! - Robert Scoble

Long live Leo - Randy Pollock

When will we all get in a long term relationship and stop getting our hearts broken? - Nate Pilling

so what is more important, the medium or the people, hope that FF will let us export our content, and our social netork :) (in my wild dreams) - abdellah

Need ice cream? I'm new to FF, and kind of sad I didn't jump on the proverbial wagon sooner! - Elizabeth K. Barone

I hope you leave your standard breadcrumbs so we can find you in the next chapter of social interaction. - jcunwired

Feels to me like maybe it's time to go back to building a distributed network, rather than hopping from service to service. - Ken Sheppardson

But where to next? That's the question. Wave sounds great, but the implementation will be a PAIN. So where? Oh LeoMoses...where is our path in the desert? - ‘-.-’ Tutivillus Grift

Sounds like a hurtin' country song in the making. - Bill Rodman

The wave of the future is wave - Randy Pollock

Well you can't say that what is happening in the 'social sphere' is boring by any means! - Matt Cassem

I think Leo's audience is more likely to click "Like" or "comment" than Scoble's is. When Leo and Rob are both posting on FF, Leo gets more likes and comments - Mark

Didn't you leave a post earlier saying how funny it was that people complain anytime there's a change (referring to the FF buyout)? This sounds like a complaint to me. - Fleagle

Not complaining - just thinking about the future. I think a little Friendfeed DNA will vastly improve Facebook. And I think Facebook is already the big winner with the general populace. I also think we geeks need a corner somewhere else to hang out in. - Leo Laporte

And I have no plans to leave Friendfeed. Yet. - Leo Laporte

Yet being the operative word..... - Roberto Bonini

sounds like a country song to me - gavin

As for this geeky alternative, http://a.tinythread.com/ just showed up in my feed this morning. Thoughts? - Craig B.

I feel more of a personal connection with the FriendFeed team than I have with other services I've left, and that will be a big part of why I will stay as long as possible. - Louis Gray

^^^ replace "team" with "community" and there's my reason for sticking it out. - jcunwired

Its also going to take a very long time to go through content and bookmark/store it elsewhere. Evernote is going to be used heavily in the weeks to come. - jcunwired

The only way to have control is to use your own URL - Craig Shipp

Wait till you meet Facebook's randy cousin Overly Friendly Book =) - Cynthia Yildirim

what Louis gray said. I'm going to hang around until the lights go out. - Jordan Brock from BuddyFeed

What they said, I don't see any reason to leave FriendFeed unless something actually changes that makes the service worthless to me. - Craig B.

And many times you cheated Twitter, she was always loyal to you. Thats mean someting! - Jacque from f2p

yup me too Louis and I don't know any of them - Thomas Power

Plurk's not worth leaving anyone for. - Rachel R.

Leo, I think you need to change your FaceFeed status to "It's Complicated" ;) - Daynah

Play this thread off, keyboard cat. - Fleagle

You have to go back to your blog. It still loves you Leo. - Dave Winer

Screw you, Friendfeed! - Andrew Leahey

Users today are investors too - only the 'exit' for us is not lucrative.... its the other way sometimes :) - Mrinal Desai

I just had the idea: wow, how good will Faceboook become though this input? (JUST imagine tagging ppl in FB the way U can Tag them in FF.) - oliver gassner

Love Stinks. - shelter watch

I'm quite surprised that you could keep track of all that! - Robert Alex

Leo Laporte listed his relationship as: "its complicated." - Randy Shapiro

Damn thats complicated - drmacintosh

Don't worry Leo, its not you, its them... - Steven McGurn

so where do we go now? - Brian Appleby

I agree with Jonathan Hardesty "It's like the internet version of Days of Our Lives" - And sites keep getting killed off only to come back to life a month later! - Amy Flynn

very true, however on the other hand, we are getting closer to that one service which everyone will be on... and I dont think twitter is going to be that one - Bryce Campbell

Facebook buying FriendFeed is like having to MOVE just when you got your house all dressed up and made into a comfy HOME! I don't feel like doing it again! - Arleen Anderson

Now that Facebook and Friendfeed have married, I'm waiting for Twitfacefeedplebospacening. - Anthony Marco

You all just have ants in your pants :) - Jeunelle Foster

Leo, u by your self made two companies (services) out of 3 famous and made Google interested enough to buy 2 of them (Jaiku & FF). Google also tried to flirt with Twitter as well. So which one u choose now? Cause we will follow u :P - Sam Ehsan

Sounds like some of my past love affairs. Of course, I'm married now. That, um, was prior. - Paul Chaney

lmfao, its so true leo, so true! - Derek Bender

Feeling a bit worn around the edges? ... me too! - Susan Beebe from iPhone

Speaking of Days Of Our Lives: Didn't that show jump the shark when the serial killer was unmasked as Marlena (a character I used to have a mad crush on, and who's now mostly a professional victim)? Then all the "killed" characters came back to life, since they were only what I call "soap opera dead"... - Dennis Jernberg

And if everyone follows you, then your all having affairs all over the place! LOL - Sandra Large

I think it's back to the TWiT Army! - Paul Salzman

It's not like we have proposed Healthcare reform, or anything really important, going on in the U.S.A. - Steve de Mena

it's getting ridiculous, FEDERATED is the word! - Dobromir Hadzhiev

who is actually leaving FF? have many people vowed to do so yet? I'd like to but there isn't any alternative. - Denise Young

the joys and sorrows of everyday social IT folks... :-) - Thomas Lee

People are talking a lot about Streamy today. Might be an alternative. - Caio Cesar

Streamy seems to be crashing left & right tho. - Rick Cogley

Not to mention Pownce was shutdown as soon as it got good! - Kenneth Reitz

No mention of Microsoft Vine? - Robert MacEwan

yep. welcome to another episode of; As the Stomach Turns. one big soap opera. - Scratch5150

I've decided I'm not going to tell ANYONE which site I'm favoring... not even myself! I swear! As soon as I decided that FF was my new place (a couple months ago) THIS happens! It's like magic, but in a bad bad way... - Mark "DerBingle" J

Why do we all assume this is a bad thing? Maybe the FF Facebook combo will be better?? - Craig Shipp

Maybe they'll keep both open -- FF is the open side, and FB is the closed side. - John Flinchbaugh from IM

Social Networks are sluts? - TheDiva Rockin

It sure is. - Jason Hill

I know exactly how you feel. What's a person to do? I am mad at Twitter for suspending some of my accounts. First, the accounts kept causing the password to reset, then they were suspended, all around the time of the DOS attacks. All I ever used Twitter for was to advertise my businesses, and for fun. Now I don't know where to go. - DogPatch

Here's some thoughts on what's going to happen:http://kennethreitz.com/blog... - Kenneth Reitz

It's like my beloved Archie comics romantic twists from childhood! Archie loves Veronica who loves Reggie who loves Betty who loves Archie... ;) - Shawn Zehnder Lea

More like "As the worm churns" - Houseofmax

한글 와서~ 루거 .. 당신은 정말 잘 생기고있다 누드 사진 기다리다 :] - HealingBrush

One of the funniest sad stories I've heard in a long time... - Aviva Gabriel

Gotta find one who is a lady in public and a whore in the bedroom. One who looks like a woman, but thinks like a man. One who tells you you're the only person in their world and worships the ground you walk on. One who's from Venus but want's to live on Mars. One who you know will always be there even when the chips are down. One who looks like a movie star, but doesn't bust the credit... more... - Jan Simmonds

I think a lot of people LOVE to think negatively and don't want to think positively. They think FB is BAD and will ruin FF, but I think if they do it well, FB won't be the bad guy. I think most people who are irked about this are irked because they think the FFers "sold out" to the "man". - Molly, "sorry"

@Mollyanna - I disagree. I am irked because the future of FF is completely uncertain. It's more likely that FB will let FF flounder and close it down than it is that FB will invest time and resources in maintaining and enhancing FF. FB has other interests and is splitting up the FF dev team. That does not bode well for FF. I don't begrudge the FF devs for taking the money. I would be... more... - Fa La La La Lindsay

Leo, I hope you mention FriendFeed in your Dubai TED talk ! :) I'll try to be there ! - Ahsan Ali aka. Slick

@Jan You're an asshat. - Ian Wright from BuddyFeed

leo, check out Streamy.com. I'm actually commenting to friendfeed from there right now...you may like it better. - Casey Petersen

looooool =)) - ★amin.m★

Haiku Laporte - Outsanity

that was cute! :O) - Jeanne

@ian - "Wordsmith. Public relations undergraduate at The University of Texas. Feminist Capitalist. WordPress geek. Future commercial rights attorney"...surely that kind of asinine comment is beneath you! - Jan Simmonds

Maybe they're just not that into you. - Elizabeth Johnson

Wait... who's on first? - Michael Rosenau

Logged in to suggest that many of us have tridden a similar path, but a lot of people have beaten me to it! I miss Pownce - SpionKopRed

wow, Leo. You've got relationship issues! - Justin Bradshaw

there there, Shawny's here... - sofarsoShawn

I sense a pattern here.. maybe you always seem to go after web2.0 services that are bent on ditching you :) - Shivanand Velmurugan

Paul Buchheit

After signing the papers :)

August 10 - Comment - Like - Share

Ozer Wrzl (EN), can catalyurek, Pelikan® and 495 other people liked this

hide - jcunwired

148 more comments

What's with the fists, Paul? :) - April Buchheit

congrats Paul - Zee.

I thought it would make a funny picture April. - Paul Buchheit

Secret backyard meetings FTW. :) - EricaJoy

What? No lawyers in suits? Mark's setting a pretty low bar on the dress code for this sort of thing...:) - Tomas Remotigue

Our lawyers were wearing shorts actually -- no air conditioning at their office on Sundays I guess. - Paul Buchheit

Zuckerberg's the only one from FB who could be bothered to show up? - Andy Bakun

American big business such a formal affair - Robert Higgins

Contrary to popular misconception, lawyers don't actually enjoy wearing suits. Haul us into work on a Sunday, and we'll definitely be dressing comfortably. :) - Brian Chang

Andy, the person on the left is Vaughan Smith from Facebook. Sanjeev (the fourth FriendFeed founder) is not pictured because he was boarding an airplane. - Paul Buchheit

Paul, that's so awesome. FB's an awesome company to do business with. - Jesse Stay

Congrats. Happy for you guys. - Tsega Dinka

Must have been exciting, congrats. - sean percival

Congrats, and thanks for having us here. Much success in whatever comes next. - Chris Baskind

Yeah, wishing you guys all the best, its been good fun hanging around here thanks!! - Mel Buckpitt

Congrats to you guys! - Jack Wilson, K4SAC

Congratulations you guys!!!! I love the Teak Conference Room table :) - Susan Beebe

:-( - Jim: Dead Like FF

Hey Paul congratulations - FriendFeed has been leading the way since its inception. Are the photos you've posted copy-protected or could I use them in a story on the deal? - Mitch

Mitch, feel free to use the photos. - Paul Buchheit

where's the ...friendfeed shirts then?? ;o) - Rob Sellen :o)

SWEET!!! Congratulations! - Chad Lester

...congrats.can't wait to see what happens with both FF and FB as a result of this. - .LAG liked that

Please try to keep Friendfeed like it was if they let you. Either way, congrats on the financials! - Josh Haley from iPhone

Congrats and best wishes for the future. - Jeff Stannard

For $50m you could at least have hired a photographer who doesn't shake so much. :) - Rodrigo Jaroszewski

FF was the cutting edge whereas FB is quickly becoming the mainstream. Unfortunately, the mainstream does not necessarily equal innovation and pushing the envelope. We all suffer when innovation is chilled. But on the other hand, congrats to the FF crew. They made their money! - laosan

Congratulations guys! - Diego Barros 

I think the Tiger suit would have been more appropriate! But hey....shorts in a backyard is pretty cool too. - Drea Lester

Congrats! - Christopher Golda

Whatever the outcome, Friendfeed is terrific. Congratulations. - ashish

LOL, click through if you want to see pics of newly rich geeks in casual wear.. -> - Alex Schleber

Hahaha! Funny Alex.. - Bill Heslin

congratulations! keep the innovation coming... - ozlubling

VERY happy for you guys. Possibly even owe you one or two. Are we getting FriendPhone next?? Think Mark should seriously think about 'Friendbook' :) - Charlie Anzman

Congratulations to you and your team. - Maria Niles

just showed the pictures to my students and they were like, "they look like normal people!" Congrats on the deal, onward and upward! - xxx xxxxx

Congratulations, Paul -- to you and everybody at FF. - Eric Johnson

Congrats Paul, Bret and the rest of the team, this is awesome news! The big question on everyone's lips is: Who gets to have http://facebook.com/paul? :) - Fenn

Congrats, and thanks for taking us all on such a terrific ride! Big ups. :) - Pete Delucchi

You've done a great job! You deserve this and more... Congrats! - Ricardo J. Valle

now this is what a deal term meeting should look like - file under inspirational - - mediaeater

Congratulations to everyone at FF. Whose house was the deal made? - seman

I am sad .. !!! I do not know .. why .. for me its not good news - Nayan

Congratulations! - Made Adi

++Mark - David Cook

Awesome! Congratulations! - michael silverton

hey, congratus Friendfeed team!!! - K.D.

+Lindsey - Kamilah Gill

I call this pic... "Six Happy Dudes & 1,000,000+ Pissed-Off FriendFeeders" - Brad Williamson

BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO OOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!!! - Mathew™ one of a kind

Looks like Mathew™ has found a UI bug by flooding contiguous characters. - Jay Cuthrell

I don't get the negativity - did no one realize FriendFeed was a business? The object of a business is to sell eventually (either privately or publicly). We should be celebrating their success. This is a huge win for them, as well as Facebook. I personally think it's a huge win for the "loyal users" as well. So now we stab them in the back when they do something huge? - Jesse Stay

Not to mention we know *nothing* about what this will mean for both services. These guys haven't let us down yet, have they? - Jesse Stay

Congratulations to all of you!! - Steve de Mena

The FB/FF deal rocks. Total win for users and developers. - Steve Gillmor

Facebook announces the acquisition of FriendFeed http://facebookmania.net/en... - Vincenzo Piromalli

Congratulations guys.. and good luck! ;) - Vincenzo Piromalli

Congratulations Paul. I hope for nothing but the best for you and FF. - Martha

We should start a PhotoShop meme on this. - Ben Hanten

Millionaire meme - Bill Heslin

Lindsey, I'm with you completely. Bad timing. Too bad there weren't photos of money being thrown in the air. - Ben Hanten

++Ben - David Cook

Congratulations Paul, you should have got more, but I guess $50m is nothing to sneeze at. Have a great wedding anniversary too, I'm sure you both deserve it. Much happiness - :) - Chris Loft

Congrats! The hard work paid off - Becca

Those are the kind of business meetings I could get used to - no suits... but selling to Facebook? Hmmm... Good for someone of course but I suppose we'll see where this ride takes us. - Ken Stewart | ChangeForge

congrats on building an amazing product and incredibly passionate community! I was mad at first, but then realize that the technology was most likely sold, not the community. I'm hoping ff community will stay somewhat untouched and features that have been built into ff will be ported to fb. - Derek Coatney

Congratulations, FriendFeeders! I'm anxious to see what changes this will bring. FriendFeed is my favorite site to visit, so hopefully y'all will find a way to maintain the FF spirit somehow. - Keith Pelczarski

http://friendfeed.com/against... - Mathew™ one of a kind

No matter the type of big change, there are those who will not like it, often simply because it's change. I for one am very pleased that two of the services I use most are joining forces, and am eager to see the new developments that come of this acquisition. Congrats to EVERYONE on the FriendFeed team. You all deserve it! You've done a great job with a small company. Now lets see what you can do with a large one :) - guruvan (Rob Nelson)

Nicely put, guruvan. - Anne Bouey

What I wonder is ... a 50-million dollar deal and no one has a camera capable of taking a clear photo? :P - Nicholas Kreidberg

Congratulations - Steve C

@Jesse Stay re: "the objective of business is to sell eventually" : Ummm, the objective of many businesses is to become profitable by providing a valuable experience to their users. Businesses that feel they can't do that are the ones that sell. - Shane Gibbons

LOL! ♫ ♫ "ooh, take the money and run"!! ♫ ♫ ;) - Vincenzo Piromalli

Congratulations to everyone involved. Well done. - Darius Dunlap

This is a very sad day in friend feed history. It is horrible because I like friend feed for how it's different from face book. I use facebook but I find it really annoying and I wouldn't use it if my friends and family weren't using it. So if Friend Feed becomes another facebook then i donno if I will keep coming to friend feed. - Colide81 (James) from iPhone

Grats. :) - Joshua Schnell

Congrats to the FF staff, but you'll have to pardon my lack of exuberance. I have mental pictures of being forced to use the FB UI and it makes me sad =( - FFing Enigma (aka Tina)

Very happy for the Friendfeed team. These pictures say it all. - Christian Burns from iPhone

Congrats -- may the FF UI stay alive! - RateBrain

Where are the photos of everyone celebrating? No beer or champagne? - Shane

Great match-up guys ! The Fabulous Friender Boys ! - Let's see some integrated mashups and extensible apps and FF UI. Given Google and Twitter a run for their money... Looks like they are going to have to "hook-up" now ! - Mike Schmidt

Congratulations Paul and the team! Hopefully we'll still get the same simple UI for FriendFeed. I'm sure however that no matter what you do, things will turn up nicely. - Ovidiu Predescu

Enjoy! - Paul Mayne

NOOOOO! I _LOVE_ friendFeed and this will change it forever. Yeah - this will improve Facebook. Great deal guys - I can not wait to see how this works out - Ric Johnson

Congratulations! :) - İdris Cin

hayırlı olsun - Sinan İŞLER

:O :( - ★amin.m★

congratulations to both parties. intuitively, it feels like the right move. - ray

Congratulations guys :) - Yalcin Parmaksiz

So the deal was done at night in someone's back yard. Weird. - Andy C

Congrats Paul, Bret and the rest of the FF team. Your smiles are priceless!! - Mohamed J

Hayırlı işler... - Onur Selek

Congratulations gentlemen! - Mutimba

Congratulations Paul. Yes, I do hope Friendfeed users and community are "treated right". - Paola Bonomo

shit all FF VC's and CO-FOUNDERS! YOU DID THE SHIT! you can safely accept all spam "app" invitations on FB. - Ahmet Alp Balkan

Ahmet: I'm disappointed to even be on the same service as you and I really can't wait until you leave. - Robert Scoble

Congrats! Maybe you'll make FB usable again... - Eran Kampf from iPhone

cngrtlti.ons I hope you will understand what i mean! - Atif UNALDI

Great vibe :) - Sharel from FriendFeed API Example

@Scobleizer: Come on you're a genius and can not realize future of FF? Turkey was one of important countries which is using FF! They asked no one about this! We hate fcking morons and stupid people on facebook, and I'm sure that this post will be real, just read it: http://ff.im/6pRmM - Ahmet Alp Balkan

But Ahmed you are still being an ass about it, trying to rain on their good times. Go find a hole under the bridge where you belong. You can be sad and not have to come out all bitchy about stuff. Clear thoughtful comments instead of going all into "fuck you" mode. - Rasmus Lauridsen

OK, that's great. I hope you can be successful at Facebook Dev Team and enjoy spending that money. - Ahmet Alp Balkan

Ahmet: I hope this helps with your inquiry -> http://friendfeed.com/about... - Clifford Kennedy

@Clifford, haha LOL. - Ahmet Alp Balkan

Bilseydik biz alırdık :) - Hamdi Yaman

wohoo, lets celebrate that ff owners for selling the land they have hired us - now we have to find another place - MobilAdam

very nice FF! Amazing team! - @RecruitingDiva - Sangeeta Narayan

valla kelepire gitmiş, fotoğraflardan belli.. - Mücahit Yılmaz

Who took the pic? - Marco Massarotto from iPhone

@MobilAdam + 1. - Ahmet Alp Balkan

@Mücahit +1 :D - Hamdi Yaman

böyle önemli bir iş için fiyat açıklanmadı ama 50 milyon $ deniyor. Bu kadar lakayt bir ortam olur mu yau. Uzaktan baksan gençler eğleniyor dersin - Fatih Hayrioğlu

Şİmdi yorumları okumadım ama çok kişisel bişi söyleyeceğim. Bu gençlerin milyon dolarları çeviriyor olması durumuna şaşıyorum. Bizim memlekette bu seviyeye gelecek mi veya? Kaç sen uzaktalar bizden bu gençler? - mustafa can

Bizim şirket sahipleri konunun belli saatler arasında, belli kıyafetlerle ofiste oturmak değil, yapılan işin niteliği olduğunu analdıkları zaman gelir tabii. Ama bence bu gavurların dediği gibi "When the hell freezes over". - özlem ercan

bu postu türkçe commentlerle doldrmak süper fikir.. sarcasm diil ciddiyim - MobilAdam

Bakmayın böyle güldüklerine arkada buyuk yatırımcılar olmasa batar gider bunlar..Adamların yatırımcıları işi biliyor... - Zeki Pehlivan

tebrikler.congratulations.gratuliere !!! - muratt

Sorry but as an FF user, I've just tried to express my thoughts about this acquisition: http://fc07.deviantart.com/fs46... - İbrahim Özdemir

Congratulations! :) - Ruben Sanchez

Great result Paul. In such a short time, millions of users, 1 new interface and a marriage with internets' celebrity. This is a period which you should write down to make it as an on-line business case. You people are really wise businessmen. Nice job, congrats! :) - Olcayto Cengiz

Not happy happy congrats bullshit from me-I used FF. - frankiecarl

Frankie, a lot of us use FriendFeed and are concerned about where things are going from here. As I said in my comment above: I'm happy for the staff but displeased with who they chose to sell to. I'm perfectly capable of feeling both emotions at the same time. - FFing Enigma (aka Tina)

@Tina ++++ - Shevonne

wonderful so normal so ordinary so simple - Thomas Power

MZ looks like he has just returned from the gym - Joe Dawson

These guys represent the most talked about entreprises (Ok even more so by geeks in the case of Friendfeed) and they're still in their 20s. We're talking millions of dollars and look how relax they look and casually they're dressed. - lelapin

Awesome, nice to see they are actually in fact human still. - Robert Schultz

Congratulations, Paul! - Bill Sodeman

Great photographs showing the very reason why 99% of all people start their own business - money! Well done and good luck for the future. - David Jagger

this is so great! congrats paul! im really happy for u guys! - Jason Pollock

congratulations guys! - Liam Daly

congratulations from me, too! mind to stay (y)ourselves. ;) - Valentina*

L-O-V-E the attire, guys. Did you end the evening with a nice barbecue and a dip in the pool? - Giulia B.

Yeah yeah, you worked hard, you got the payout, well done guys. Now. Down to business....where's OUR share? ;-) - Slappy Line

"Hi my name is Mark, I do $50m deals in my shorts!" - Simon May

Congratulations. I'm sad for us and extremely happy for you and your team. - Arleen Anderson

congratulations...can't wait to see the success of the collaboration! - Katy Barrilleaux

We better run away! - Constantine

Congratulations. I'm sure that this acquisition will be beneficial for both parties. - Volkan Özçelik

the one in the green shirt is hawt. just sayin'. - Jessie

eew, that causes diseases - Jim Norris

congrats Paul & evereyone ! - Thomas Mader

Is that Mel sitting on Paul's left? http://www.youtube.com/watch... - j1m

CHA CHING!!!!! - sofarsoShawn

congrats guys - well done!!! - Gerd Leonhard

supper! - Ahmet Koldaguc

Business is Business and we can only move forward with social-media applications as we herald a new interactive platform. Albeit thanks to the Mothers of all Mothers, Google. Frank Burns - frank burns

Alex Scoble

Is it wrong for me to feel a certain sense of betrayal? I didn't spend all my time here making connections, adding in interesting content and trying to get friends to join so that friendfeed would get acquired by Facebook.

August 10 - Comment - Like - Share

Kim, sofarsoShawn, Mitchell Tsai and 168 other people liked this

I guess I should be glad that I made a bunch of new friends here and have learned a lot, but I just wish that the guys at friendfeed hadn't sold out to a company that doesn't really need what friendfeed has. - Alex Scoble

91 more comments

I think betrayal is the word of the day around here. - Akiva Moskovitz

EXACTLY! - Kandeezie

Damn. Just heard.... Not sure what I think yet, but I worry about the openness of my info and postings. - Mark Aitken

You guys amuse me. - Cristo

Meh - Andrew Roche

Whatever, Chris, I'm not amused. - Alex Scoble from IM

@Alex: I completely agree... and I haven't been and won't ever be on Facebook... - Harold

not wrong at all. I actually feel a little hurt. - Jim: Dead Like FF

Yeah, I think betrayed is a good description... - Fa La La La Lindsay

But let's be honest, they built this to make money and survive. Gotta say I'm pleased it's shown to be worth something, and I'm guessing a significant something for FB to acquire them. Wonder if they were offered shares in FB as part of the deal? - Mark Aitken

I guess we are all betrayed - in certain terms.. but FB should have done its market research before it got this property. Most of the USERS are not happy with FB type of connections or that property , so we left and looked for something better, it was FF. Now a new hunt will begin ! - Peter Dawson

I think a lot of us feel betrayed. - Mathew™ one of a kind

What did you do it for then? - George F. Snell III

I think it's too soon to feel betrayed. This interview made me feel a lot better about the whole deal: http://bit.ly/PReef - Adam Reyher from Alert Thingy

actually, you kinda did. if users like you didn't create so much value, Facebook wouldn't have acquired (notwithstanding feelings of betrayal). - jeffscott

Yeah. That's excatly how I feel. - Roberto Bonini from iPhone

Throws a sheep at Alex... Yeah, that wasn't much fun. - Mark Davidson from BuddyFeed

I share your sentiments in many ways. I have been proud to tell others who had no idea that FF existed how good it is (lets hope not was!) Lets hope they keep the spirit alive. By the way the minute I see any target 'phorm' style advertising, I am off to find a new up and coming. I wont run to Tumblr yet but I do have one foot in already, just in case. - Kevin J Hatton

My immediate reaction was Facebook will push ads onto their users. I think FriendFeed could be seriously screwed up with live moving ads, so that's hopefully out of the picture from a purely usability view. Friendfeed is all about realtime web information. I then wonder how in that case will the monetise the relationship. My guess? Facebook will show live conversations and hopefully they will rip out the poor IM implementation in Facebook. The purchase may be nothing more sinister, I hope... - Mark Aitken

Feeling a bit of betrayal, or unhappiness atleast. Have a Facebook account but rarely use it since it's a walled garden. Preferred Friendfeed for better technology, organization, but even more so it's openness! - LonelyBob

Betrayed is a strong word, but I do feel a loss of ownership. And it's not like I really 'owned' the community, or the content I put into it. All the same, I contributed, and the more a person contributes to something, the more they feel a sense of entitlement (?) or ownership. Now it's as if I've had someone just pull a rug out from under me. - cecily

I don't give 2 cents if that's wrong or not but I feel betrayed. - vijay

Peter, I doubt FB gives a crap about FF users. FB wanted the talent that worked at FF, not the product. - Jeff P. Henderson

I understand the sentiment, but this is the way of tech apps;.nothing stays the same for long. Feeling betrayed is not gonna change anything. Either you roll with the changes and try to force the positive, or you quit. - Rene Wirtz

I agree with Cecily that betrayal is a strong word. I have always understood that FriendFeed is a free service, thus I can't claim control over it. Though, really, I wonder what s going to happen to my thousands of likes, comments, posts, etc. - Rishabh Mishra (p248)

:-) + :-( - Majento

Completely concur with you Alex. Just goes to show maybe there is room for another platform... - Arleen Anderson

As I said elsewhere, this was a talent + buzz acquisition. I sorta wish I could download my FF history and host it on my own server with SweetCron or something. - Anthony Citrano

+1 Alex. EndFeed's the word... well, how about everybody grieves for 5 minutes, then gets the search for greener pastures under way. There was plenty to be improved about FriendFeed (been saying that since well before this announcement), so I just hope that someone else has the databasing/real-time wherewithal to build something like this, improved. - Alex Schleber

Facebook doesn't even give a crap about their own users - Alex Scoble from IM

Do any of these sites give a crap though Alex? I understand what you are saying and how it makes you feel this way, but I realised a long time ago.. they are ALL businesses and the bottom line is NO they don't give a crap... because they are NOT depending on you to be ok.. - Rob Sellen :o)

friendfeed at least acted as though they gave a crap...at least until today. And there's nothing about being a business that says "crapping on your customers is OK". Business is business does not equal "screw your customers to make a buck". - Alex Scoble from IM

That and stunned. Lately I've been describing Friendfeed to the uninitiated as "a facebook without all the crap." Unfortunately, it looks like now it'll just be integrated into all the crap, if kept at all. That said, congratulations to the FF team - this is a big win for them and they deserve a lot of kudos. I look forward to the web apps they come up with in the future. - Chris Rogers

"Is it wrong for me to feel a certain sense of betrayal?" - in an emotional sense, no. In a literal sense, yes, unless you can show me where FriendFeed made a commitment to you that they'd never change in a way that didn't fit your ideals for the service. - Edward Coffey

i'm just hoping they will keep friendfeed separate and use it as a testing ground for new features. - Edgar Rodríguez

They made a commitment to us when they built a service that wasn't called Facebook or Twitter. They made a commitment to us when they listened to our feedback and participated in our feeds. They made a commitment to us with their actions. A commitment that has been forever shattered with their deal with the internet equivalent of the devil. - Alex Scoble from IM

Lindsey is right.. the thing is Alex... friendfeed is STILL here... ;o) YOU are still here... - Rob Sellen :o)

Not for long, Rob. I give friendfeed a year tops. - Alex Scoble from IM

And forget about any improvements to the site. You know that the team will be much too busy trying to figure out what the next iteration of Facebook should look like. - Alex Scoble from IM

Yep , definitely a sense of foreboding there ... "for the time being" - Tom Horn

I can empathize with these sentiments, but Social Media is a set of tools--I appreciate the connections I make, but I'm not getting too emotionally worked-up about the tools changing. - Rob Michael (Atmos Trio)

why? friendfeed.com is not going anywhere is it... no reason this place couldn't stay.. what if they LOCKED friendfeed users in now.. said.. we WILL reward you users for helping us, testing things for us etc... ;o) - Rob Sellen :o)

Rob...did you not notice who bought them? Facebook is known for doing dick for their users. - Alex Scoble

Absolutely not Alex, I feel the same way. About 18 months' collection of content, great friends, an open community all gone. We now are marched into an atmosphere of censorship and walled relationships where users don't amount to a hill of beans. Really, really sucks. - jcunwired

I'm sure FF is going away one way or another; there's no way that the combined company is going to keep developing full steam ahead on both products. Is it wrong to feel betrayed? I don't know. I don't personally feel betrayed, but I guess I'm not nearly as invested in FF as you and others are. I do think the end result may be something positive though; the ability to interact with the larger FB community on this level is something that could be truly wonderful. Then again, it might just end in tears... - Tristan Seligmann

Especially when we consider that while they built the tools, we as a community are what made it great - both with our usage, our dedication and our regular feedback to make the site better. As I said before, its our fault FB even looked this way. - jcunwired

"...internet equivalent of the devil" - ohh-kayy...*backs away slowly* - Edward Coffey

betrayal isn't the word i feel. it's just business. i do agree with Anthony Citrano: I wonder if there's a way to pull all of my stuff out of FF and put it on my own machine. the year I've spent here, and the 2+ years on Twitter and FB, have been to the detrimiment of my own writing and content creation. The thing about all social media is they depend on users to fill their cyber-vessels with content, and then they make a living off of that...but it's pretty difficult for you to reclaim your "stuff" later. - .LAG liked that

If Google's motto is "do no evil" then Facebook's motto is "do whatever we want to our customers, even when it makes absolutely no sense"...yeah, I'd consider that to be bordering on evil. - Alex Scoble from IM

I did Alex.. Facebook sucks in many ways, they treat users like shit... BUT does this deal mean the actual end of frienfeed.com < the domain etc... what about if this place is used like a testing place and kept here? who knows? - Rob Sellen :o)

Ironic that! ToS & privacy & UCG & bandwidth & yet how much of that can be measured without actuarial measurements of packet flow? Not surprised based on much of the commentary the past 18 months. Attribution & authenticity matters. - Scott Moskowitz from iPhone

Get this out of your system soon, before time runs out :) https://friendfeed.com/jcunwir... - jcunwired

I think betrayal is appropriate - the FB community is NOT the FF community. Even if they make it better, or build something completely new, they will at some point shut down or gut what they have here. - Jennifer Dittrich

As long as my stuff is still indexed, I don't really care. I love Facebook - and I love watching my real friends interact with my Internet friends. :) - Mona Nomura

FWIW TXT is a bigger "content" biz than music, movies, games combined ... Yet this was not a predictable exit? Come on ... Said many times - what is a fair split for UCG & those that skim the packet flow? - Scott Moskowitz from iPhone

Betrayal is definitely appropriate. So is apprehension and a little bit of anger. - Mike Lewis

I feel the same way! I'm glad I'm not alone in that feeling. I have facebook I don't like it as much I like FF. - Anna Lynn M.

I don't feel betrayed. I am, however, worried. And I know people will jump all over me and say that I am a fool for thinking that anything online can stay hidden. I wasn't naive enough to think I'd never be found, but I take steps to try to head that off. I don't use my full name, I don't link certain social sites to the blog, I don't let the blog be indexed, etc. And now, with one... more... - pea

I wouldn't worry about Facebook integrating your FriendFeed content into Facebook; that doesn't seem very likely to me. - Tristan Seligmann

I feel you, Alex, and dread what is to come. But at the same time, seeing the reported terms of the deal, I don't think I would have turned it down either. - Michael W. May

Alex - Think you'd have to agree (despite the fact we don't know everything) that they were smart. On the other hand, it's pretty obvious you're not alone in your sentiments (Funny - posted this to Robert's stream first by boo-boo :) - Charlie Anzman

Alex, I feel your pain - but someone was going to acquire FriendFeed. It was inevitable. I'm just glad Facebook didn't buy Twitter. - Bill Sodeman

I would rather that Google bought friendfeed and Facebook acquired Twitter. That would have been justice. This...this is a travesty. - Alex Scoble

So would I alex..but it never happened.. - Rob Sellen :o)

Do you think Microsoft finish the job and eat Facebook? - τorƍue

:( - Martha

pea brings up an interesting point - pseudonymity is allowed by FF, disallowed by Facebook.And what of the FF groups? - Richard pancakhaus Walker

τorƍue, or worse - Oracle buying out Facebook. hehe - imabonehead

follow the money - L Stephen Cleary

I completely agree with you, Alex. - Johnny from BuddyFeed

I love the way FriendFeed works, I hate Facebook interfaces. I wish there was another FriendFeed-like service to jump to. - Amit Morson

I've never found Facebook to be intuitive, and I just enjoyed the manner of connecting here. Not sure what to feel now. - Rick Cogley

I don't think it's wrong to feel betrayed. If Facebook bought Twitter, honestly I would feel the same way. I think they're going to shutter the store here, which is kind of sad, but we'll see.... - matt singley

My fears are threefold. I fear unavoidable unwanted integration. I fear the addition of the awful Facebook TOS, and I fear the loss of the community. That last one is the big one. - Joe Pierce

Joe, perhaps FB may change their TOS... - Bill Sodeman

my sense of betrayal is so strong that I made this --->- http://bit.ly/A0jWq - vijay

It's all about the money, It's all about the dum dum didudumdum, I don't think it's funny... - Dobromir Hadzhiev

Bill, that is a nice thought but it is very doubtful. It would solve a lot of the problem I have with them if they did though. I seriously just don't want to lose the awesome community that has built up here. I mean without FF how would I keep up with Alex, its not like I live in the same town....oh wait /stalkermodeactivate! - Joe Pierce

If you find any decent asylum, Ryo, please check a room for me, as well, please. - Zackatoustra from email

Guess we didn't read the Terms of Service carefully enough. :-( - Mahendra (SkepticGeek)

I wish it was Twitter, Google, even Yahoo but not Facebook. - Jacque

Yes, it stings like a ... - Ahsan Ali aka. Slick

Would you have not spent all the time here (etc...) if you were told that this is a start-up business and could get acquired at any time? Or could run out of money and shut down at any time? At least you had a chance to make the connections and share/consume that content...for free. Looks like you're better off than you were before you joined, no? - Mohamed J

Yes, that's probably an accurate way to describe it, a sense of betrayal. Of course, we're not paying money to use this good service though we are paying time and good will, so it can be argued I suppose that FF did not betray us. I'm feeling upset myself, because I have never liked FB much. I did not want to be on there but got invited by old friends. I don't like the walled garden... more... - Rick Cogley

Rick: +1 - imabonehead

I am agree :( - Janice

I especially feel crappy because I evangelized FF aggressively among my friends, most of whom are on Facebook. - Ahsan Ali aka. Slick

To Alex Schleber: if you build it, we will come. Seriously, what Rick Cogley said too - I love that I can interact with almost anyone, not just people I'd interact with anyway and, in my case, have known forever. I love that it's like a small, really fun cocktail party with your friends, some of their friends, and a few strangers - as opposed to a convention (or, for me, a high school reunion!). Sad. - Amy℠

It's not wrong to feel betrayed, but everyone has their price - sadly. - David Jagger

The way the transaction was done is a betrayal of trust. Facebook can buy FF but not the trust of FF users. How much user pay for FF pay? Nothings? The time we invest in this application worth somethings unless you consider users of FF like shit.... Who care that crew of morons (FF users)? Just sell FF and move them like potatoes, right? Wrong! Trust can't be bought even with $50 Millions FriendFeed? Call it FailFriend. :S - Claude LaFrenière

Yeah, Claude, it's definitely a trust thing. - Rick Cogley

I've examined the emotional reaction of Alex (and others) to the announcement http://empoprise-bi.blogspot.com/2009... - John E. Bredehoft

Steve Rubel

Friendfeed is coming to Seesmic Desktop and web, says Loic (see comments)

July 23 - Comment - Like - Share

Daniel Rowley, HealingBrush, Darren Heydon and 109 other people liked this

This may get me switched back to using Seesmic but will @loic release a iPhone app? - Vinko

26 more comments

Vinko: yes. Loic told me he's working on iPhone app too. - Robert Scoble

Now if only socialscope would put it in their client for Blackberry's. - Sheryl

Here's another vote for a Seesmic iPhone app! - Susan Beebe from BuddyFeed

I still haven't met a FF application I could stand to use for more than a few minutes. - Craig Eddy

I saw an early alpha of the iPhone app. Looked good. I also saw an early alpha of Seesmic web and the way it advanced between the alpha and launch was dramatic - so I expect the iPhone client will track the same way. - Steve Rubel from email

Robert that's really great. I definitely will consider switching back when the Seesmic iPhone app arrives. - Vinko

Will get me,too, switched back to using Seesmic ;) Looking forward to hear from Loic soon - Ali BULUT

I interpret this as a strong sign favorable towards Friendfeed - lelapin

hurray - Thomas Power

This might just tempt me away from Tweetdeck... - Andrew Terry

If they add friendfeed to the web app, I'll maybe use it instead of PeopleBrowsr. But then again, peoplebrowsr has implemented friendfeed in a very good way already. - Svartling

Great News ! - Jean-Charles

You gotta keep an eye on Yahoo homepage. They have FB integration and someday may integrate Twitter (they have the 'what are you doing now'). Seesmic is way ahead, but Yahoo has mainstream adoption - Jeremiah Owyang

Jeremiah, I agree. The new Yahoo homepage is impressive. - Steve Rubel from email

Im not sure it's impressive, as it's evolutionary, not revolutionary. When Wave comes out, it could dash the shine that Yahoo has. - Jeremiah Owyang

I like ff's web design - kang

Android app, please? :D - Rishabh Mishra (p248)

Where do I sign up! I'm praying your web app will make my life of FF, FB, Twitter ETC more manageable!!!!! W/out crashing my puters AND still let me see my Home feeds! - Arleen Anderson

I'm thinking that this is the type of post that would be good reason for FriendFeed to have a "Love" click option next to the "Like" click option so that we can register better levels of our emotion towards news we read in others' streams! - Chris Aldrich

good news! - Jeroen De Miranda

I have been using Seesmic from the beginning this is GREAT news! - Robyn Hawk

Great news. Been looking for a good Friendfeed app - Barry Howell

I'm quite excited for Seesmic's FriendFeed iPhone app. - Amir

yes yes yes - Loic Le Meur

Don't forget Android when developing mobile apps! - Travis B. Hartwell

I agree with Vinko; this would be a good reason to switch back to Seesmic - Anne Mai Bertelsen

Might be late... but how is the Facebook acquisition going to effect this? I can't stand the way that app takes over Friendfeed. - Arleen Anderson

Robert Scoble

Twitter is down. Oh, what will the SEO experts, the celebrities, the spammers, the bots, and the social media experts do?

August 6 from iPhone - Comment - Like - Share

Asha Tampa, Bruce Lerner, Laurentiu and 221 other people liked this

Come to FF! - Simon Wicks

236 more comments

Give Friendfeed a shot? - Rubin Sfadj

Hang out on FF - Roberto Bonini

Hopefully they don't come to FriendFeed :) - Robert J Taylor

they will spam friendfeed instead? - Denis

They are so freeeking out. - SolidSmack

I couldn't tweet about it, so I told my wife instead. - Patrick Lightbody

I tried retweeting that. *sigh* - Andy McIlwain

Big ups to the FriendFeed massive! - Josette Torres

Call them to join friendfeed, and make - Madhav Tripathi

Hopefully FF won't get killed by the Tweeters flocking over here. - phil baumann

ok.. here ya go..twitter being down has forced me here. Haven;t tried FF yet so... - cheapsuits

just like ya possibly twiddle their thumbs... - Baba

I suspect the bots will rejoice.... - walidmREALTOR

Let's see where these so-called "social media experts" go to fill the void of Twitter. - Christian

I can't open twitzap.com - ybs

Can FF servers manage such a massive movement? - Samuel Goëta

since bots supply at least 25% of Twitter traffic, should we feel the worst for them right now? - Kevin Norman

write a post about twitter being down as a threat to humanity, may be?:) - Nikos Anagnostou

Twitter down... can't post on Facebook,,. so it's FriendFeed! - carrotmadman6

So your're not responsible for that ? Strange... :-) - Enikao

lay on the floor and spin in circles - SolidSmack

Maybe the SocMedExperts will go back to Plurk since Scoble likes Friendfeed. :) - Jay Gilmore

thank God, now we can get back to work - E.P. Scott

if they are the experts they claim to be then they should be here! - Mark V. Fusco

Facebook seems frakked too. - Gregg Le Blanc

I get tweet trough tweetdeck... - Giorgio

I need serious help with FF. For an idiot like me this isn't so intuitive really. Help section is nice but I need someone to hold my hand ..bleeech. Don't get me wrong I am sorry I was reluctant to try FF before - cheapsuits

I blame Scoble. It's always his fault :-) - Keith Barrett

but how am I going to tell the world I need a cup of tea???? nooooooo - Rachel Clarke

Giorgio - I'm seeing some activity through the Twitter API, too (that's what TweetDeck uses, I believe); not a lot, but some - Robert J Taylor

I thought it was just my connection. ;-) I'm also having problems with Facebook today. - Timothy Federwitz

yeah, it seems the web interface is down but the api is working.. - Giorgio

I think the social media experts are going to spend the next hour talking about Twitter being down - Keith Barrett

Maybe read a book for a change? - Yiorgos Adamopoulos

Scoble's followers where the glue keeping Twitter together! now that he's 'pulled the pin' and released them all, Twitter has fallen down and can't get up. - MikeAmundsen

Seems to me like some sort of an (DDoS) attack on Twitter and Facebook. - Jari Hakkarainen

I'm so lost this morning without my cup-o-Twitter - frank barry

You broke it Bob! All this follow/unfollow madness. - ZuDfunck

They'll comment on it, much like I just did. - Marlin Forbes

Man imagine if this had happened on #followfriday... - Rob Paller

Facebook is copying twitter too closely...even to going down at the same time - Robert Littlejohn

Yiorgas: read a book for a change? I do that anyway, but only about 10/month. need more twitter time to balance it out - Rachel Clarke

Does Twitter have what it takes to be a big player? We've been working with their API on a project and every time there is something out of whack. Anyone else have the same issues? - Chris Nadeau

twitter is really down, I think twitter itself should have a site that tweets when it's down :) - Ata İsmet Özçelik

They will use FF to inform their friend that twitter is down - Didier Girard

They'll use Identi.ca ;) - Nicholas James

No actually the blog: http://status.twitter.com/ ("We are determining the cause and will provide an update shortly.") - Patrick Mackaaij

Show up here I'm thinking. :-) - Dion Hinchcliffe

Huge exodus to FF! - akihito

We will start feeding friends and keeping up our identi.ca 's - JuneM

They're probably crying so loud right now that they can't do a thing ;-) - Caio Cesar

What's been the longest twitter outage on record thus far? - Dusty Edenfield

hmm at least they found a solution with a blog :) - Ata İsmet Özçelik

I don't understand why you maintain an account when you have such contempt for Twitter & those who use it. - Liz

they will cry in their soup - Bobby Griffith

holiday - Ronald

Well Robert, where will you go when they all come here? - Tokyo Dan from iPhone

it's back up. made ya look - Kevin Norman

Strangely, search.twitter.com is up. - Marlin Forbes

Tokyo: I already have a private group setup. Sort of like a bomb shelter in case the rats take over. - Robert Scoble from iPhone

i noticed that twitter is down... anyone know how facebook is ssOOO slow 2...???? - Sebastiaan van den Akker

Just noticed it... - k00pa

do not waste time and do their job :D - Roldano

twitter outage and news of the PubSubHubbub feature in Google Reader (http://is.gd/24YvH) make FF look pretty good right now. - Dusty Edenfield

facebook too! i guess i'm going to have to do something like "get a life" which is abhorrent to me... ^_^ - Kayce Maisel

friendfeed is having some issues but for the most part is still up and going :) - (jeff)isageek

find another medium such as friendfeed ;). - rick

Roger, Mr. Scoble! - akihito

@Sebastian they connected somehow... ahhh scary :) - Dani Martínez

good. so not the only one with issues with FB.. wel atleast is FF is going strong.. - Sebastiaan van den Akker

what we all are going to do??? =) but if seriously i remember this video on youtube - trouble with twitter: http://www.youtube.com/watch... - obolonskyi

They will all sit in their chair and stare at their monitor! - Gabe Diaz

@Dani, who knows... the might merge or something... explain the strange twitter is pulling fb down 2.. - Sebastiaan van den Akker

Did Scoble bring Twitter and FB down as he unfollowed everyone ? winks -) - Del_

This is still up... even this FF tweet. http://search.twitter.com/search... - Johann Chiang

In the event that twitter goes down I tend to frequent FF more. - © b e e n s w a n k

This is very interesting that it is impacting more than one social network ... can't even speculate what the cause is yet. Not getting much work done today I'm afraid, going to be following these conversations.. - Joe Magennis

I haven't been on twitter for days. I guess I picked the wrong morning to jump back in. - Jeff Stannard

Robert: The most important question>> How many new sign-ups for FF today? - K.N. Ajit Narayan

...and who wins? FF great :) - Dani Martínez

Was just able to post to Facebook but took several tries. Wow. FF FTW! - Tom Guarriello

so!! - abdellah

The smart ones will go to FriendFeed ;) - Helene

The spammers should go to MySpace... - Dennis Bjørn Petersen

Tweeple will come to FriendFeed! - LauraLee Dooley

That's why I joined FF a while back. Then I found all the useful features- and the bonus is having Scoble here to show the way. - Brenda Young

No, the smart ones are ALREADY on FriendFeed :) - Susan Beebe

and? - abdellah

@obolonskyi nice. vid.. ROFL... never seen it before... - Sebastiaan van den Akker

GUILTY ! I have had a FF account for awhile just never used it-- - cheapsuits

What the celebrities like you do. Talk about it on Twitter. - Tad Chef

This actually made me laugh out loud, because I was thinking the same thing! - Dan

This kind of reminds me of a line from Office Space: "I must have put a decimal point in the wrong place or something. Shit. I always do that. I always mess up some mundane detail." - Jari Hakkarainen

haha lets get FF down also :D - Salim Sarımurat

Could this mean that CNBC was right??? Nooooooooooo! - Travis Koger

I was planning to unfollow a bunch of followers due to Twitter's follow limit rule kicking in at the ~#2000 user level. I have to wait with that then... ;) - Martin Lindeskog

FF FTW - Eran Even-Kesef

Is the Twitter bubble bursting? - Travis Tasset

Let's see how well Friendfeed handles this Twitter outage :) - Rene Silva

Re previous comment of mine, 'Nooooooo!' was for CNBC being right, not that twitter is dead. ;) - Travis Koger

life goes on - Eran Even-Kesef

Hey don't tell anyone about this FF thing, its our little secret - Jeff Wiant

Twitter better be back up by the time Rick Sanchez is on CNN this afternoon or he won't know what to talk about ;) - cjcubs

telnet 80 twitter.com ? - Gordon Joly

@gordon wont work - k00pa

FF was down for me for about 10 min just now. - Dusty Edenfield

Blogger's having some trouble as well - Crispin Heath

No address associated with nodename (twitter.com) - Gordon Joly

If friend feed ever gets as popular as twitter were will everyone go to to avoid the popular crowd? - JP Holecka - Jaypiddy

Panic? - Dean Clark

@scobleizer I'm seeing issues with twitter and facebook. Social website attack? - Michael Fierro

Panic? Aren't we all used to this already? :) - Sasha Kovaliov(.com)

if this is the North Koreans with a coordinated attack I WILL laugh - cheapsuits

@scobleizer I'm seeing issues with twitter and facebook. Social website attack? - Michael Fierro

Robert, please follow back 106,000 and everything will be ok))) joke =) - obolonskyi

I can not play 140mafia!!! This sucks sooooo bad :( - Sam Beckett

Twitter outage is causing issues with both facebook and friendfeed. I guess we know where everyone is going instead of twitter. - April Russo (app103)

facebook? no way :) - Sasha Kovaliov(.com)

Twitter being down is a a relief to me this morning! Now I can stay OFF it rather than fitting it into every 30 second change of task! n - Arleen Anderson

at this rate they will have to start sending out junk mail via the post office again... oh the humanity - Terry Bruce

Let's all chat on Friendfeed - johnpiercy from iPhone

Nothing seems to work, I think it will be the Friend Feed greatest traffic boost ever - Jacob Kobi Gamliel

guys, is it Ddos attack? or smth like that? as I understand twitter is hosting somewhere and this datacenter is down. am i right? - obolonskyi

FriendFeed traffic is rocking now... - Jacob Kobi Gamliel

social media "experts" might need to actually find other work to do. - Luis Sandoval

thanks God, Youtube is working - obolonskyi

More info needed. Where is there an alternate feed to real time news? - SenderOK

seems unlikely I'll do anything productive in the interim - WarLord

Friendfeed is an excellent choice :) - Hunt from BuddyFeed

http://theloopzilla.blogspot.com/2007... - Gordon Joly

Hopefully they will move to FF :) - Martynas

it could be ff provocation - obolonskyi

I feel like we are all stranded on a tropical Island together - Jeff Wiant

was afraid for a moment that out IT blocked all social networks or something horrible like that. Thank god FF came back up quickly. This might have gotten me to use FF more. I often neglect it. - Ryan Cummins

Wondered why tweetdeck wasn't loading anything. actually got some programming work done. lol - Justin Long

friendfeed rules! - Kevin Dolan

twits will move, but only until twitter is back online, then there will be a mass exodus. Remember during all of the 2007/2008 fail whales users still flocked back to it regardless. - Travis Koger

Twitter, Facebook, now Posterous... 4chan organize an attack or something? - Sam Harrelson from IM

Thank goodness FF is still working. :) - 3Cinteractive, L.L.C. from twhirl

http://status.twitter.com/post... - Martin Lindeskog

Friendfeed + Facebook :) - Rafa Lacerda

http://whentwitterisdown.com/ - Josette Torres

From status.twitter.com: "Site is down 1 hour ago. We are determining the cause and will provide an update shortly." - Martin Lindeskog

Having issues with Facebook as well as Twitter. Can sign into FB but unable to go to anyones profiles- process just hangs - outofmyarse

chinese attack? :) - Roldano

Touché Robert, Touché - Jeff Woelker from twhirl

"We are defending against a denial-of-service attack, and will update status again shortly." from Twitter Status - Kurt Jarchow

North Koreans I tell ya.... - cheapsuits

took inordinate amount of time to get into ff today as well - A Zmaj

Hmmm DoS attack...someone wanting a ransom from Twitter? - Mike Gargano

Guess they'll have to either pick up the phone or do some work :) - Graham Bunting

Can someone with 94k followers really mock the the celebs and experts devoid of Twitter? - Augie Ray

Hey, no bogus follow messages in my inbox for a while! ;-) - Julie Barrett from twhirl

This is teaching us something about the framework of the current Internet traffic patterns. We're watching cascade scale problems from one major Internet program going down. - Melanie Reed

Facebook is giving up the ol', "Transport error (#1001) while retrieving data from endpoint `/ajax/inline_comments.php': A network error occurred. Check that you are connected to the internet" message now. - 3Cinteractive, L.L.C. from twhirl

http://downforeveryoneorjustme.com - Martin Lindeskog

I think this is bigger than Twitter and FB... I think it's some interweb routes or something. I had a VoIP call going with a party local to me and two across the country and I lost the two across the country, but maintained the local party. And others are commenting on other sites showing signs of outages. - Timothy Federwitz from Alert Thingy

Twitter is Down....panic..run.,,SOS! - Veetrag

Yeah, had all the characteristics of a DDoS attack. What do perpetrators of such attacks get from doing that, I've never understood. - Jari Hakkarainen

What will they do? Use FriendFeed! - Chuck Huckaby

It's official. Twitter's problem is a DoS attack per twitter/status. - Roger Jennings

http://status.twitter.com/ - giuny

shhhh they'll come here - andy brudtkuhl

The real bummer for me is, now I actually have to listen to the radio to get the word of the day! - Travis Owen

is twitter connected with FB or Friendfeed? I am having page errors with both, Ajax issues with FB intermittently , I am no tech geek so I have no clue whats up and come here to learn - lisa coultrup

Maybe Ev's interview on the BBC last night didn't go down well with the Iranians! - Andrew from iPod

Status Blog says "We are defending against a denial-of-service attack." Mmmm... http://status.twitter.com/post... - akihito

Friendfeed it is then. - Aren Grimshaw

Now, It's up! - Martin Sliacky

Posterous isn't working properly either, at least for me. - Steven Melfi

http://status.twitter.com/post... We are defending against a denial-of-service attack, and will update status again shortly. - Zalt Woo

What does DoS mean? - Kimberle Kelly

denial of service - Justin Long

I meant what does denial of service mean? (dumb blonde here sorry) - Kimberle Kelly

If it's true..or is it propaganda? - Alex Schleber

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki... - Zalt Woo

It's down, again. - Martin Sliacky

Tracing route to twitter.com [168.143.162.100] over a maximum of 30 hops: 1 1 ms 1 ms 1 ms 172.16.1.1 2 25 ms 29 ms 28 ms lo1.br57.fra.de.hansenet.net [213.191.64.45] 3 24 ms 24 ms 23 ms ae1-252.prju01.fra.de.hansenet.net [62.109.64.13 7] 4 24 ms 23 ms 24 ms fra32-hansenet-3.fra.seabone.net [89.221.34.61] 5 120 ms 119 ms 195 ms ash1-new50-racc1.ash.seabone.net [195.22.206.2] 6 125 ms... more... - Zalt Woo

Thank you :o) - Kimberle Kelly

Ev coming onto the BBC last night and saying that they were asked by the US Goverment to keep Twitter up and running during the Iranian protests cannot have gone down well in Tehran! - Andrew from iPod

DoS on large portions of the internet. Is this 4Chan... Chinese... N. Korea... durkadurkastan... - Ryan Cummins

now having trouble getting to Friendfeed - Justin Long

look, few days ago Clinton back home with two imprisoned american journalists from North Korea and today Korea is attacking twitter? it is revenge))) - obolonskyi

maybe Robert's great unFollowing crashed the servers... no loss! Go FF - Jay Shapiro from BuddyFeed

some government is DDOS'ing the real-time internet to cover up something :-) http://leeprovoost.posterous.com/the-twi... - Lee Provoost

hmmm - abdellah

As I said, I predict a baby-boom in 9 months... wait and see! - Jordi Soler

SEO Experts can analyze their charts, celebrities and wannabe's can entertain us with video (maybe some cool Twitter Whore like stuff) , and social media experts can quickly become Fail Whale Experts. - Michele Lorito-Chase

@Lee Provost don't you thing you're going to be a little apocaliptic ? :-) - Filippo Ronco

Twitter downing has to be a lesson for all of us. if sometimes gmail or even google will be down. what we all are going to do in that situation??? - obolonskyi

@Filippo i've been suprised many times that reality is often more wacked up than the conspiracy theories of geeks :-p - Lee Provoost

I'm hoping the social media experts go away and do something useful. - Parvez Halim

@Lee this is true too :-) - Filippo Ronco

@Jordi LOL, considering that there are a vast amount of single male computer geeks out there in the twitter community, baby boom effect might be negligible :-D - Lee Provoost

what is bad here? here doesnt exist reply button =( - obolonskyi

@Lee single male computer geeks - LOL)) - obolonskyi

The realtime updates of the comments is great. FF rulez. Would be better though to have the comment link not on top - Flynn (Michael A. Volz)

Go back to MySpace? - Juliana

Maybe some will switch to FF if twitter is down for a while - Flynn (Michael A. Volz)

The twitter bots are rebelling - Charles

@Flynn, go check out this Greasemonkey script, solves it: http://userscripts.org/scripts... - Alex Schleber

Come here and moan about it! - Kami Huyse

Read post on 100k unfollow - I love how people are commenting and blaming Twitter being down on that! lol - Helene

@AlexSchleber: thanks, great :) - Flynn (Michael A. Volz)

AAANND.. it's back. At least for a moment I guess.. - Alex Schleber

AAANND it's GONE! ..Again. At least I managed to send out a quick FriendFeed SOS, as in: "Still think you shouldn't have all of your favorite tweeps in a "backup system" on FriendFeed? Join here: www.friendfeed.com/alexschleber " - Alex Schleber

Either collapse or back to use their phones in voice only mode, do some shopping, get eye to eye contact ... Blame god, and then. Give a serious try on FF ;p - Marco ILLESCAS from iPhone

They will still be able to Tweet to themselves - not sure if they will realize it is down until it comes back up. - Phil Harrison

I hope everyone will be ok...lol - April Mendez

Hey, can I hang out here on FF while my Twitter is down :) - Kevin Krewell

Welcome to FF Kevin! You can tweet from here too! - Arleen Anderson

Thanks Arleen. I hear all the kool kids hang out here now - like Scoble and you! - Kevin Krewell

I'm glad I joined FF yesterday, great timing! - CodeSamurai

I also micro-blog or create my own Twitter, but in more than 140 characters. - polou/indigo_bow

FF and Tumblr are working fine! :-) - Tim Moore

A good FF day- new familiar faces on this thread. - E-Advocate Network

What will the blackhat SEO experts, the SM spammers, and the social media experts do during a widespread outage? The answer is obvious: While sitting out the crisis they're fine-tuning their methodology. Seriously, your question offends me. There's a gazillion of SEO experts out there who do not abuse social media. - Sebastian

Sebastian there can't be a gazillion SEO experts! What's 10,000 keywords times 20?? (and that's being generous!) - Arleen Anderson

Would a social media expert consider it to be a crisis? If they rely so heavily on just one or two tools that it's enough to throw them into a tizzy, their expert status would seem to me to be ... questionable, at best. - Gord McLeod

Agreed. - Greg

Arleen, 10,000 keyword phrases times 20 is a tiny fraction of the search terms that are worth optimizing for. Think of the long tail. Also, consider lots of webmasters and even publishers / site owners / bloggers / Web developers ... SEO experts who are able to optimize their stuff quite successfully but don't sell or publish their expertise. Many of them, and even many SEO consultants, do make sensible use of social media, as plain users. - Sebastian

Gord, in a social media spammer's book 2 hours of outage, IOW 2 hours w/o sales from sneakily distributed links to questionable sales pitches, can sum up to way more than a good day's beer money. ;) However, "crisis" might be a term too strong for this potential loss. - Sebastian

+1 Sebastian - Bill Sodeman

I'm hung up on hop 12! - bev

I love FF! - John Giglio

come to Friend Feed? Not - Rob Cairns

You must be dying of laughter now Robert! - Arleen Anderson

Arleen: yes, reading this is fun. Sebastien SEO types are so easy to wind up. ;-) - Robert Scoble from iPhone

Gotta love it... @RobCairns says "come to Friend Feed? Not" and then his page shows ONE POST from Twitter in the past 18 hours! And that one talks about how Twitter seems to be slowing down again! (Sorry Rob, but that's just too good to let pass!) - Mark "DerBingle" J

Robert, admit it, you broke Twitter by massively unfollowing people. The DDoS attack reports have just been a ruse to cover up the fact that you were the backbone of Twitter all this time. - Louis Trapani

Louis: that is true. I pissed the bots off. - Robert Scoble from iPhone

Keep running into the wall a few times then find alternate outlets such as ff, linkedIn, etc... - Kirsten Mitchell from iPhone

Looks like the devious plan to move everyone to FF is working well. LOL :) - Geer

Ha! The whole Facebook Twitter slowdown may have been just people clicking on spam (not a DDoS botnet). How funny! Manual DDoS. See Bill Woodcock's theory at CNet, AP, SF Gate, and The Register http://ff.im/6gLmO - Mitchell Tsai

There you go again implying the only ones that use twitter is SEO experts, the celebrities, the spammers, the bots, and the social media experts - This is definitely SPIN. Perhaps you should join CNN also LOL - RetiredTeacherD

Ironic, given your status as a celebrity social media expert who constantly spams about bots... :-P - David Kettler

Now they'll have time to shower and do their laundry! - Ron Hagenhoff

Louis Gray

To Jump on the Massive Unfollowing Trend Would Be a Mistake - http://www.louisgray.com/live...

August 6 from louisgray.com - Comment - Like - Share

Harold Cabezas, Sheldon Harker, A. Karl Kornel and 60 other people liked this

"So too do I see it better that 100 spammers fill my feed than I lose access to the innocents who remain. I am not so self-centered as to believe I know the full set of people who I can learn from and derive value. So don't look for me to start shaking my numbers down on any of the networks - even if it is getting more popular. " love this part of the post, however I want just to notice... more... - abdellah

62 more comments

fighting talk - I do believe you just called scoble self-centered. Still I am sure he has been called worse ;) - Riaz Kanani

it's not about unfollowing, it's about filtering - Barak Hachamov

filter before you fellow - abdellah

Riaz, Scoble and I get along great. I wouldn't call him self-centered. - Louis Gray

I shared this in GR as soon as I read it. Congrats on a great post, Louis! All I can say is finally someone has said it. This trend of unfollowing is rather disturbing imho and shows how self-centered some people are, how desperate for attention others are, and how they all are rather clueless at creating valuable networks on these social tools they so much love to love. - Vlad Bobleanta

true, but people who don't appreciate following others shouldn't do it and shld unfollow..keeps tweeting young and influential. also, the only way to get rid of spam is to unfollow/block each such perp - Amit 'zyaada' Mittal

Louis: you will come to dislike your choice here. I used to say the same thing, but as you get more and more people who you aren't interested in you'll realize you just aren't getting anything out of the home page on Twitter anymore and, worse, you are getting spammed both on it and via DMs. That might not be a big problem for you with 12,000 friends, but as your numbers move up (and they will) you'll hit the same problems I did. - Robert Scoble

Why is Louis' followers number growing very very slowly relative to his popularity on the net - Mark

Robert, I never did get anything out of the homepage of Twitter anyway. :) - Louis Gray

I think unfollowing makes sense on Twitter. On Friendfeed Lists are your friends. - Paul Kinlan

Mark, I would say it has to do with not being put on any kind of suggested list. :) - Louis Gray

I don't find that the Twitter website does a good job of making Twitter usable. The applications are what make it usable for me. - Michael Owens

Unfollowing kinda makes sense. Have you ever played an RPG the second time through... you know what to do in the beginning, you aren't lost, and you know what your end goal is? Yeah. That's pretty much what we are talking about here. - Evan Travers

I like that Evan :) RPG - michelle harris

Yeah, the real thing here is we both are heavy users of FriendFeed. That's why I didn't care that my Twitter feed was getting worse and worse. Over the past year I've done almost all my Twitter reading here on FriendFeed. Now that I've restarted it, though, damn is it 100x more useful! And, yes, there are lots of people who are on Twitter who aren't on FriendFeed. - Robert Scoble

I could barely handle following 600 or so people, even with appropriate tweetdeck filters. There were too many people who just weren't adding value. I made a particular point to unfollow anyone who regarded themselves as an "SEO" or "Internet Marketing" expert.. I had made the mistake of following back anyone who followed me and slowly began to realize that they were just playing the numbers game. - Neeraj Kumar Agrawal

abdellah: I am starting to agree with "filter before you follow", which I also believe is what Robert Scoble is doing now as he starts to follow people. Louis Gray: I don't think it is a movement to unfollow everyone, at least, not for me. I think Scoble had to start from scratch because of the number he had... for me, having a very small number in comparison, I will start unfollowing... more... - Timothy Federwitz

If you've never mass followed, and managed your connections in the way that's right for you, why would you have a reason to mass unfollow to being with. Good points Louis. - Ken Camp

I've been curious as to the counter argument to this trend. Scoble's reaction albeit extreme is one I can empathize with, but unnecessarily severe. I appreciate the alternate perspective and grounded reasoning to your approach. While I have far fewer followers the numbers have crossed the line of unmanageable with out an automation service. Thanks for the great post and food for thought. - Jim Goldstein

Scoble has this big 7 point list of criteria for following you on twitter, but on Friendfeed he will follow anyone who asks! - Mark

Mark: that's because on FriendFeed I can have lists. So I can use a variety of different following strategies here. On twitter I can only follow or not. - Robert Scoble

I think I am in the middle on this. I am not about to wholesale unfollow everyone, but the noise from news bots etc in my twitter feed is getting insane. I am still nowhere close to "getting" FF so I am still struggling a bit here too.. In fact, I have fallen right back into the trap I was in a few months ago. I think it's time for another social medai diet - Andy Glover

Robert, you can certainly use tools like tweet deck to create groups, but . . .whatever. To me, it's just not an issue, either way. I like it when folks that I find interesting (and Robert is certainly among them!) follow me back, but it's not essential. I don't need to follow the Roberts of the world on Twitter in order to check in on what they're up to, from time to time. Unless someone has a private feed, it seems to be a non-issue. - Kathy Fitch

Andy: on FriendFeed whenever things go nutty, just open up a new friend list and move your high quality follows into that. Leave all the other people in the old list, so you can check in once in a while. - Robert Scoble

I don't see how anyone could follow as many people as Robert w/o losing control. Twitter would become marginalized by sheer un-manageability. Even with groups etc. there's only so much real estate on a monitor. I have groups on FriendFeed as well but honestly I spend most of my time on the home feed. - Rick Bucich

That said, when I'm launching a new twitter presence (as I just have for an organization), it's *really, really great* when people and organizations with similar interests follow back. If nobody did, that would just be sad. Still, I'm mostly interested in the feed aspect of things, so even then, it's not really crucial to have followers. - Kathy Fitch

What I don't get, and what has never been explained to me despite asking, is why have low "quality follows" in the first place? I know you follow me, and given that there is seldom interaction its quite apparent I'm not on the high quality follows list. If its not for ego, what's the point? Mass unfollow, filter, etc. that's entirely your decision, but why follow to the point that mass unfollow is necessary? - jcunwired

I've always had the policy of being quick to follow and even quicker to unfollow. As soon as someone begins to bore or annoy me I just unfollow them. But on the other hand I'm glad to follow people on a whim. You never know. - Leo Laporte

Rick--so true. In some ways, the conversations that these folks with massive followings are having around the follow/unfollow issue just is utterly irrelevant to those of us with more moderate goals and purposes. - Kathy Fitch

Nice to see Leo Laporte being more involved on Friendfeed - Mark

Right Leo - follow to see what's interesting, unfollow when you find out there's no value. The alternative, if I may say so, is misleading and unfair to the end user. - jcunwired

Value in this instance is pretty subjective, and that's the point, really. What is your subject position? I'm in SMB mode, so what I'm after is quite unlike what a twit guru would be after. For me, the following/follower # some are cutting down to would be massive. If I hit those numbers, then I'd probably want to trim it back down. Robert is still about 500 over anything I'd be interested in. - Kathy Fitch

One of the first people I looked through was Leo Laporte's following page. He has some great people who he is following. - Robert Scoble

Take a look at Dave Winer's RSS Cloud technique - a great way to assess a following list in your newsreader before adding. http://www.scripting.com/stories... - Leo Laporte

Why limit yourself? Someone asks to follow me, I check out their profile and tweets. If the words SEO,check out my webcam, or Arrington are there, I don't follow, If I do follow, I give them a month and then unfollow if any major douchbaggery makes its way to mine eyes. - Paul Puri

Ah, somewhere there's an SEO person who is offering useful tweets about how beginners can use the basic Google Analytics and Webmaster tools to help them create better, more useful sites for users and potential users. That person could be good for some folks to follow. - Kathy Fitch

On the "low quality followers/follows" point, I really needed some of those at first to help me get a feel for the ebb and flow. The trajectory of any given twitter user's account, if it's public, probably follows that basic pattern of "whoo hooo, followers!" to "what the heck?" to "now that I get how it works, how would I like it to work for me?" Seems pretty common sense. It's okay that answers to the final question vary. All as it should be. - Kathy Fitch

I'm just generalizing, of course, but most of the people who try to follow me that have SEO in their bio have 10 tweets and they are link bait. - Paul Puri

I shared w/ Robert and will share with you, YES I spend too much time trying to block all the FakePornSpamBot accounts. And I miss blocking many. BUT, my HOME Stream is the most amazing view of the world! With a few refreshes I can get the pulse of what's going on! Besides, even if someone is often a voyeur, there are those times they pop up and share the most insightful things! I believe I can learn from everyone! So if you're real and follow me - I'll follow you! - Arleen Anderson

In parallel to this, I do manage a corporate account for one of the companies I consult for. Every follow and unfollow there is measured. But I learned a long time ago, that at least for me, people just want to be connected, on any network they prefer, so I try not to get in their way. - Louis Gray

Louis: there's another aspect to this too: every follow you make signals to the world what kind of person you are. Look at my following list. You'll see geeks, VCs, journalists, entrepreneurs. Who isn't there? Not many celebrities. Not many plumbers or quilters, if any at all. That signals to the world the kind of people I want to have in my life and the kinds of information I want to hear. If you are autofollowing that opportunity to signal to the world is totally lost. - Robert Scoble

You're doing it wrong, Robert. ;-) - Chris Baskind

Chris: always. :-) - Robert Scoble

Oh, Paul, point well taken, of course. I'm just pointing out that they've no doubt ruined it for a handful of smart and useful SEO folks. Arleen was actually one of the first folks to follow me back, and just watching her from a distance (I guess that makes me a voyeur? <grin>) helped give me a good feel for how someone at her level of #'s worked with the system. Very educational! - Kathy Fitch

The "signal to the world" bit makes much more sense to me on the corporate accounts I'm working with. For the Catholic parish, for instance, who to follow gets really important. I can't afford to have anything with even a whiff of inappropriateness about it in the stream. That's going to be a very small list! - Kathy Fitch

I just think the only way you can do this wrong is if you don't continually revise your thinking and your approach. Right on to all of you for exploring this topic. - Holly Rae

Leo, I can usually tell by the last 4 to 5 tweets whether I should follow back. But, everyone is annoying or boring sometimes (including myself) so I don't unfollow very often unless someone's stream becomes overly promotional or full of gimmicks. - Rick Bucich

What's the benefit of following thousands of people? if you say its because you have to in order for them to DM you, how can you possibly respond to potentially thousands of DM's consistently? Once, I tried following everyone that followed me and it made my follower count jump quickly, but it made twitter less fun because I had random automated DM's from people I didn't know, and a useless stream of info from people I followed for no reason. - Dusty Edenfield

Robert/Kathy: I think who I follow making a statement of who I am and what I'm about is less important to me since I am using it for a personal experience and my likes are wide and deep. If I was using my Twitter account as an outward facing presence for my business/organization, then it would matter much more to me... but I'm just having fun with it and like the idea of seeing lots of... more... - Timothy Federwitz

The DM thing. Sigh. Here on FF, it's totally useful. I've never had a single pointless DM. On Twitter, it's a thing to scan very occassionally, and ignore the rest of the time, seems like. - Kathy Fitch

The thing that is being overlooked is this: The real issue is the auto-follow, NOT the total number of "following". It is what removes the vetting process. Once vetted, I'd say the more the merrier, b/c there is real value in your "with friends/following" stream, precisely b/c it is way different to search/filter it vs. regular Twitter Search. It is a huge omission/mistake that this is... more... - Alex Schleber

Since I mass unfollowed I've had SIGNIFICANTLY better interactions with the people I genuinely want to communicate with. A good % of the social media gurus who just follow in the hopes that you'll follow back unfollowed and it's seriously been like a weight lifted off my shoulders. - Ryan Stephens

(cont'd) For this reason, I will openly admit to trying to get as many of my Twitter peeps registered into FriendFeed as possible, & I won't even care if they sub to me there or not (not required for conversation on FF anyway). It's to get them into the stream that I can then search over, and further add people into separate Friend Lists from there. Currently I'm at about 1k of 3k... more... - Alex Schleber

Also see "My comment on: 'Why You Should Start Over On Twitter With A BRAND NEW Account - Twitip' Hint: I disagree" http://post.ly/1owO This about sums it up: "..the solution to overwhelm by technology is better technology, not retrenchment..". - Alex Schleber

Louis, I only read part of your post, but I agree as far as the types of people that are following others. Twitter has become a place more for business than meaningful conversations. Best thing to do is look at who is following you and purging those who just seem to market links to " Ways To Generate Massive Cash " through whatever they might be involved in hawking. - Lew Newmark

@Lew funny you call this "business". I call it "racket" - Jorge Escobar

Somewhat parenthetically, like the 19th century theoretical "corporate shield" that was supposed to shield individuals from liability, artificial demarcations between "my personal site" and "my business site" are increasingly obsolete. We are all complex, intertwined, interdependent, human-computer, systemic hybrid participants in an increasingly systematized hybrid world. The old silos... more... - michael silverton

@Louis - I think you are right. Doing something because it's a "trend" is dumb. Can you tell me what the metric is you use to measure when something breaks through to "trend" status? When "unfollow" hits Trending Topics, maybe? I didn't reboot my following list to join a trend. I did it because I really like following the people I follow...and they were getting drowned out by the people... more... - Rex Hammock

I'm going to mass unfollow everyone who ignores me :) - jcunwired

Lets be honest, this unfollowing thing by "certain" people is nothing but a PR stunt - Spencer

Spencer--well, of course this thing does have PR implications. After all, the big wigs are all talking about it non-stop, and then those on the next few tiers down from there are talking about the talking. Still, having PR implications and being a stunt aren't exactly the same thing. Many of these big name folks *are* established brands, which isn't something most of us can claim.... more... - Kathy Fitch

@Spencer - I know my unfollowing thing was nothing but a PR stunt. As is my commenting here. - Rex Hammock

agree. More than reasonable post, Luis.. - Marco Castellani

Robert Scoble

Everyone on Mashable/Twitter wants to tell me how lame I am and how I'm doing it wrong. Here's your chance to tell me I'm clueless:

August 6 - Comment - Like - Share

Thierry R. Andriamirado, Hutch Carpenter, Peter Murphy and 40 other people liked this

Lots of people are saying I was always doing Twitter's following wrong. It's funny how social media experts have it all figured out. So, here's your chance to tell me how screwed up I still am. - Robert Scoble

95 more comments

you're clueless.. :P - Rob Sellen :o)

I think you tried a noble approach. It just was ruined by spammys. You did what you had to do to fix the problem. - Drew Lucas from iPhone

Tell me something I don't know. And tell me why. :-) - Robert Scoble

Everyone thinks they're right in Social Media. I try to ignore them. - Jesse Stay

were you? In hindsight? now you have done this big purge? - Rob Sellen :o)

Drew: the real reason why I'm clueless is cause I am on FriendFeed, where I can put people into lists. Which, by the way, make AWESOME filters for searching. - Robert Scoble

which list am I on? - Alex Scrivener

Robert - I think you're always interesting and thought provoking. - Andy C

I agree with Jesse, everyone thinks they are a social media "guru". I loved your approach, well done. - Johnny

Alex: pay me $20 and I'll tell you. :-) - Robert Scoble

Robert: I don't think you're clueless...just so cutting edge it doesn't make sense! haha I really like friendfeed, and if more people would more over here, I would use it more than Twitter. Actually, I'm already starting to use it more than Twitter. - Sam Guzman

Your clueless Robert. You have no clue how to do the whole social media thing. Please teach me your cluelessness Master. :-P - Rasmus Lauridsen

Everyone needs to "reboot" their twitter strategy once in a while, there's no harm in it at all. It's just those out there who still think that thousands of followers is the only metric that everyone should go by to determine if you're using twitter successfully. - Richard Arblaster

Richard: bing! - Robert Scoble

What? That's ridiculous. You don't look anything like Alicia Silverstone. - John Craft

There is no right or wrong way to use (except maybe spam). Who cares what other people think about your social media habits. - Shawn Hickman

I covered the topic of mass unfollowing awhile back when @Loic and @AriHerzog unfollowed everyone. I think you might enjoy the comments in particular. http://blog.tweetworks.com/2009... - Mike Langford

Scoble is clueless like Socrates was foolish. - Pierce Presley

Rob: in hindsight, yes, I was clueless. I just didn't get quite how clueless I was, because on FriendFeed I could follow small groups, like everyone else. - Robert Scoble

Pierce: Good point! - Sam Guzman

Loic is not around much anymore - Mark

The reason you are clueless, is because we ALL are at the start.. how could you have known the "right" way at the start?? Couldn't.. so you NOW changed things... :o) Big difference now then? - Rob Sellen :o)

the thing you HAVEN'T been clueless about is friendfeed... ;o) - Rob Sellen :o)

your clueless, just like the rest of us !! We are all trying to figure things out.. each have their own way of doing it. To each thier own posion ! - Peter Dawson

The only way to know if your Twitter/Social Media approach is working or not is by looking to see if it is accomplishing your goals. There is no "one-size-fits-all" approach in a dynamic growing space. This Right/Wrong game is tiring at best. - Bill Sanders

I have learned that there is no one set way to do social media right or wrong. Is there an echo in here? - Mike Lewis

For half a sec I thought it was a FAB publicity stunt! Seriously Robert I adore and respect you. There are 2 different views. Twitter is different things to different people. You and I can agree to disagree. But, won't you MISS the amazing view of your HOME stream??? - Arleen Anderson

Arleen: the thing is I was looking at that screen less and less. Now I look at it a lot. Well, except for today cause Twitter has been mostly down. - Robert Scoble

I find that alot of people are a bit... selfish in social media. I follow people I find interesting. They don't need to follow me back. Maybe they don't think what I post is interesting even if I find theirs to be. We got to cut down on our ego tripping sometimes and let people enjoy the social tools, the way they enjoy em. I bet ya, there are not two people out there, that use all of this in exactly the same way, and that is great. - Rasmus Lauridsen

Steve: that's absolutely not true. Sit next to me sometime. I can follow many thousands of people. - Robert Scoble

Your comments make the conclusion that everyone that disagrees with you is a social media expert, spammer, or non-techie. Are you sure you are not a politician in disguise? LOL Putting people in groups on Friendfeed did not require a massive un-following on twitter I know what you are doing. I like FreindFeed. I would not like twitter near as much if FriendFeed was not there. I am grateful for FriendFeed and it champion. Cheers for Robert - RetiredTeacherD

Sorry Scobe, but you innovate, care deeply about all of this, and are fun to read. You don't even budge my Lame-O-Meter. (As for lame, well, AP is the King aren't they. And Reuters just told them to stop whining. Heh.) - Bob Morris (polizeros)

Seems funny to me that everybody is still talking about this issue. What's the difference between this and telling people what you're having for lunch? Twitter is chatter but from time to time, a clear interesting idea comes through and sparks a reaction. Reminds me of the thought process in my own brain... tons of ideas, lots of chatter and some gems. Meditation helps me quiet my mind... perhaps unfollowing does the same. In any case, less chatter is always better. - Yanik Falardeau

RetiredTeacher: heheh. But, sorry, the main reason I did the unfollow isn't the home feed, but DM's. They just became more and more filled with spam and useless stuff. Getting my home feed back is like icing on a cake. - Robert Scoble

@Robert, There's no right or wrong answer to social media usage. Only you can decide your goals and if you're successful in achieving those goals, that's all there is to it. You're anything but clueless, not that you need me to tell you that :) - MiaD

I was a big critic of your Swisher/Mossberg article as I think you are misguided about where in the social chain FF falls-- HOWEVER... although I had a FF account for awhile doesnt mean I 'tried' it. In light of the non conversational approach twitter is taking ( @replies) and the fact its getting spammy and many people are talking AT me not WITH me I concede. I don't agree with some of your tactics or selling points but I do agree FF IS ABSOLUTELY on to something in a big way. - cheapsuits

Auto following everyone is not good idea... - k00pa

ROFLCOPTER! - k00pa

IMO. Your following deletion was good thing :) - k00pa

I just use Twitter differently than most. Regardless whether I "follow" you or not, I still follow millions of people because I mostly use search for getting what I want. - Jesse Stay

you did an experiment. you learned something. take the learning and move on. economic theorists are doing the same thing:-) maybe spammers were Twitter's Black Swan. - Francine Hardaway from BuddyFeed

Let's assume for a moment that you are, indeed, clueless. Since you follow the same methodologies as most other "social media experts", then they, themselves, are clueless, as well. Since most "experts" (like yourself, Pirillo, and Conn) are generally smart people, then all clueless people are geniuses. Therefor, you are a genius and are, beyond a shadow of a doubt, not clueless. - Thomas Ward

Thomas: I like your thinking! :-) - Robert Scoble

So Ashton Kutcher can have 3+ Million followers and only follows a few, so why can't you filter the noise too? Double standard... - manielse (Mark Nielsen)

Robert: Glad you liked it. Hell, I'm glad you understood it! Even I began to believe I was only rambling! - Thomas Ward

would you please change your green #Twavatar ? .. my baby cries .. Thx :) - Marcel Bloingo

My favorite thing about you is that you do your own thing. Go with your gut. - Ted Murphy

Marcel: that will also cost you $20. This is how I will monetize social media! :-) - Robert Scoble

An 'auto-follow everyone regardless' is just nuts. I don't think you're clueless. I just think you *were* nuts :) - 1x29

Ted: In this case his "own thing" is what many of us have been telling him he should be doing for months now ;-) - Ken Sheppardson

It's your SM experience, so you get to do as you wish. Personally, I think it's great you're not chasing numbers so much anymore. But the next time I experiment and you tell me I'm doing it wrong, I'm gonna remind you of this and demand a one-time pass, OK? - Chris Baskind

OneGear: my heart was in the right place. I was doing that so everyone could DM me. Of course that let in spammers and other bad actors. So, turns out you are right. - Robert Scoble

Chris: we're all doing it wrong. :-) - Robert Scoble

I think you did it right: the conversation is going again and everyone is thinking about things. Job done. - WorldofHiglet

Surprised you lasted this long with that many users. - Mark Chandler

Forget about them, Rob. Heck, I may even follow in your footsteps! Seems like all I'm getting anymore is links to products I don't want or sites I have no interest in visiting. Oh ... as far as the green avatar goes, you should have it say "Scoble Smash!" underneath you! - Thomas Ward

I miss the Robert Scoble with long thoughtful blog posts and video interviews. I understand that it is not easy to find the balance between the conversations/interactions thingy and the content thingy. - Edwin Khodabakchian

Edwin: I've been posting a LOT of video. But, yeah, need to get back to doing long blogs. - Robert Scoble

I'll give you that $20 for your lists! *giggle* - Arleen Anderson

We should remember Twitter is Sociability. - Felipe Aneudi Campana from fftogo

Hmm. Do you post all your videos on your blog? different content on blog, building43, somewhere else? I liked the Office 10 videos. - Edwin Khodabakchian

you were telling people that they didn't "get it" for doing exactly what you are doing now - Eber Irigoyen

Edwin: I post them all here. Pro videos at http://www.building43.com Videos shot with my Canon 5D on http://scobleizer.blip.tv Finally, live videos at http://www.kyte.tv/scobleizer -- but they all are aggregated here. - Robert Scoble

lame, wrong, and awesome. Keep it up! - motownmutt

Eber: yes, I told Loic that. Again, my heart was in the right place. I wanted to get DM's from everyone who wanted to follow me. Turned out that was a bad strategy because of spammers. So I was wrong. I'm often wrong. Keep that in mind when I tell you off. :-) - Robert Scoble

Twitter is the one doing it wrong. They should just read our minds and learn what information we need and publish it to our home page. No need to follow anyone in that case. - Sumanth Kolar

dont worry Sumanth, google will take care of that ;) - Kashif Khan

There could come a time when I reverse strategy, in six months, as you did, and you can mock me then. But right now, I am keeping the door open to new contacts and not wiping them away. FriendFeed is my high quality network. - Louis Gray

Thanks Robert! It just occurred to me one alternative to domain squatting is embarrassing Avatar adoption. Your $20-at-a-time strategy is more credible than most monetization schemes (scams?) - Richard pancakhaus Walker

It would seem to me you did it "right" as it brought a strategic challenge to light. It's been the source of some great posts and conversation. It's not as though things are unsalvagable even if you made a miscalculation. As a strategist I don't think there is a generic right or wrong way. You have to align your social media activity to meet your goals. If your approach on Twitter wasn't working to meet your goals then you did the right thing. - Jim Goldstein

There is no wrong way to use a resource that is infinitely customizable. Well, perhaps there are illegal or immoral ways, and thus "wrong." But not the case here. - Justin Long

I've seen everywhere (it seems) that social media is all about the user's experience, that they should determine what's best for themselves. Yet, I constantly see posts and threads about how to do it right. I don't care what Robert is doing, because he has other reasons for using it than I do, and on down the line. Too much of social media "time" is spent discussing social media. - Steve Lowe

One question, Robert: What would you guess is your reach in terms of unique users? (if you combine all the channels you are on?) - Edwin Khodabakchian

Do your thing man. You know leaders are always jeered before they are applauded -- don't wait for the applause <grin> - Pam Baker

Very much in agreement with what Steve Lowe just argued. - Marcos

" Too much of social media "time" is spent discussing social media. - Steve Lowe " SOOO TRUE!!! - cheapsuits

Robert I agree. The lists feature is one of the most valued. - Drew Lucas from iPhone

Robert, "right" or "wrong" is immaterial here. Each user gets something different out of their use of social media. So each user constantly adjusts their social media experience to fit what they want to receive. Your mass unfollowing is not wrong. Your user paradigm changed. - Jack Wilson, K4SAC

Not clueless. You're simply learning more-and-more about web 2.0 and social media as you go. Trying different approaches. Ultimately it's your #Twitter account and you can do with it as you please. - Eric D. Wilson

Robert: My heart was in the right place too when I followed back my first porn tweet follow from an email notification - I honestly didn't realise at the time ;-) Boy did that open up the flood gates! My main advice on twitter now is to stay away from any girl with three numbers as her surname :D I can only imagine the spam you got from auto-following to 106,000 follows. Each day we get older and wiser :) - 1x29

Robert: can you write a blog post about how you setup your groups in friendfeed? I this it would make for an interesting read. - Bryan Lee

When you were using auto-follow, it made the most sense to do so. Twitter changed, you examined what was working and what wasn't working, and made some adjustments. You are still doing it right. You also invested your time in FriendFeed pretty early on. That was also a good decision. (That will be $25, thank you.) - Mark Davidson from BuddyFeed

I'm no expert and I don't care how you handle your tweeples... I'm just curious how you were able to avoid being suspended for mass unfollowing. My account was suspended after I cleared out 20 or so folks I didn't want to follow any longer. It's against their latest TOS to mass unfollow or follow. Your celebrity in the tech world probably gets you the free pass on the TOS violation, yeah? - t i n y m

I'm not of that mindset, if all adopted that mindset and only followed very close knowns what would you have? A phone call - JuneM

Tinym: He used one of the premium services on SocialToo.com You have the ability to either Unfollow everyone that isn't following you back or you can unfollow everyone. - Bryan Lee

Thanks Bryan. I used a third party service to unfollow too - I still got suspended. I guess my third party service wasn't as good as SocialToo... - t i n y m

i dont really understand their argument...i had to mass unfollow some people as well, as I was getting spam and it was clogging up the stream. - Crackle

I just joined FF today due to a few factors: 1) Twitter went down and a light bulb went off 2) I've been following you for quite awhile and you're not lame nor do I think you're doing it wrong and 3) I finally acted upon all the advice you've shared about FF. If you follow me back, fine. At any rate, I'm following you here. I do like the threaded message form, which trumps any Twitter app. I'm also looking for value, not noise. - MR

It just signified your preference to communicate with high numbers on FriendFeed where everyone can be organized, searched and found- it is thus more meaningful. On Twitter it was chaos for you that way and everyone lost. Why lie? - E-Advocate Network

MR:Welcome to FriendFeed. - Bryan Lee

I thought you should've done it sooner. - Ben Parr

agree w/ Ben - michael sean wright

LOL. Just a theological point: God's following everyone (or not) is not a theological explanation for why bad things happen to good people. But I'm guessing you're speaking tongue-in-cheek? - Justin Long

Change is natural. It's part of innovation. We adjust to new tools and technologies as they evolve, and because our methods of using them change, the tools evolve. Sometimes they (or us) take even a bigger leap and revolutionize. Then we get the next big thing, or take the next significant step in history. It's far better that you adapted, Robert, based on your findings, needs and experiences, than continued on with previous use patterns. - Cathryn Hrudicka

People are haters. Ignore the idiots. - Nile Flores

I second Nile even when I disagree with you Robert! (((pu liki))) spreading Aloha! - Arleen Anderson

Robert Scoble

New blog post: you are SO unfollowed! http://scobleizer.com/2009... I'll follow on FriendFeed anyone who comments here:

August 5 - Comments disabled - Like - Share

Ozer Wrzl (EN), Jens Christian Freund, Harold Cabezas and 157 other people liked this

Follow me! - TheHenry

427 more comments

TheHenry: I already am! :-) - Robert Scoble

Please don't unfollow me!! :) - Carlo Nasuti

oh yeah! I forgot! lol! #fail - TheHenry

Very interesting approach Robert. If it is working for you that is awesome though. Hope all is well. Give Roc a big hug for me. - C.C. Chapman

Yo... - MVB (Grinch of FF)

Not too much unfollowing please. - Tim

i'm in - Tai Hsia

Can you follow me? - Giorgio

ok I'll allow you - Derry O Donnell

What's going on here? - Andru Edwards

I think you're already following me Robert. - Andrew Leahey

well ok ) - Denverken

Lead, follow, or get out of the way. - Robert Kenney

* - Michael J. Carrasquillo

[comments here] - Nick Humphries

I will comment here! :) - John Ptacek

Great blog appreciate all of your "likes" that I would not have noticed before. Thanks for all the time you spend educating us. - Gary Prechtel

auto-follow always seemed like a bad idea. people can always msg you but your stream will get totally cluttered if you dont do a little bit of housekeeping. - William Kapes

"baby I'm a star" -Prince (off purple rain) - Michael J. Carrasquillo

novel approach, seems sound - Danny Ayers

Consider me available for following. :-) - Eric D. Wilson

Okay, I'll bite.. - Tanya

Bring it Scobleizer. - Todd Pringle

I agree, Twitter is much better this way. - Ryan W

I appreciate your work, and your passion for social media. - Evan Travers

sounds simple... - Mateo Yadarola

Scoble follow me baby - Jadito

Oh you are getting quite a response here!!!! I'm commenting so you'll follow me but the thing is you're going to LIKE following me because you'll learn all about Sedona through tons of videos and you'll love it so much you'll want to pack your camera and head out here! =) - SedonaTV

Thanks for the mentions, Robert (and you know I'm not commenting just for the follow - I just like to follow you, which is what counts!) - Jesse Stay

Guess I might as well delete that overpriced twitter app I bought last week. - Shea from iPhone

Actually Robert, now I've seen you've tidied up your twitter, I'll probably follow you there again too. :-) - Tim

hey follow me scoble - Andy Jenks

Meh, who cares really, not like you read everyone you followed. Plus unfollowed you anyways, not like you have to say that's interestined except friendfeed spam. - Steve

joining the crowd - good move Robert. - Adam

follow me - Tai Hsia

welcome to Boulder - Andrew Hyde

@scobleizer just created the most important tech follow list on Twitter. - Christian Anderson

aww shucks, and here I was thinking it was just me who you unfollowed. - Jess Sloss

I underwent the same situation, Robert - I unfollowed almost everybody on Twitter who duplicated their accounts here on FrF. I got a tempest of fury for this action. web3 is too personal still )) - massagin

Scoble in Boulder = Trouble. - Jim Halligan @jim

I feel fortunate that you're still subbed to me on FF. I haven't even noticed whether you unfollowed me on Twitter. But you following me, still hasn't gotten me the chicks. :P Always fun seeing your posts, long as you don't block me, it doesn't matter if you follow me or not. :) - Arlan Koizumi

I did the same thing some weeks ago after avoiding twitter because it got too noisy. It was instantly better. But in the mean time I started to use FF more and I like it better here so I hardly go near twitter now. - Murray Barton

You already follow me here on ff, which i use more than twitter. - dthree

What's up? - Kevin Whalen from iPhone

Hey Robert, so for following >1,600 is it that right way taken by Philtro and Filttr? - Martin Adamek

I'm glad you mentioned Loic, he caught a lot of flack for doing this earlier. - Steven Cains

Hey Robert - fight the tweetspam ! - Michael Neale

Don't think you are following me on Twitter anymore..please do and best regards - Karma Martell

I'm still trying to figure out the following... so I'm watching how you do it scoble. - Matthew Schrock

Good plan. I'm looking forward to your results. I'm trying to figure out all these social media elements. I would appreciate your Twitter follow. - David Stanley

hope this new approach works for you! - timepilot

Oh, so now you are only easy on FF. - James Watters

Odd internal response, I don't follow everyone who follows me cuz of the very noise you talk about. And, there's no good reason for you to follow me since I'm unlikely to deliver news of interest to you. And yet, here I am, posting on FriendFeed so you have the OPTION of following me, a stranger who is not the same kind of SMART as you. Who'd have thought... - Della Mauler

Interesting statement about original content value of FF independent of twitter. Twitter is where you keep your noise level down... - James Watters

This seems like asking for trouble to me, Scoble. But, it's your time and bandwith to do with what you will. Since only a handful of people (by that I think I mean just one) follow me on Twitter, it's pretty easy for me to weed out the bots. The people I follow are my internet nerds (mostly the Rev 3 crew) so I know their interests are in line with mine. Hit me up for some edifying conversations about Lost and video games, Robert. - Jeremiah Green

Here you go Robert! [also via twitter: @Scobleizer Therefore: only approx. 1.7 million "active" human @Twitter users contribute 50%+ of all activity, right? #engagement] Regards, @AAinslie - Alexander Ainslie

The green avatar is so disturbing mate. :) - Jordan Windebank

I'll lead, you follow. So where are we going? - Tom Sheppard

I was sad to see you unfollowed me, but now you may follow me again, so all will be well in the world. - Jodi

following the leader... - John Munro

You're still following me - does that mean I'm a smart feller? ;) - Brett Kelly

so glad I mail Robert a business card every month :) - Christian Anderson

Della: the thing is here I can follow you and put you into a list and watch you less frequently than some of my other people. So everyone wins. But only here on FriendFeed. :-) - Robert Scoble

Some of us have been doing this from our start. Kind of cool, eh? But our numbers don't grow quickly so we were tagged as "slow." Nice to see you catch up with us! Also, this may shock you, there sre folks who follow and communicate with only 3 folks on twitter and they are HAPPY! Imagine.... - lynda spangler

Yay. Now he will follow a librarian. - Joe

Follow this dot!!! . - Bwana ☠

I've long thought the entire Twitter "etiquette" of always following who follows you to be a bit of a folly. I'm following 114 at the moment, and the stream still moves too fast for me to keep up with. - Darren Landrum

Comment! - anna sauce

ok - Vasu Srinivasan

Good test, count me in... I don't follow tons of people, I follow a few prolific Scoble-types and the rest are more focused in areas I'm interested in. - David Ziembicki

I'm not following tons of people, just a select few. More to follow on FB when facebook has completely integrated Friendfeed-funcionality. ;-) - Wolfgang G. Wettach

I only follow people I know or have something interesting to say, did you really have 160000 people that said something worthwhile??? - Gerard van Schip

Well I commented via your Blog so instead of repeating myself I'll link to comment http://disq.us/1ms9 - Keith - @tsudo

Gerard: everyone says something worthwhile once in a while. The trick is to see it when it happens. Here on FriendFeed, by the way, you have a better shot because good stuff usually gets liked and commented on, so it pulls up higher into my view. - Robert Scoble

come join us here folks http://ff.im/6dUHN xxx - Mark

Okay. But will you read and comment on my stuff? - Mellissa Claus

Robert, I posted this after Loic's decision and it looks like it will need another update. http://www.knowthenetwork.com/blog... I think there is value in stating your follow policy. - Keith - @tsudo

cool - Zach Cheatham

Hello? - Vicky

following all the discussion of you unfollowing everyone on twitter has made me think about doing the same thing and starting fresh. - (jeff)isageek

not unless we beat you in the Ashes - Mark

Nice post Robert, and no surprise it's an improvement. ;o) I have seen it for me too. - Rob Sellen :o)

1 thing I find Robert still worth following @Scobleizer when I am not on friendfeed & on my Hootsuite or PeopleBrowsr. therefore not much affected, not much 2 bother me, ego not gone at all. luv your post Robert it is a frank posting - polou/indigo_bow

Follow me Robert, I promise I'm not annoying. :) @cluteman - Greg Clute from iPhone

You've piqued my curiosity. - Kathy

Robert, thank you! I follow you and enjoy your "likes" and your energetic takes. I also enjoy your Building43 interviews! I am a constant FriendFeed user now. Thank you! - Tobin Truog

This made me realise I must be more active on FF and comment/post more :-). - Mats Pettersson

I think I'll give FriendFeed a go! Never tried it, but looks easy and I need to understand the interwebs better. @CodeSamurai_Com - CodeSamurai

butt-kissing is not a prerequisite for being followed, he will follow you anyways :D - Mark

Count me in! (Please??) - Ricky Maveety

lol @mark. ;o) - Rob Sellen :o)

You can follow me, but since you follow a lot of people, you probably can't pay attention to the stream of tweets. - Alex Knight

Alex..that's the WHOLE point he did this... ;o) - Rob Sellen :o)

IMHO 1,647 is still way too many people to follow. - Alex Knight

I will NOT get baited into ... ah CRAP. I follow very few people on twitter, mainly only to find info from Android developers (my topic of choice). If you mention anything about the food you are currently eating, etc.. you will probably not be followed. If you post 80,000 times a day, you will not be followed, since Twitters interface sucks (not so for FF). Also, no offense to other social users, but if you resend your FF/FB/<insert other social site here> entries to twitter, I probably won't follow. - Tim Hoeck

http://socialspark.com/blogs... Chris Pirillo is Scum. - Mark

good move IMO - Joanna Nicol

Love the post, love the response. - Chris Rogers from BuddyFeed

nice hanging out at with beach w/ you last week! follow moi!!! - Raina Lee

I always feel like scoble's following me - Rodney J Woodruff from iPhone

Don't forget your Dunbar number, Scoble! There are only so many people you can have meaningfully connect with online. - Steve Lynch from twhirl

Mark is right. No butt kissing. Ew. - Robert Scoble

"I always feel like, somebody's watching me..." - Wizetux

Comment!!!! Ohh wait but you already follow me... - Amit Nangare

Follow me, if you aren't already....please. Thanks, - Steve de Mena

here is my comment ZOL - Shane Gibson

Comment? What kind of coomment, Robert? :-) - Mitch Featherston

Whoop there it is! On Twitter @jimgoldstein - Jim Goldstein from iPhone

Oh..Oh... Mr. Kotter...Mr Kotter..follow me! - Scott Booher

Glad to see you're writing more than 140 characters on that blog. Doesn't that feel liberating? Maybe we should be allowed character# based on your metric for powerful/smart/newsmaker - Noah Bloom

You already follow me here on FF, for which I thank you. So, I'll just say thanks for the phone call the other day. :) - Jeff Harbert

I'll take a follow! - Jeff Weber

@shaunhess - Shaun Hess

Ok, so follow me again and I will follow you back. Thanks! - Audrey

Robert - I fail on most of your criteria so I'm not expecting you to follow me. The thing is I don't care if you follow me back - this is social media and everyone has their own choice. I choose to follow you because you entertain and inform me. The relationship is 100% one way and I am more than happy with that! - Pon

Robert - Last night at GDGT Party the person at the Blackberry booth said: 1) She had 'heard of Twitter, never friend feed' uses neither 2) Is SCOBLE is coming tonight 3) Wow, your Blackberry is really "archaic" and find out when contract lets you upgrade. F-D UP? Booth babes need primers. - Liza

Interesting theory... people who comment more apt to contribute? - Mark Philpot

I know someone else who tried this strategy last year, with similar results. I've been debating it. Once I got over 3K followers on Twitter life just got weird. Started to spend X amount of time every day blocking porn spam. - Patricia F. Anderson

Liza: yeah, sorry for not coming to the party. I went and saw Obama's CTO instead. - Robert Scoble

Steve Lynch: my Dunbar number is higher than yours is. :-) - Robert Scoble

Nice summary Robert on the whole Unfollow thing, but would it be too repetitive if I re-post on my FF? - Keith Rowland

What is the best friend feed aggregation strategy of non-friend streams (eg RSS, twitter, etc)? Imaginary friend per service, then add to lists? Multiple services per imaginary friend or 1 to 1? Or add the services to a group? What are the considerations? - John Brown

Keith: you can repost anywhere you like, thanks! - Robert Scoble

I'm in! - Craig Shipp

still wondering how you are able to handle such a big load of subscribers here and e.g. so many followers with twitter o_0. I am already (sometimes) lost with the few i got till now. Lately with one sweep almost 40 to 50 contacts in twitter disappeard and i have no clue why ... boah, how are you handling the noise? Hell, with so many ppl in, you might have a terrific noise? Or you wear just good headphones ;)? - Ronald

I very much agree that being choosy is the key to Twitter. I'm not nearly on the scale that you are, but in my experience, freely following people (whetther they follow me or not) and then mercilessly cutting back on them over and over again results in a kind of darwinianly better and better signal to noise ratio. - Tim Maly

Touche! - Steve Lynch from twhirl

Count me in - Johnny

Hi Robert - Randy Allen Bishop

Liked the blog post and totally agree. I've been meaning to do something similar. What I do is occasionally prune and then add some "better" replacements, so my total is always 2000 follows. - Bora Zivkovic

I don't see how anyone can manage so many users without groups. Then again, with groups you could just make an "ignore" group. - Oscar M. Cantu from iPhone

Great blog post. I totally agree on the noise level. I figure I have blocked a few hundred accounts on Twitter, and my noise level has dropped dramatically. Thanks for the follow! - Tony "Frosty" Welch

Hello Hello! - Sam Goldfield

Robert - I figured you were in DC from FF, but she had NO IDEA what a CTO is. Point is, she was eager to give you a Blackberry, but not me, and I wish I had a Scoble costume to pretend for 5 minutes. - Liza

@Robert I think you are starting another mass follow again. - Steve Chou from fftogo

Steve: that's not the problem. As long as spam doesn't enter the system I can deal. Keep in mind here I can choose how I follow. I can put you all in a folder that I never look at, if I wanted to. - Robert Scoble

my feelings were hurt that you unsubscribed to me on twitter, but i agree with your methods - Brian Appleby

I'm in! - Chris Rossini

Brian, yeah, but I follow you here. So there. - Robert Scoble

really doesn't matter as long as i can follow you, that's the beauty of these services - Brian Appleby

How did you come to follow so many to begin with? I get annoyed with ppl and unfollowing is easier than sifting through their garbage constantly. - R1CC1

Autofollow was a horrible idea to begin with. - David Chieng

I kind of tired to keep an eye on who follows me now,the ones I'm following is much more important.:-) - Steve Chou from fftogo

Whoa lots of comments I'm following you longtime lol - Edgar Rodríguez from iPhone

Robert: we need more intelligent spam-follower-filtering on Twitter! We need to fix this. - Steve Lynch from twhirl

@David +1 I think auto follow is such a bad idea to begin with,and people like Robert now even need to pay to unfollow these people. - Steve Chou from IM

How much did SocialToo charge for running the unfollow script? - Shane

I'm in! - rich brant from iPhone

I heard its 25 dollars. - Steve Chou from IM

I've always been very picky in who I follow on twitter. I follow 40 people, and I can't guarantee that I see every single tweet. I don't scroll back usually, unless it's my "Real Life" column in Tweetdeck that couldn't fit on my screen. - Tom Ribbens

My birthday is also January 18th, therefore you must follow me Robert! ;) - Chris Luckhardt from BuddyFeed

Thanks Steve! $25 is pretty reasonable. Wonder if anyone else will be jumping on the bandwagon - Shane

Haha....I also threw the devil horns for Scobleizer...that should count for something. ;) http://www.flickr.com/photos... - Chris Luckhardt from BuddyFeed

OK, let's try it! And what about Twitter? - Alexei Zheglov

Thanks for your post. Last time I checked you follow me here on FriendFeed. OK not to follow me on Twitter. - Pilgrim Five

Smart way to clean house. - Jeremy Chone

u have already subscribing me although i am just a-staying-at-home mum =)). thanx scoble. u are really a nice geek. haha! - zʍıɔ

Let's do it. - Kate

this is like an awesome commentfest - Edgar Rodríguez

You can follow me, but I never say anything. Oh.. wait.... - James Macgill

follow me! - Tate DA FF MVP from BuddyFeed

Sometimes the tortoise beats the hare after all... building organically based on getting to know people and interactions tends to avoid the ghastly spammers, seo peeps and bots - Sally Church

Tap, tap... is this thing on? - Yanik Falardeau

This is the best place to follow you. On twitter you only see post headlines, but friendfeed is where the conversation takes place. - Michael Fidler

Ah crap. You're already following me :) - Jason Nunnelley

I'm outside your sphere, but bootstrapping is bootstrapping right? - Travis Bedard

Tuesday night for the first time in 2 months I UNfollowed everyone on Twitter who wasn't following me. Since you had UNfollowed me, yup I unfollowed you. My Twitter account is so /FUBARed! It only goes to page 506 to show who I'm following and after that it is BLANK! I don't even know if they show in my Home stream. So Robert, I value what you say. Know I can tweet profusely - but it's as @replies to others with the occasional micro-blog thrown in. Question, what DID I do to cause you to UNfollow me? - Arleen Anderson

I hope you'll follow me... - Shane Tilton

Follow me, eh? - Joey Gibson

Trying to fill out those dropped Twitter follows? - Jamie Elgie

Scoble: Have you convinced Guy Kawasaki against his "follow everyone that follows you" mentality? - Kevin Pruett

please do what you must to have the most effecient feed mr scoble, the random will still creep through the cracks, ;) - chaz2b

I still haven't really adopted FriendFeed, but I will get interesting here in time if you follow me. - Lance M. Brown

How are your cleanup efforts coming along? - Jennifer Ruggiero

Oops - I also meant to ask, Robert: how are you managing to follow the couple thousand that you are now re-following on Twitter? You must be using groups, I guess...any other methods? I find ~500 people to be a near max in terms of how many folks I can fully read. - Lance M. Brown

Following your inspiration, I unfollowed almost 100 people last night and blocked about 1000 spammers, cam girls, MLM marketers, and the like. Twitter is more like it was a year ago, its almost like I gave my Twitter account an enema and it worked. Thanks for the original idea. - Mark Edwards

Excellent! - Don Strickland

Robert, I started out only following those I know and those I am genuinely interested in. I've only followed back a few of the people who've followed me. I have a second account that I decided to experiment with. I followed about 700 people on there. It has had about double the followers of my main account consistently. I am about to try some new tricks there with an auto-follow script I'm writing but I think I will stay the course with my main account. - Paul The Raven

Robert, I tried the "follow everyone" (almost) method for a short time - then I'd unfollow about once-a-week. Now I try to schedule a "follow new" once a week. TweetDeck's group feature makes following lots of folks bearable. So does FF, but you've been saying that for-ever! - Kathy E Gill

I am just taking it slow. - Rick Cogley from iPhone

Hey. - Kreg Steppe

I will follow you if you follow me (Genesis) - Keith Barrett

I may not be smart, but I'm smart enough to follow you! - John Pfaff

It occurred to me (and surely to someone before me), that different definitions of "following" might be a big factor here. If I'm following someone, it means I'm following along with their updates. But others might see themselves more as becoming part of a person's "following". Not that they are necessarily reading the person's stuff, but they are willing to be considered part of that person's inflated Twitter posse, as part of the influence-trading aspect of Twitter. - Lance M. Brown

Robert, I think that the biggest thing that changed is not that you were "wrong" (to follow everyone) before but that the Twitter population has changed so much. A year ago, pretty much everyone on Twitter was real, and interesting - now there's so much automated gaming the system going on that the signal to noise ratio has gotten unbearable. So I think anyone who cares about more than... more... - Matthew Blaisdell

I can't imagine how it would happen technologically, but it would be great if there was a way to ditch followers who weren't actually reading your tweets. - Lance M. Brown

Enjoyed recent posts and look forward to more from you! Keep it up. - One Degree Connected

I don't want to be left out please!! - Jannifer @wordsforliving

All right, I'll bite :) - although I'll say that I did the mass-unfollow-thing months ago - long before it was cool. - Justin from Nambu

Your most active followers are on FF. No loss.If you really wanted to make a bold statement you ought to have blocked all of your followers and started from scratch. - Benjamin Taylor

Been a while since I put you and Shel On the record...Online - Eric Schwartzman

blah. - imabonehead

Good article Robert. I honestly enjoyed the perspective. I found the same to be true, but on a much lower scale, of course ;-) - Ken Stewart | ChangeForge

i'm in! - Criz

I don't get it - so now you are using Twitter kinda like a normal person, and its some kind of miracle that it works better? - Nick Lothian

I'm impressed you can keep up with 1600 people. I have trouble enough with the little amount I have. I did find that making FriendFeed imaginary friends and putting them in groups for those I'd like to read occasionally (but not on a regular basis) has helped a lot - Tamara

Follow....how about some promotion! - Bob DeMarco

i'm in - Joshua Smith from twhirl

9/11 Was an Inside Job - bill giltner

Stop it, or I will have to get a restraining order. - Sriks7

Hey, Robert! - tomit from iPhone

In my mind I'm important enough to follow ;-) - Jonathan Callahan

Hello Robert....Whatever your favorite genre is...http://listen.grooveshark.com/#... - Michele Lorito-Chase

Looks like you have a lot of work to do following everybody. - Corbett Barr

now i'll have to write something interesting... - Robert Littlejohn

me! i offer nothing but the warm feeling of having accepted a ff reject. - Marco

ok. so how will you filter the noise now - Kfir Pravda

Ooo, I've won the lottery. You'll follow me now. Wheeee! (how do you have the time to go through all of the names by hand? VA assistance?) - Peggy Dolane

Great :) - Baard @ Pixum

Interesting trend on twitter - I always wondered what sense it made to follow tens of thousands of people, too much noise. I'm finding it hard enough to follow 2900 (looking to cull even that down as I mostly tweet about 30 people!) - Tia Singh, Life Coach

211th comment: WTF - Geer

Good :) - ★ Soner Gönül

I like your ability to influence so many people. I'm following you (mostly here - on FriendFeed) because it's one of the ways to learn how you do it (but, please, do not follow me if you do not see anything you could learn from me :-). - Hanna Wiszniewska

I would come up w/ a better vetting process. - Joe

why would you do that? - james

got to get a pic up so i can fit the criteria, I only follow 45 people and some of them are on thin ice ( Im lookin at you Scoble) - James Hunter

"Where in The Net is Robert San Diego?" (cit.) :-) - Luca Perugini from iPhone

I'm not kissing your arse,but i do learn a lot listening to you. - Paul Downing

@scobleizer why would you randomly follow people who comment in this post when you just got done knocking FFollo and having to unfollow a gazillion people on Twitter? - Bryan Zirkel

Bryan: because I'm following people one by one and putting them into lists on my screen. Autofollowing means you aren't doing ANY of that thinking. Also, autofollowing will get you spammers, if they ever show up (and they will). - Robert Scoble

@Robert: Read your blogpost and that's indeed what I look at to follow people too. No autofollow and even close friends have to tell something interesting for me to (keep) following. Friends who are new to Twitter (no tweets yet) get the benefit of doubt. - Patrick Mackaaij

If you follow me, great, but if you don't I'll understand. :) And I ought to do some pruning myself... - Grant Bierman

Let's give it a try. :0) - Toma Kazakov

I still don't understand how you want to follow someone who just writes a comment over here. Well, this is not the first time. I did not understand why and how you followed 100k people. I find it hard to properly follow 100 people. - Sumanth Kolar

Sumanth: obviously there are degrees of "following." When you read the New York Times, do you read the entire paper word for word? I don't. Same when I'm following. I only get random slices of some of my lists. Others, which have 500 people on them, get 100% read. - Robert Scoble

I'm still here . . . although tired after teaching all day. Louis Gray came to my PR class at SFSU and WOWED the 50 students [except for one who thinks we are making too much of social media] We won't be following him. - Shari Weiss

I like cheese! - Paul Puri

really? - clockwise from iPhone

Shari: Louis wows me too. Glad to see the class is getting into it. - Robert Scoble

He he :) - Richard Holas

I still like the "stranger stream" of Twitter vs "friend feed" of other applications. I don't feel the need to read all tweets from everybody - and tools let me check my fave tweeples. I think mass unfollowing destroys some of the social contract - Robert you are lucky because you are well liked and can do some risky things but companies for example (not Brands of One) would be in... more... - Laurel Papworth

As @charleneli predicted back in January, 2009 will be the year of de-friending on social networks. It's here. - Mark Evans

Laurel: yeah, you have to navigate these waters carefully if you are representing a brand, that's for sure! - Robert Scoble

you can put me on your boring list... - Charles Tanton

i will not get followed back: not powerful, don't have a brand, not a news maker... but i kinda understand the reasons - Dani Martínez

I still think it all goes into how you use twitter. If your using it as a communication tool it depends on if you are looking for broadcast or 2 way. Its interesting to watch as some of the bigger names turn back from the broadcast and go back to the 2 way. - Luke Kilpatrick

@Robert so when you're taking in information from FF do you have a feed of several dozen/hundred "key" people and then categorize the rest, or are you mainly searching? Do you utilize groups at all or mainly just rely on what comes across your feeds? I guess I'm curious as to how you're using FF to collect information. - Bryan Zirkel

I have found Twitter becomes noise rather than a conversation once the following/follower thing gets over a certain mark. I think this is the dirty little secret of Twitter - if it just turns into white noise, rather than a filter, then it becomes less than useful. - Michael Liss

I'm interested in how we'll all feel over the next few years as social networks continue to change and more people and organizations get on them. Obviously, many of us are getting fed up with spammers and are unfollowing them on Twitter and Facebook. I am also having a hard time keeping up with new subscribers on FriendFeed because I know less about them from their profiles and have to... more... - Cathryn Hrudicka

BTW, I feel like I'm finding lots of interesting new people to follow from these discussions that Robert and others are holding on FF. Cool! - Cathryn Hrudicka

Am I too late to comment and get followed? - Hichame Assi

I'm definitely around :) - KyNam Doan

Aren't you following me already? If not, you should be! LoL - Thomas Ward

I'm definitely late to be followed. :D - Faraz Mullick

I don't get it but ok :) - Parvez Halim

LOL! I follow those I find interesting and which can give me useful information. And hope someone follows me for the same reasons. - Flavio

Very interesting post - I've always thought that you guys who follow loads of people must get completely swamped by noise! Like you, I've found it useful to follow companies I use that have interesting products like Zoho and Evernote as a way of keeping up to date with their latest innovations. Excellent idea spelling out your "follow criteria" - it needs to become standard etiquette for social networks so that people don't get offended when they aren't followed back :) . - David Meredith

aren't you doing the same thing here, that you did in Twitter? Choose carefully who you follow, filling your brain with pollution doesn't make you smarter - Allison

Just finished reading the Mashable post on your unfollow exercise. It's attracting attention from all the other big names now. - George Hall (Australia)

Very interesting indeed, I only to unfollow a few, cause I just never had auto follow on.. So now I just unfollow the ones I'm bored of.. - Jaap Willem

Seems like a good idea. Although Louis Gray also has a few valid points on his latest blog post why it might be a mistake http://bit.ly/19UKxk - Silver Hage

I've never understood the auto-follow procedure on any social network. Even on Facebook, where it is obligatory, one can still lower the noise by simply hiding the updates of those who want to follow you, but perhaps also have little personal connection and therefore can be hidden. - Noah Gray

It seems like the unfollowing was the easy part. Choosing who to follow again must have been a chore. I think it is crucial in twitter (and FriendFeed for that matter) to have a clear out every six months or so otherwise you get bogged down in an information feed you don't really care about. - Chris Nixon

I can totally understand why you had to do this. I'm following 2700-ish folks on Twitter and I need 3 groups to manage it (using TweetDeck). I feel I am keeping up with most of my local community and the general tech community at large though I'm sure I'm still missing quite a bit of stuff from people who are not in the 3 groups. I also wonder how much more I can actually handle. - Ken Seto

Um... well, I made something of myself, but then I didn't like what I made, so now I'm doing it all over again. Not sure how that fits with your criteria! Plus, I really don't have a brand or any influence to speak of. I do look great in boxers, however. - Mark "DerBingle" J

OK, OK, changed my picture. Instead of a green clock (a clock is my personal brand) I put a picture of myself. A lot of people told me to do that.... - Bora Zivkovic

I am still looking for info on holographic technology being used for news delivery. Perhaps it's a technology that hasn't even been invented yet or is sitting on a shelf somewhere. What say you? http://specialdee.wordpress.com/2009... - Denise

Hoping your new look account has had the desired effect. No need to follow me, I'm not the interesting type, I'll just be glad if your insights, links & content continues. Congrats & good luck - JanLawrence

Here's what's interesting, Robert, I've noticed an uptick in followers even if you reply or RT or like someone's tweet, not just if you follow that person. Then again, perhaps that's the intent - if you like or RT someone's idea, that's a kind of stamp of approval. - Aaman (Clone of FF)

Hej hej! - Peter

The Scoble Pendulum.. How long till we go back to FOLLOW!! FOLLOW!!! FOLLOW!!!! ? :) - Adrian Scicluna

I did a purge on Facebook for the same reasons a few months ago. It's under 300 and it's people I actually care about. I've come "this close" to running a purge on Twitter but haven't yet. Maybe this will spark me to do it. I've kept FF tight from the beginning. - Rob Williams

moving from FB to FF ... fewer, longer, more meaningful threads. welcoming your follow. cheers - marc calamia

ok, you´re following me already :-) - Torsten Eckert

alright - follow me... - thx in advance Robert Scoble... - Nilesh

All that commenting in the past counts for nothing? - Kevin Gamble

Hey Robert... Great post... On FriendFeed, I increasingly put people without meaningful and valuable content on a separate feed that I rarely check... Its a more "sensible" way to unfollow, i think... I only unsubscribe if I get pissed at someone etc. I wish, FF gave users the option to only unsubscribe from comments and likes (but keep the main feed). This would be a good tool to control the noise... - Onur Kabadayi

I agree with Robert (duh!). I very briefly made the effort of checking out the new follows and deciding whether to follow back. I think once I hit a thousand I shifted to a model of occasionally saying, "If you want me to follow you, talk to me." Hit two thousand and quit saying anything or checking followers. I don't care if they follow me as long as they either say useful things like real people or don't talk at all. I've never autofollowed back. This strategy works for me. - Patricia F. Anderson

I have a large difference between people I follow (around 2000) and people who follow me (around 1800) - I choose people who are important sources of information. People choose me if they think I am an important source of information to them. I never thought it would have to be a one-to-one relationship as to who is useful to whom: some are informative, others are good listeners and learners. I learn from people I follow and I hope my followers learn from me. - Bora Zivkovic

I also think that those of us who follow larger numbers of people don't use the stream in the same way. It is more dipping in and out of the stream, trusting that the important stuff will be repeated enough to float to the top, engaging with conversations of the moment. I wrote a blogpost on this earlier this year: http://etechlib.wordpress.com/2009... - Patricia F. Anderson

Someone told me twitter can be separated into two types. (id say at least two) - Kay Proskin

Scoble, I am beginning to think you are a cult leader :). Look at all these comments! I am using FF more and more these days... Useful for eGuiders.com that's for sure. - Marc Ostrick

I'm not sure your following me. - Amit Morson

Hey Scobie :D Follow me ! - paniaguai

I like Robert. He was one of the first people I followed on Twitter and brought me to FF. But I don't understand why people are desperate to have him follow them. Status? Some kind of virtual autograph? - Tech Introvert

What the heck. Follow me if you like. I'll be as entertaining & informative as I can. - Aaron Schaub from iPod

Been considering doing the same. Your post just might be the flame that lights a fire you-know-where to get it done. - @katebuckjr

I only follow a few people and keep losing track so lord only knows how you managed to even begin to keep track of a conversation before friendfeed came along - Iain from BuddyFeed

Well done! Who need followers that aren't reading your tweets anyway. - Sean Rasmussen

I just want a toaster! - ZuDfunck

I'm considering doing same once I'm more confident in my use of FriendFeed. I RT'd this and it resonated with at least one of my followers. - Tony Hollingsworth

'Hand-crafted personal network' is the meme of the moment, and whilst I can see the workmanship, where's the value going to be for you, Robert, in following this rag-tag (no offence people :) ) of folks from a gazillion different verticals. (OK, so they're mostly life scientists). - Andrew Spong

I use to want to be Bob Dylan. Now I am not so sure. - ZuDfunck

um..... - Spencer

My take: you can't be an authentic, credible voice to your community if you let 'sex & dollars' spammers hang on to your coattails. Spam followers matter.... in a bad way. Allowing them to be associated with you diminishes your potential value to genuine followers. It's a pain. It takes time. It's worth doing. More on this, if interested: http://tr.im/vJwb - Andrew Spong

I'll have mine to go. - ZuDfunck

Hope to see more "old fashioned blogging", like it better than tweets. Tweets are bound to disappear into oblivion the moment they're posted. - Willem (@wim66) ☠

"Spam followers matter.... in a bad way." - I certainly agree with this. I block pornbots just as quickly as they follow me. I'm less vigilant about the commercial follows, but usually they go away by themselves after a while. - John Craft

You're already following me here (don't care about twitter tough), so i just hope you don't un-follow, even though you probably don't understand what i'm talking about most of the time, since it's in portuguese. - Diego Sana

So what happened to the advantages to following so many people you always talked about? - Bas

Thanks for connecting here, still learning all the advantages of FF - carece

@Andrew Regarding spam followers and the idea that allowing them to follow you somehow dilutes your credibility, I just have to disagree. To me that places the burden on the wrong person. I don't have time to waste pruning those who follow me, unless they are overtly annoying.My stream is public, they can follow me anyway. What matters to me is that the spammers leave me alone. If they don't, I block them. If they keep quiet, I don't care. - Patricia F. Anderson

What is important is not who follows me, but who *I* follow. - Patricia F. Anderson

Follow me if you want, but I gotta warn ya, it's scintillating stuff! - Pierce Presley

Funny my twitter feed is much noisier but I have been very selective on who I follow. I have tried to make the feed relevant and actionable. At times I post things that seem out of the norm on my twitter feed but that is mainly for the few people who follow me that don't get it but I am trying to keep up their interest level. I also control who follows me, yes this breaks the model but I think the follow everyone model was broken and reckless - Richard Gallo

Am I interesting? Dunno. I'm often controversial, tho. ;) BTW, we met in person at a Pittsburgh Blogfest, but I really don't expect you to remember that. - Eric Williams

Enjoyed the post. I just started Twitter a few days ago to get away from Facebook. I like friendfeed the best - can't wait until it becomes more mainstream. - Robby Parker

Awesome move. Consider that my comment please :) - Charlotte Barker

friendfeed is definitively more evolved that Twitter. Conversely, user bases of Twitter is still its real (and unique) point of strenght... - Marco Castellani

Don't want you to follow me (unless you find my stream of interest) but it's quite interesting the number of people that comment to get you to follow! - Ben Drury

Hey Robert! So, I would like to talk to you about a social media company I'm working with right now. They launched a few months ago and their trajectory and momentum is pretty amazing. Oh, and I started unfollowing the noise in my Twitter after I commented on your blog post. - Gregg Le Blanc

Great ideas. I've been selective (though it fluctuates) about following people/accounts on Twitter since I joined about 2 years ago. I can't take too much noise. - Joe Lance from twhirl

I'm asking the same thing Bas asked... what about your video on the benefits of following so many people? I took a stab at that method of madness by starting to follow all kinds of people, and following anyone that followed me... but I always felt like I was missing good content from good people because of all the "spam". I started to use TweetDeck to create groups/columns for... more... - Timothy Federwitz

@Patricia - reminds me that I should probably review all my twitter followers and thin things down. :) - JA Castillo

thanks - Keith

I like conversing with interesting people. Sometimes that means commenting to get followed, @cogiva. ;) - Eric Williams

Hi Scoble! - Pete Gilbert

I did almost the same thing - unfollowed about 1000 from my 1500, no attention is way better - Maarten den Braber

Couldn't agree more. It's about time we all grew up. BTW Don't follow me. :-) - Gee Ranasinha

Robert what's the deal with Twitter? - stockmanmarc

Your post makes good sense. I didn't auto-follow & still find folks to unfollow because their noise gets too loud. - Debra Ellis

Very clever. I imagine the signal to noise is sooooo much better. - Chris Brogan

I've been thinking about unfollowing a bunch twitter folks as well. I'll look at SocialToo again. My initial experience with SocialToo wasn't good. However, it was during their infancy. - Ron Hudson

I don't blame you at all. Leo was all over that yesterday. - Daniel B. Honigman

why would simply leaving a comment prompt you to follow me? - David Wescott

You're not going to change your mind and mass unfollow us are you? - walidmREALTOR

Sup! :-) - Jon Winters

I suspect it identifies you as a real person interested in dialog, David. - Eric Williams

Followers are currency and you have plenty to spend - Lee Odden

Bob, did you do anything on Twitter recently ? Did you massively refollow people ? Seems like you screwed up Twitter : down for a while... ;-) - Enikao

Follow me! @carloscomputers - carloscomputers

very cool timing with just before twitter goes down hard! well done Robert! @crbrowning - Colin

@davidorban - David Orban

I've followed you and have really enjoyed your posts. I think I would miss that - Tom

Good to hear that your experiment has stopped the spam @lindsaydavies - Lindsay Davies

ciao Robert! - alex

Your ego is amazing. You make it seem like it is a special deal to be followed by you. I'm glad there are many very bright, talented people here who follow others, regardless of class, education, social status and not based on some snobbish criteria. - RuthNH

DON'T follow me! I write in Italian :-) - Lorenzo Strambi

Here I be - Robert

Wow, this is a lot of comments. And kudos for following Followable people who have something interesting to contribute to your day. I'm glad you did it, because that means you'll find AND share more interesting things. This, in turn, makes you more followable too. Thanks for seeing the light, so to speak. - ax0n

You killed twitter. - Melissa Pierce

and now with twitter down, many will flock to here! - Mark V. Fusco

I love rob - Mark from iPhone

Did this take down Twitter this morning Robert? - frank barry

That must of taken a long time :-) I've always been a fan of twitter, but I must say they have struggled in the last few weeks. We are working with their API on a project and their seems to be an issue every other day that causes problems. Do they have what it takes? - Chris Nadeau

I follow under 200 people and it's great. I can't imagine 1k+ . I add about three or four a month. - Mike Janicke

I unfollow people when I find I ignore their tweets/updates. After reading your blog, I think we ALL need to be more judicious. - Janet Barker-Evans

Is this why Twitter is down? LOL! Can't check to see if you unfollowed me. Hope not. You, Shel Israel, and Jeremiah Owyang were some of the very first people I followed way back before Twitter even had 100,000 people on the service. -- It's been a fun ride but, of course, the spammers always show up to make things difficult. - Brenda Young

How do you really know if you should be following someone until you follow them for a while? Sometimes I don't start talking to someone until I see a common interest, then I tweet back and we start talking, but that could be months later. I don't follow everyone back, but I follow back those that interact. I will unfollow once I see that won't happen, or I don't like their tweets. - Nadine Gilden

Twitter is victime of it own success, they have to re learn how to scal better, but more important they have to learn to share better. - abdellah

looks like you'll need to follow at least 343 people LOL - Shari Weiss

Friendfeed takes over for twitter finally? - Thomas Resing

@Patricia I don't want potential followers to be put off by who is following me. I wouldn't want them to think I care more about have n+1 followers than I do about what they're going to see if they review who I've allowed to follow me. Not to cull spammers suggests I care more about my experience than theirs. To a great extent, the quality of their experience will determine the quality... more... - Andrew Spong

1600 ... isn't that a big number too? It could be you'll think again before you follow every one here :) - Mario Gastaldi

Hi... do I get a follow? - Jason Mayoff

If you are already following me. Will you double follow me? :) - Brady

Hi Robert!! :) - Zaneology from Nambu

Still waiting for my Building 43 t-shirt. Not that I'm bitter or anything. ;-) - Donna Tuttle

Be sure to come by Dallas when you swing through Texas! - Zaneology from Nambu

Respect your opinion Robert but we'll have to agree to disagree. Yes I despise all the FakePornSpamBots who follow me. I block as many as I can, but can't keep up. Our views differ regarding what is important to SEE! I treasure home Home stream! I read it, refresh, read, refresh and in minutes I have the pulse of the world... at least MY world! EVERYONE has something of value to share at some point. If I UNfollow tens of thousands, I will miss so much worthy of consideration. - Arleen Anderson

Just another reason why it's good to diversify, I can still read your posts here. :) - Luis Sandoval

Cheers! - Jeff Wiant

Funny. I was catching up on news on Friendfeed for some odd reason. Great post; plenty for new and long-time users alike to consider there. - Alex Howard

I'm still waiting for the ultimate tool to manage my followings - I can only manage to keep up with about 1/3 of those following me. I'd love to see something that can tell me what friends of mine also follow those that I am or those that are following me. Maybe it's out there and I missed it? - TheDiva Rockin

Anyone interested in assessing the quality of their followers should check http://tweetblocker.com. It's pretty chastening. I aim to improve on my C rating. http://www.buzzom.com is a fun, fast way of decoupling yourself from non-reciprocal followers. You can select individuals to purge, or flush 50 random non-reciprocal followers at a time. - Andrew Spong

Robert, your timing could not be better. ;-) - Dave Martin

Great post, with perfect timing! Dang it, Dave Martin just took it off my lips. - Vadim Lavrusik

I hereby rename this comment thread neoTwitter <waves at followers> - Andrew Spong

/me waves - Kevin Johnson from iPhone

Awww, you gotta admit, saturation, the level of influence that you have, because of your high follower, count, is a tool of mass destruction. Seriously, did you think if you recommend an online service that people would not try it out? Was this an asassination attempt - Peter Murphy

I'm glad i'm not the only one who misses /me actions from IRC, Kevin. ;) - Eric Williams

With today's Twitter outage your timing is pretty stinking good, Robert. :) - Chris Cree

Now to get the rest of the world to follow that same logic when it comes to follow/unfollow! I only started being more selective as Twitter (and everyone else) started getting aggressive with spammers or anyone that even remotely did a single spammy tweet. Now if only there were the same contact management tools available for the other social networks as with Twitter. No matter what though, I'll continue updating my status when I eat a peanut butter sandwich! (With Fluff of course!). - Paul Monaco

Twitter couldn't handle the mass unfollow load, blew up... - manielse (Mark Nielsen)

I've been followed by Robert Scoble :-) - David Finch

Follow iPolitics - Jacob Kobi Gamliel

Now I think that it is time to think about a way to make money using Twitter. - abdellah

@Mark, +1. When in doubt, the default delegation of blame goes to Robert. - Dave Martin

what is critical mass for twitter? Too few and nobody interacts, Too many and spam bots overwhelm, Is it 1K or 2K needed to get a real experience? - WarLord

Hmm can you unsubscribe from "comment notification via e-mail" in FF on a *specific* topic? This one :-) - Patrick Mackaaij

Of course I thonk it is a different experience if you hand follow reading each bio from the beginning then these mass purges are unnecessary - WarLord

I thought you already followed me. lol - Duane-PreppyDude

Not sure if you do, but here I am... - Aron Michalski

I am intrigued how RT addict will RT now?!! (ps: FF please don't post this to my twitter) - abdellah

I have been keeping my twitter account private a majority of the time lately b/c I am going through a divorce, but I really kinda like it. Have been reducing followers as well as the number I follow. - Jackson Miller

You should follow me here in FF and on Twitter too! - Karthi

hopefully most of us have proven our worth beyond commenting on this single thread - andy brudtkuhl

I like the way you operate, Scoble. Thanks in advance for the follow! - Dr. Frank Ramblings, Ph.D

Nice way of doing it... - Charles

No need to follow me unless you are actually going to engage in conversation with me. - Jeff Hurt

If you're already following and we comment, will you unfollow? *wink Hoping all is well your way! - Dayngr

4&5 are my favorite! Those are big reasons I decide to follow someone too. - Kelly Mitton

I'm lucky. Have never had Twitter spam. But then again I'm no Scoble either :) - Lori Reed

I am the peanut butter eating bot - Benjamin Spector

If you are already following me on ff does that mean I get a cookie or something? ;-) - Tomy Thomson

I'll add my name to the list. I came back to FF after the Twitter DoS outage. Maybe Scoble broke Twitter by all his unfollowing. He was the "glue" holding Twitter together. :-) - Tom Newman

Robert: Here's the bit you missed off the end of your title here: .... and put them in that group I don't read :-) - Jim Connolly

Hi Robert, greetings from germany. - Flynn (Michael A. Volz)

add me for your social media and the practice of law news! - Rex Gradeless

Great post. I'm sure that some people might say that this kind of mass unfollowing will hurt Twitter, but I think it's just the opposite. Users who are following people they have no interest in just to pad their own numbers are diminishing the meaning of "following." - Mark Denton

@Ulrichmargarita - Ulrichmargarita

To stave off being unfollowed we need to comment here ya say? - Jason

you are already following me here... perhaps you'll consider re-following me on twitter too - t i n y m

I don't know how you ever did it the other way. I am not in the tech world near as much as I used to be, which wasn't a whole lot. I just followed some random people I saw on SMugMug-related people on here when I started. You were one of them. I had no idea who you were (and still don't :-), but you talked about Twitter a lot too, which got me on there as well. Both services have really... more... - James Schipper

Follow away! - Ferdinand Perez

ok 400 jackpot - abdellah

Quality over quantity in all things, including (perhaps especially) Twitter. Loved your friending methodology -- those are the same rules I've applied since being on Twitter. Posted them onto Posterous to share the love with credit to you: http://lorilaurentsmith.posterous.com/ - Lori Laurent Smith

it's not about unfollowing, it's about filtering... - Barak Hachamov

I started out following everyone on Twitter.Then I got wise. When someone's stream becomes more noise than signal, that's when I consider unfollowing. I realize that threshhold is different for everyone, but I'll take "what I had for lunch" over a dozen bogus "marketing tips" any day. - Julie Barrett from twhirl

Well, I am trying to use FriendFeed more after watching Scoble's video on all those monitors he had up. I'm not a big consumer of information and don't own a TV but this online social stuff has been a perfect fit into my life because I can connect with people who are fountains of knowledge on a specific subject or are "human mashups". I like both! - Adria Richards

Why !? - Bertrand Soulier from iPhone

I've been reading al of this unfollow bits, and this point of yours: - Donna

Hey, I think that today you might make your point about FriendFeed being more interesting than Twitter. Hope you are well. Talked with @fransteps this morning and she is excited to work with you at Rackspace. - Kami Huyse

hi - George Desmyter

I would appreciate the follow, thanks! - Jeff Reisdorfer

I've been reading all of this un-follow posts lately, and this point of yours in WHY you unfollowed: "#2 Because I personally care about everyone I am following their noise level is a LOT lower. ." Is exactly what I do. And now I am starting to understand Friendfeed more. and using posterous to do aggregate posts. So is this overload making more people sit up and think first? I think so. At least the intelligent ones. - Donna

I love you Scoble! ;) - Carol Levesque

with all due sycophantism :) - jeff hammond

This is a great move, Robert. It's also a lot more human...I was almost convinced that you were the only person who could actually drink from the fire hose without choking. - Steffan Antonas

That sounds fair. After this morning, I've renewed my love for FriendFeed and Tweetworks. Until the next DDos attacks, of course. I will miss the fake porn stars, but I did when I moved from L.A. - Scott Pierce

Steffan; I agree...there is no way anyone else could do what Robert S. does. It's good to see him become human. - Robert Jones

This has been my problem for about the past six months. I routinely go in and unfollow, get the noise level down to where I want it, and then end up following back a bunch of new people, some of whom I'm incredibly grateful to get to know. When I had track, it was a whole lot easier to manage the stream, but I suspect even that tool would now be out of hand. I have a set of rules for... more... - Karoli

hee hee. i am commenting not so much to beg your follow but what a clever pitch:) - Tresha Thorsen

Robert - I have not read all 416 comments so if this was asked and you answered forgive me. What was the all of a sudden revelation that caused you to reverse stance on Twitter Followers? - Jeff Vreeland

It's difficult to maintain and filter a list on all the social networking sites. I cannot even imagine maintaining the kinds of lists you must deal with, Robert. - Jeremy Brooks

Dude, you broke Twitter! When you unfollowed all of your 100,000 the other day you pulled the rug right out from under it, so it fell down and now it can't reach its beer. :-) - Robert Morrison

Actually I felt rather sad being fav'ed by you on FriendFeed then dumped.. But again. I get more from you from FriendFeed, so oh well, stop talking about Following and Get on more with Tech! :P - Du Senyao Peter

Me Me! lol! - Bill McGehee

i like the idea of importing favorite tweets into friendfeed. i haven't used that favorite feature much because i haven't seen any real use in it. thanks! - Jonathan Blundell

When twitter is down I always wish I could tweet: checkout friendfeed. Nevertheless, how will following folk that leave a message here really improve the quality of your input? While I don't want to judge many of the fine folk on this thread, are they all that interesting? In other words, isn't this the start of the same problem you had on Twitter... - Jon Mountjoy

what like here? this is a comment :) - michelle harris

Barak - isn't filtering just unfollowing while pretending you're still following? ;) - Matthew Blaisdell

Well to bounce back on your Twitter is down comment I think it is time to watch this video again http://www.youtube.com/watch... Hilarious! - 77Agency

Robert, I'm glad you decided to stop auto-follow (finally). :) - Veronica Sopher

I'm in - Jeroen Sangers from Nambu

works for mw - Brendan Jackson from twhirl

Robert, but why clutter your FriendFeed stream? This comment is not to get you to courtesy follow me on FriendFeed, think you've established you've changed your thinking. :) - L.P. NEENZ FALEAFINE

OK, I have enough people to follow so I will close the comments on this thread. Thank you everyone, I will try to get to everyone today. - Robert Scoble

Jannifer @wordsforliving

Fwd: Snickers Pie by MakeLifeDelicious.com - http://makelifedelicious.com/2009... (via http://friendfeed.com/foods...)

Fwd: Snickers Pie by MakeLifeDelicious.com - http://makelifedelicious.com/2009/03/snickers-pie/ (via http://ff.im/5rApT)

July 20 - Comment - Like - Share

Nia, Alix Whitmire, Myrna and 12 other people liked this

I am seriously craving this right now! - Jannifer @wordsforliving

2 more comments

And now me too. - Eric @ CSTechcast.com

so much for my diet I'm making and eating this! - Arleen Anderson

Me too!! - Jannifer @wordsforliving

April Russo (app103)

July 20 from Flickr favorites - Comment - Like - Share

Death Sucker The Great, Lars Clausen, Arleen Anderson and directeur liked this

Sometimes this flower (Tacca Chantrieri), under just the right conditions, looks pure evil, as if it has a wide open mouth and teeth, ready to bite you. - April Russo (app103)

Gorgeous! - Arleen Anderson

Johnny Worthington

How many people have actually used a typewriter? What is the average 'cut off age'?

July 8 from IM - Comment - Like - Share

Franklin Pettit, Pete Delucchi, Dan Morrill AKA Techwag and 77 other people liked this

I used one until university. so, cut-off was, what, mid 80's? - MVB (Grinch of FF)

150 more comments

i used one very frequently until sometime in 1994. - Joe Silence is not Santa

I've used one, many many years ago. Probably late 80s - Glenn Slaven

I used a typewriter once when I was fairly young, around the beginning of the nineties. We had a "modern" one and I was curious to see it in action. I made a typo in the first word. - Jon, the Chilled Beartato from Android

You will probably still find them in use today in a lot of law firms. - Alex Scoble

My dad had one when I was little, and I managed to type a paper or two on it. Nothing major. - Carlton Hackett

typewriters are still used as backups in case our 486 pc's die at the firehall .. - johnpiercy

I used one in elementary and Jr high. Some in a work training job that I had with OC County in Jr High. - Uncle CW™

my first two were manuals, my last one was an electric Smith Corona from the early 1970s. the only reason i stopped using it in 1994 was becos a cousin of mine walked off with it one day. - Joe Silence is not Santa

We had a typewriter at home until the early 1990s. I used to type opening paragraphs to the Tolkien-rip off fantasy novel that I never finished on it. My dad may actually still use one in his office on a daily basis even though he has a computer and a printer, too. - Victor Ganata

We had one of those big green IBM ones that I use to type my assignments out on until about the 90s. Just strange that my nephews (8 and 5) have never, ever seen one or used it. - Johnny Worthington from IM

I remember using my dad's when I was six or seven (mid-1980s). And when I worked at a bank, we used one to type up a few forms that had carbon copies in them. - Jandy, ConcertMaven of FF

I love typewriters. - Mona Nomura

Probably early 90's in typing class - Rodfather

I took a typing class over the summer in '92. That's the first and last time I used a typewriter for any length of time. I took a typing test on a typewriter when I interviewed for a temp agency in late '94. I think that was the last time I ever touched one. - Fa La La La Lindsay

Very early 90's - Mo Kargas

I've used one before. but yea. early 90s - John Wang

I used a typewriter in the late-80s / early-90s. Parents thought my bro and I (hunt-and-poke typists) would best learn to type and that was in the days of typing class. Even though we needed to learn typing such that we'd type on the computer better. - Wirehead

I did, I'm 27. - Joshua Schnell

My Dad used to type up his tests for his students back in the mid-80's. I used his typewriter a couple of times to type up papers before we got our first computer around 88 or so. I'm 32 now. - Give 'Em DBizness

When we donated dad's library we also included his beloved Selectric. They sent it back... - MVB (Grinch of FF)

I used one until I got decent word processor software for my C-64, around 1989. My sister actually took a word processor to college her first year; second year, it was a PC. - Ladybug Heather

I took typing in 1989. Never used one again after the class, because I took computers the following semester - Matthew DeVries

I learned to type well before computers. - Janet

I had one when I was kid, early to mid 90's. - Sarah Peterman

I've used one. I'm 22. My dad had some old manual ones. - Aaron Hood from BuddyFeed

32 here as well. Used one to write up book reports. - Arlan Koizumi

I worked at a tiny 50 watt AM radio station in high school, and we used typewriters. I am 33. - Michelle Martinez

I'm 28 and I used one quite often as a kid. - Joe Pierce

High school typing class -- 1988 - Christopher A Carr

High school typing classes: 1960-63 Best thing I ever did (though I hated it then). I can fly round the keyboard, touch-typing too. Cut-off when I got my first Mac (1984). - Kate Foy

I'm 24 and I remember using one a lot as a kid... I don't even think I used it to type schoolwork, I just liked typing random stuff on it for fun. Also, when I worked at an elementary school in 2004/2005, we had a word processor in the office that we used frequently. - Penguin It's Cold Outside

I was using one at work in the early 90s. Maybe '92 at the latest. - CAJ, somewhere else

I've played with one before but never actually used it for anything. - Andrew Trinh from IM

The interesting bit is when you try going back to a typewriter from a computer. Messes with your head! - Kate Foy

Used one and I am 43, but never gone back to try and use one since moved to the computer. - Lyndon Washington

I'm 43 too and learned on one. Used them half way through college, and then they made us start using WordStar word processor. Dot commands, FTW?! - Rick Cogley

When I started working at Social Services in 1997 we used ballpoint pens and carbon paper. - m9m, Crone of FriendFeed

I used one until 1995. Only used one once since then. - John (a.k.a. dendroica)

I kind of want an old skool mechanical typewriter (Although I have no place to put it) so I can preserve the antiquity as long as possible. - Wirehead

Although, I think I want a proportional spaced typewriter most of all. - Wirehead

I have one in my bedroom. Though, it's for fun. All of my work was always done on a computer. The typewriter was for zines or creative projects. I like the click click click. - joey

Used one regularly until I was 23 or so. I used one infrequently at my last job, some grants are required to be typed but people don't supply e-copies. Madness. - pea

I used one when I was at college. I was a "secretary" for the undergrad music department. It was a workstudy - jamar78

I used one as a kid, maybe 3 or 4. It was cool, but huge and not as cool as Nintendo. - Mike Nayyar

Took typing class first year of high school and used one sporadically in the 60's. Not since though. - Brian Sullivan

I used one up until 1987 or so when I got a computer with a printer. My mom had an IBM Selectric that she was quite proud of. - Joey Gibson

1990. My mother had one never used one since. - M F

I used one in the mid-90's, didn't get far with it. I'm almost 20. - Jimminy Fuller

I certainly have! And I'm only 25! - Amy℠

Many times. I'm 27. - Bec Rowe @d0tski

< used. 25 - mjc

I still use one occasionally at my parent's office when they want me to type an envelope up or something. - ronin

I used one a LOT in the 80's. I just used one two weeks ago as well. It felt very quaint. - Jeremy Brooks

I took typing 101 in 1969, then took one to USC until 1973. - Russellreno

I just almost had an argument with my husband over his wanting to give away my old Brother typewriter........just seems wrong not to have one in the house. You know, for ransom notes and stuff. - suzanne

yep, learned how to type on a typewriter in the early 80s - Herb Hernandez from iPhone

I grew up with typewriters (and was hit by lighting while typing on one in my parent's basement). When I started college in 1982, there was only one computer among 40 students in my dorm. By my senior year 1985-86, there were 0.75-1.00 computers/student (helped by the Lisa/Mac release in 1984). In the 1990s at UCLA, we used typewriters occasionally to type on forms, but I left UCLA in 2000 and haven't used a typewriter in about 9 years. - Mitchell Tsai

I took typing in high school (82-85) and I owned a typewriter while I was in college. I didn't use it much because we got Macs at my college in 85-86. I think that typewriter is still at my parents' house. - ha3rvey (Ho)^3

One of my friends, Adrienne Su, http://users.dickinson.edu/~sua (now Poet-In-Residence at Dickinson College) went with me to the Harvard Bookstore browsing. I heard a strange music coming from the typewriter area. Adrienne was typing soooo fast and so musically - just dreamy. I've never heard anyone type like that since. - Mitchell Tsai

I learned to type on one in like 1990. - Brett Kelly from iPhone

Many friends typed papers in college for extra money. My roommate Howard Pollack was typing in the dark one day (on a manual typewriter), when the four of us turned on the lights to se what Howard was typing. He had been typing a transcript of our conversation (script-writing style) in real-time! Me, I never took typing in high school...ended up being a 40 wpm hunt & pecker... - Mitchell Tsai

I used my mothers as a kid, but I actually bought one for my first wife when she graduated college. - Ian May

Did in my high school typing classes, but not after that. I'm 32 - Haggis (Sean Loyless)

I learned to touch type on mechanical typewriters in 1986 at school (no Australia is not a third world country!). Electric typewriters were introduced in 1987. But I have never used a typwriter at work since then. - Matt G

Used one right up until the end of high school. - Steven Perez

I played with my grandparent's when I was a kid, but I had computers most of my life. - Neal Jansons

Typing class, high school. Electric, but an actual typewriter. Yes. - Micah Wittman

Early 80s - maybe 1982 or 83-ish? We actually had our first office PC hooked up to a typewriter as the printer because the typewriter type looked better than the dot-matrix type. Naturally, once I met the Mac in 1987, I never went back. - MaryB, BrandingBroadOfFF

I used my grandparents' one when I was about 8, so 1993. - Mitch

In the 90s, we dug out the old Olivetti and set it up for our daughter as a toy. She's now 19 and thinks of her MBP pretty much as a body part. - MaryB, BrandingBroadOfFF

I actually used to own one and used it in college, until I bought an Osborne computer and Epson RX80 dot matrix printer my senior year. I think I gave my typewriter to my younger sister when she was in college. For some reason I never asked for it back ;-) - Jeff P. Henderson

I used to sell them when I worked at Staples. I worked there until 2005ish and still sold them. I used one as a kid too. I'm 31 - Ⓐ ☠ slayerboy ☠ Ⓐ

I have a '40s-vintage Royal sitting on display in my living room, and I type letters on it from time to time just for the fun of it. It works beautifully, and I find the mechanical feel and sound very satisfying. But then, I'm a bit odd. - Bren -- feeling merry

I got a C in typing class in middle school. (35) - Brian Daniel Eisenberg

I have. (32) - Louis Gray

I first learned in high school about office machines and one in particular was the wondrous typewriter, I have not used one in awhile but at the very least I do remember. And really sometimes a simple typewriter can be a great thing, so I have used it but I don't make it a point to use it regularly. - Rem-Sleep w Ray

I actually did my college thesis on a typewriter (all 120 pages of it) - that experience was what drove me into computers - never looked back since then. - ian kennedy

I owned a manual typewriter and learned to touch type on it in 7th grade in 1982. My mom may still have it and I don't remember much about it, but I can picture it in my head. It's really fuzzy though, like my memories of Shell Beach, can't put my finger on it... - Adrian

I learnt to type on a typewriter way back in '67 - one of the best things I ever learnt - srsly - I'm still really young -] - Chris Loft

I did a typing course at school. The famous Scheidegger typing course. I was 12 or 13 in those days. So that was around '76/'77. It's probably the best thing I learned at school, because I'm still enjoying what I've learned then. - Ton Zijp

I used to use a typewriter, and I'm 24. - Will Higgins™

Some involved in air traffic in the 90s still used typewriters. - Bernie Goldbach

I have, in the 90's I am 31. Also, I believe the high school office where my mother works still has a couple that they use for adding names to certificates and the like. I will double check this with her tomorrow. - Rachel Lea Fox

I learned how to type on a manual typewriter, but haven't used one since maybe 1986. - Bonnie Foster

i'm 23, used one briefly when growing up not because we didnt have a computer (had some P1 box and a Mac Centris) but because i liked the cool mechanical sounds it made. ;-) - Paul Stamatiou

What's a typewriter? ;-P - Jeff P. Henderson

We were taught to use a typewriter at school - that was actually the only time we ever used a typewriter, for most of us, since computers were already taking over (except perhaps for form filling). We had the typewriter class and a computer class the same year, and the typewriter class did not even help for computer typing because it was on the horrible french key-layout whereas our computers had swiss keyboards - Joelle Nebbe (iphigenie)

I have. 29 years old now. Last time was probably 2 years ago to label envelopes (I think printers remain bad at this). - Sajida H Khan

I used one many Moons ago but only because my parents had an old one at home. - Kol Tregaskes

I had, I'm 26. It was my mother's, she used it at school. But I remember her using it at work in the late 80's too. - albameccanica - Arianna

I had to type the personal info on my college applications (in 1996) but I got my Mom to help because I was afraid I wouldn't line things up correctly. - Shannon Jiménez

I did, back in the 80's as well. - David Cook

I learned to type using a typewriter during high school (mid 90's). - Kevykev

I saw one once & think i tried it, but it was like 15 years ago or so - immaterial

Yes, up until 1994, I think, I often helped my father type academic papers on our typewriter. I didn't have a computer of my own until early 1996, I believe. Used campus labs from fall of 1995 until about February. - Scott of Two Countries

I used one up until about 1988. It was an IBM Selectric. - DGentry

I'm 23 - I have seen them, but never used for anything. - Rich

I'm 36 and used one. We were tought type writing at school, but that ended in the mid 80's when the school got computers and we had to learn Basic - Martin Liechti from fftogo

i used one in jr high and part of high school in the early 80s before i saved up enough to get a printer for my apple ][e - Imabug

used one till late 90's. I found it kind of cool for "creative writing"... :)) - diego morelli

Wow.. I actually used one in junior high.. I still remember the smell of burning oil! Gee.. that was in the early 80's I think? - Sean

I'm 26 used one until HS. - Amber, Random Time Lord

I'm 41 I owned one. Used it in HS and college. - Gunny doesn't side-hug™

im 21 and own 3 typewriters - Anthony Feint

I used one in high school typing class, circa 85, that I took as an elective to better learn how to type on the computer keyboards I had for the 4 years previous. My dad used typewriters in his small business until about 89-ish when he switched over to the wordprocessing unit he had used at home for year or so prior. Actually slow for him given he had car phones when they were huge radio units, a pocket TRS-80 in the early 80s ( http://www.trs-80.com/wordpre... ), and such. - Michael W. May

i took it in high school around 1990. that was probably the last time i did - (jeff)isageek

I learned to type on one when i was 11 or so, which was in 1996. It was a very modern one, as it could store documents typed and such. I only used it for that class though. - Tom Ribbens

I'm 36, typing class in HS used electric typewriters as PC's were too expensive at the time. Had IBM "lugables" for computer class :) Teachers in school did not like the printout from dot matrix printers so even though I had a computer at home since about 1981, we still used typewriters throughout school for reports etc. - W_B_K

I learned to type before I could hold a pencil. Well, the 2-finger hunt-and-peck method of typing. I'm 38 now... I think I regularly used a typewriter for things until sometime around 1987. - Nine

i did,since i was 9 to my late teens. no computer and a writer's spirit . I'm 31 now, the typewriter belonged to my grandfather, who gave it to me before he died. It's one of my most important possessions. - Alexandre Gamela from twhirl

I taught myself to type on one, so once we got a computer I used to bash the keys really hard. We got our first pc with printer in 1986, but I still used the typewriter for letters and stuff after that til the ribbons ran dry and we couldn't buy replacements - probably around 1990 I think. - Mellissa Claus

I used to carry around a portable electronic one in my briefcase that I'd take to high school with me every day. - Thomas Hawk

I'm 40. My mom had a typewriter, I used it once or twice just to see what it was like to type on... - Chrimmus Tad

I'm 50. Actually took typing in high school. That was mid-70's. - Norma Dennis

I'm 37 and used a typewriter in my middle school typing class. Had a computer at home too though. I feel like I'm on the cusp. - Graham English from iPhone

I have attempted to use a typewriter before. My typing career suffered a major setback when I was kicked out of the typing teachers class on the first day of school. I decided after that that taking typing would not be a good idea. - Alan Simpson

by the way check these out, this picture was taken a month ago or so: http://twitpic.com/7t485 - Alexandre Gamela

I am 30, and used to use it - Shevonne

28 and I used my dads at home for school work when I couldn't get time on the computers at school until we got a computer in 94. The typewriter even had a delete key! - alphaxion

I'll admit it ..... not the age part :) - Charlie Anzman

I've used one. Also used a word processor until 95 or so. - FFing Enigma (aka Tina)

i learnt to type on one. Used one until 2nd year uni (1991) when we got all cool with computers. - Sue

I still use the old typewriter for post cards and special mailings (USPS) found extra ribbon on ebay. - Tricia

I had one until my third year of college, in 1989 . . . then a Commodore something or other (128?) - William Harryman

I am 43 and I used one up until 1999, which was when I got my first computer. I have it stored away in the basement. Should I ever need one for filling out a form, I'll go down there and drag it upstairs. It's a big heavy machine with a built in word processor. I stocked up on print & correction cartridges awhile back, just in case they stop making/selling them. - April Russo (app103)

I'm 28, and I last used a typewriter about 4 years ago. Usually I own one, and now that you've posted this I want to go buy another. Love them! - Lo

23 but my grandma had one, probably is still around, my impressions: the loudest keyboard I've ever used - Dobromir Hadzhiev

I stopped using a typewriter completely in '85 when I got my first PC... with an extra keyboard that allowed it to double as a typewriter! LOL! - Arleen Anderson

used one at college, sometime in the late 80's haven't used one since though - unicomunica

I used one until probably 1993 - Steve C

I still have a typewriter. - Morton Fox

I did and we had a mandatory typing class Freshman year of HS. :-) - Mathew A. Koeneker

I learned to type on one. Around 1989-90. - Derrick

The last time was when I was a kid in the 70's. Then the ZX81 happened... - Andy Bold

at my grandparents. probably mid-80's or so. - SolidSmack

I still have to use a typewriter. It's a monster. IBM Wheelwriter 30 Series II - MicahBear78

I had to take typing in high school. I got a 42. On a 100 point scale. It was definitely not my sport. I'm 44, btw. - Kevin Pedraja

i have! I'm 35. I wish I still had one. - Anna Lynn M.

I have never seen a functional typewriter. I'm 22. - Garin Kilpatrick

We had the opportunity to learn how to type when we were young at school, age 11 I guess. That's how I actually learned typing! - Kris

I've used 'em, even had a junior high typing class which I did horribly at, but surprisingly learned rudimentary skills. Remember having to retype entire pages every time I made an error on a paper that was due the next day. I used to always seem to be miserably sick the nights before papers were due, and miraculously cured the next day when I turned the paper in.. I'm about 43. - motownmutt

through 92. got my first puter in 93. - Matt Soreco

I took typing in 9th grade. Glad I did too. Now can I remember margins? Not like I can in Word... - Mike Lewis

I'm 27 and I used one in elementary school for my reports - Shey, Jamaican of FF

In my senior year of college (1982-1983), I decided to write my undergraduate thesis using nroff and some macros, rather than typing the whole thing on a typewrite. - John E. Bredehoft

I had an electric typewriter when I was in college - but I didn't use it for much more than applications when I started using emacs and a dot matrix printer in 1983. - Bill Sodeman

Does a MOD-40 Teletype count? - Dan Morrill AKA Techwag

I learned to touch-type on a manual (non-electric) typewriter in junior high school in 1986. Born in 1973. - Kevin Fox

Related question: when was the last time you used a pencil sharpener? - Paola Bonomo

1st used typewritter in 1988 at highschool typing classes, actually five years after using an Apple at primary school in 1983 - Yant

Me. Played with parents' one in the '80s, used one for work right into the early 2000s (was a bank teller, had to type to make cashier's checks and money orders). - Kamilah Gill

Robert Scoble

Wow, I just saw something stealth coming out at TechCrunch's real time Crunchup on Friday that's going to bring blogging back. Big time.

July 8 - Comment - Like - Share

Leslie Poston, AJ Kohn, Brome and 87 other people liked this

http://www.techcrunch.com/real-ti... is the CrunchUp. Stick around for the after lunch session. Very cool. - Robert Scoble

98 more comments

i thought rubel said blogging was dead? :) - Allen Stern

Do Tell! - Bill Heslin

Allen: Steve Rubel will bring his blog back after Friday. - Robert Scoble

wow nice - Allen Stern

Bill: I can't tell, agreed to an embargo, but you're already getting a preview. Just think about your blog now (or mine). :-) - Robert Scoble

Oh shoot..this is Real time web..can't wait till Friday - Bill Heslin

Blogging was dead? - Ara Pehlivanian

Real Time is where it's at. - Robert Scoble

too bad sites like mine can't be ready to post about it :( - Allen Stern

Ara: have I blogged this week? If I had what is coming on Friday I would blog a lot more. - Robert Scoble

Uhmmm tablet tablet... - Francisco Espinoza

FriendFeed Pro? - Chris Saad

<pops thread out> - CAJ, somewhere else

Allen: embargoes suck. I know. But you should be one of the first sites to use this. - Robert Scoble

FriendFeed Pro....oh no please :S - Francisco Espinoza

i dont even have an embargo robert - oh well, no worries - Allen Stern

Shhh...nobody tell Steve Rubel. - Judd6149

Oooooh! like that Chris...FF Pro - Bill Heslin

Chris: no. Not FriendFeed Pro. Although if FriendFeed were smart they'd buy the company after Friday. - Robert Scoble

Data Portability Exporter 1.0 ? :-P - Allen Stern

blogging never died. Some things make it easier and better. http://posterous.com - Dj Skunk Diesel

Oh your bad Robert...lol.... - Bill Heslin

Allen: there is a lot of data portability in what I saw, yes. - Robert Scoble

i think Data Portability is the future :D </obvious statement> - Chris Saad

Dj: it is going to be interesting to see how this changes people's approach to blogging and Tumblr/Posterous. - Robert Scoble

Dj: it is going to be very interesting to talk with Steve Rubel on Friday afternoon after the demo. - Robert Scoble

it's the first ever virtual blogging tool - you just imagine your posts and they appear! - Allen Stern

Allen: I imagine that you appear and you do, how do you do that? :-) - Robert Scoble

Another service of "tumblog"? - Francisco Espinoza

He's funny like dat...lol... - Bill Heslin

oh i just bought guy's package - i have hired a team of allen's - for example, i am the evening shift allen (allen2.1 internally) - the night allen arrives at 11pm (allen 4.2 internally) - Allen Stern

Am I that far behind? Why is blogging dead, and by real time you are talking about more than live stream video? - ASKJDOG

Hmmm. Sounds like FF benefits from this. - Nick in Manila

Nick: FriendFeed might benefit, yes. JDOG: we are talking about real time text. Just like here. - Robert Scoble

Allen: you are cracking me up. So fun! =) - Miiko Mentz from iPhone

miiko - sometimes we all need to smile, that's my job as Allen2.1 - Allen Stern

Allen: personally I like the morning shift better. Since I'm in London I'll go to sleep now and wait for him to show up. - Robert Scoble

Got it: real time text stream = "blog." Blogging is dead; long live blogging!! - Tom Guarriello

remember when techCrunch said they were gonna break embargoes... you should, too - Marco

aah still in london! get off ff and have some fun - Allen Stern

Allen: I was off FriendFeed all day! - Robert Scoble

How can you bring something back that isn't gone. Have you seen the WordPress growth numbers? They have been very consistent and very impressive for many, many months. - Missionary Broadcasting

Missionary: well, I have definitely left a lot of my blogging due to real time interactions like these, but I don't have page views to worry about. - Robert Scoble

Now ur both making me laugh. Good times! - Miiko Mentz from iPhone

Can we mere mortals watch it online - Mark

Mark: I don't know about video, but I'm sure that the second this gets announced it will be discussed on FriendFeed to death. - Robert Scoble

miiko - be nice or i get out the voodoo doll! - Allen Stern

Thanks Robert. I'm starting to "get it" just thinking how to implement this in my niche - ASKJDOG

I just add a lot of this other stuff to the blogging I'm already doing. Most savvy bloggers are doing the same thing. They sort of all fit together in my world. - Missionary Broadcasting

it's after 3am in London - Ian May

somehow this feels like a test of the "tc50 and demo broadcast system" - im sure we will see more of these "oh hot damn i just saw x but i cant talk about it until y" posts come sept. - Allen Stern

Allen, why do companies talk to people about products and then tell them they must tell no one about it? I mean, since no one can talk about it, no extra excitement is generated? I don't really get it - Mark

Allen, gotta luv the voodoo doll. ;) - Miiko Mentz from iPhone

@Allen, to give the individual an opportunity to form an opinion and write a well thought out article when the service launches. - Darren

Mark, tomorrow's event will be streamed live. Hopefully it all goes smoothly. - Miiko Mentz from iPhone

Mark - embargoes give writers a chance to test and play before the tool goes live - so the posts should be better than just press release copy - i rarely ever mention a product before it goes live - scoble likes to build excitement about what he sees. i just wish that more companies learned that excluisves are bad for startups - Allen Stern

Thanks Allen - Mark

Mark: PR people tell me they use embargoes so that they can brief a large number of people without pissing anyone off. If I wrote about this stealth company tonight, for instance, lots of other journalists would get pissed off at the company. Some, like TechCrunch, even refuse to write about companies if they aren't given equal access. It also, like Allen says, gives writers a chance to produce videos and test out products so they can write more authoritatively about them. - Robert Scoble

So its largely to stop competing blogs, sites etc from complaining that Site X got earlier access than Site Y for example? - Mark

Robert/Allen, well said. Mark, in theory, yes. But it doesn't always work out that way. - Miiko Mentz from iPhone

So what was all the fuss Arrington was making last year about embargoes? Didn't he say he would violate every single one? - Mark

I can't wait to hear about it! - Joshua M

Mark: Arrington just said he reserves the right to break embargoes when he wants. Usually if the company deals with him straight up he'll agree to the embargo. What I hate are companies that give some people special deals. Apple does this all the time, which is why I never go to Apple press conferences anymore. - Robert Scoble

a good example of poor choices are YC startups - they go to tc/sent to tc/etc and miss so many more opportunities for coverage - works well for TC tho - they always get a HN frontpage. - Allen Stern

Hint? - Scott Williams from BuddyFeed

scott - he said "after lunch" so check which startups are presenting after lunch lol - Allen Stern

Notes like this really make me long to be in the Bay area. One day Sheryl and I will move there. It's our plan. - Ken Camp

Thank you Backtype for bringing this to me. I can't wait to hear about whatever this is. - Steve Rubel

Robert how will we know when this thing your talking about is public? How will you update us? - Chris Saad

@Chris - you won't miss it. He will be on a unicorn that everyone is talking about. JK - looking forward to this - Steve Rubel

@Steve haha true - Chris Saad

So I wonder what this would mean for newspapers. - Michael from iPhone

Can't wait to hear more. I hope it's a tool to make it easy to aggregate content into blog posts -- that's what I've been wishing for lately. Sometimes I have up to ten browser tabs open to pull in all the urls, images, videos and quotes I want to include in a new blog post. - Andy Kaplan-Myrth

cool ... buzz .... buzzz!!! :) - Susan Beebe from BuddyFeed

It will be interesting to see what it is. Maybe my guest bloggers will cover the story. I am on a worklife summer break! Blogger since '02. - Martin Lindeskog

Robert Blogging has never gone away! Not in my book. - Sandra Large

Scoble, are you referring to LazyFeed ? - Ahsan Ali aka. Slick

We here at Posterous are looking forward to the announcement. Innovation is always great -- can't wait to see what's going down on Friday. - Garry Tan

Sounds a lot like LazyFeed: http://www.louisgray.com/live... - twitscoop

Just what we need! - ZuDfunck

Lazyfeed sounds like a combo of feedly and backtype, with categories - Ahsan Ali aka. Slick

Blogging straight from my brain coming tomorrow! Hook me up! - Mike Buechele

@Michael For the love of gods, don't invoke Zobzee! - Sam Harrelson

All this is making me wish Friday comes sooner. For me it will be another 24 hours away as I presume @Scoble is referring to US PST. - Vinko

Robert! U R such a TEASE! *giggle* - Arleen Anderson

hmmm I wonder what this is.... - Marko Saric

I guess it's this: http://www.techcrunch.com/2009... ... The WordPress Jabber client - Marko Saric

No, the blog is not dead by any means http://lifestreamblog.com/should-... but Lifestreaming is almost a necessary component needed for supplementing them with the advent of real-time http://lifestreamblog.com/you-say... - Mark Krynsky

so TC has come out with 300 invites to LazyFeed (which are sadly gone), any going here? :P - Marlin Forbes

It's Friday. Who's the stealth company that's gonna "bring blogging back" and how are they gonna do so? - Brad Williamson

According to the presenter, Echo is the service: http://js-kit.com/echo/ - Brandon Titus

Thanks Brandon ;-) - Brad Williamson

I really don't like being forced to spam my tweetstream just to sign in for an Echo invite. I won't do it. Bad bad practice, guys. But fascinating service concept. - Nick in Manila

I understand scoble's statement now. I was all ready to shift 97% of my publishing off my blog and onto platforms like FriendFeed till I just saw how Echo and the new Disqus features are enhancing the conversation on the blog. It's dragging me back. - Nick in Manila

Glad to hear you will be blogging more Nick - FriendFeed and other services are fantastic for virality and discussions with your friends - We feel that Echo makes those services even MORE relevant while putting your blog back in the picture. - Chris Saad

Chris - interesting. This certainly isn't an either/or thing. Well, not any longer. Heh. - Nick in Manila

It rarely is :) Communication systems rarely go away - they only find their place - Chris Saad

loling at "blogging is dead" comments - Jeremiah Owyang

Just to confirm: you were referring to the pubsubhubbub demo at the real-time crunchup? - DGentry

Josh Haley

Your best passive-aggressive line here:

July 6 - Comment - Like - Share

teymur madjderey, Varun Mahajan, (jeff)isageek and 27 other people liked this

" Fcuk off. " - vijay

82 more comments

isn't that just aggresive? - Josh Haley

This might be an interesting thread if it wasn't about such a boring topic. *ahem* - pea

THANK YOU PEA - Josh Haley

just sayin' - Josh Haley

but that's the best I got! : (( - vijay

Oh this is SUCH and interesting topic. *rolls eyes* - Molly, "sorry"

"Sure, if you think that's a good idea." - Derek Coward

Fine. Go ahead. - Josh Haley

I don't want to hurt your feelings, BUT .....*followed by some rude comment - Shevonne

"So what happened?" *looks somewhere else* - Josh Haley

oh, sorry i must have misunderstood what you were asking for - Marco(aureliusmaximus)

"Wait a minute, you did that ON PURPOSE?" - Derek Coward

"Ha. That's a good one." - Derek Coward

*sigh* whatever. Just go on and do it anyway. - Fa La La La Lindsay

To each their own, I s'pose. - Jon, the Chilled Beartato from Android

so - Alfredo

"What? No, it was...nice." - Josh Haley

"Really?" - Derek Coward

"Wow, that's interesting." - Derek Coward

Yes dear. - Steve C

Can't you just take a survey from 80% of what a female says? - Akiva Moskovitz

"I just figured {blah blah blah], but hey..." - Josh Haley

Yeah, I'm sure you did. - Christopher Harley

why give a line when you can write a sticky note? - Jason Wyttenbach

When looking at an ugly baby & I feel forced to say *something*: "Wow, those eyes!" - Admiral Anika

Go do your thing, Josh, I don't care. *pouts* (Side note: This reminds me of a game they used to do on Whose Line Is It Anyway? where they had a topic like, "Things people say when their plane is crashing." Hmm, Josh, you just gave me an idea. :P) - Molly, "sorry"

You're entitled to your opinion, wrong though it may be. - Alex Scoble

"Did you get a haircut?" "I thought so." - Trish R

So how's the love life? - Mattie Kenny from fftogo

Is it in yet? - Steve C

I COULD tell you what I think of this thread, but I'll spare you the embarrassment. - Edward Zwart

"Oh, you BOUGHT that dress? I was sure you had made it yourself." - Kenton

You would think up a question like this. - MVB (Grinch of FF)

As far as YOU know... - Kevin Pedraja

meh/fuck it let's go - Dobromir Hadzhiev

If I wanted to hear your opinion I would give you one. - Moved to Facebook from email

Yes, but .......... [fill in the blank] - Martha

Ugly much? - Bwana ☠

"Is that so ?" - Ahsan Ali aka. Slick

some people would consider this Comment bait which I'm sure wasn't your intention - Don Bonaddio

if you don't want to do pick me up at the airport, no problem, I can take a cab... how expensive could it be - Don Bonaddio

When I'm around stupid people, I complain - Bwana ☠

Would you like a pet bird or two? - John Blanton

*waits for an interesting comment to comment on* - Rodfather

"Well, we could do it that way, or..." - xero

I'm glad you're making good use of FriendFeed, Josh. - John E. Bredehoft

"Don't you have a podcast to prepare for?" - Steven Perez

"So, when did you take your last vacation?" - Jorge Escobar

"I guess you could it that way. Sure." followed by silence. - Kamath (नमः)

anything followed by :) - Josh Haley

Anything followed by - Akiva Moskovitz

Great post - Greg Santos

After the earlier drama I'm thinking "I apologize. now remove it." might apply - Tamara

LOL - Josh Haley

Fuck you. Just kidding LOL :) <3 - Rodfather

No, that's fine. I'm not mad... ; ) - Fossil Huntress

Good luck with that! - Rob Michael (Atmos Trio)

I'll take that under advisement. - Arleen Anderson

From a friend's four yr old, I learned that "it's not my favorite" can be a useful response in many more situations that I would have guessed. - Sarah Miller from iPhone

No, no really! I didn't mind at all. - Janet

Meh. - Bill Sodeman

f- u (not u, just answering) - chaz2b

Yeah. - Joel Robert Perez

it is what it is. - Violet Mae Lim

WHY ARE YOU STILL BREATHING? - Mo Kargas

Oh you think that's bad, well, when I . . . . - William Harryman

I'm FINE. REALLY! - Bec Rowe @d0tski

I'm sure you mean it. - Eric @ CSTechcast.com

Sorry I'm late, but some of us DO have a lot to do... - Rick Cogley

why'd u delete my comment? - Greg Santos

Greg, it was inadvertent. Completely. *clicks delete yet again* :-) - Rick Cogley

"I don't care what anyone else says, but you're alright." - Diego Barros 

The only one I use is "with all due respect..." Technically I'm still being honest, I only use it when the other man is not due respect. - Lo

"I think we should reconsider" - Mayuresh Walke

A very frigid "I see" - Kamath (नमः)

Well, fine. - Mistletoe Glen from iPhone

No offense, but [blah blah blah]. - Trish Haley from iPhone

Seriously? - Varun Mahajan

Subversive hashtagging #I-could-say-what-Im-saying-but-nah-I-will-use-my-mad-tagging-skills-instead - Micah Wittman

#hyphenfail - Josh Haley

"My bad" - Fred Yankowski

#hypowin - Micah Wittman

oic - Edward Zwart

Louis Gray

According to one entrepreneur, you guys are a bunch of techies, and not my real friends. (See his comments here) Update: Lior has responded below.

July 6 - Comment - Like - Share

Andrei M. Marinescu, Nicholas James, Alfredo and 34 other people liked this

Lior Levin here (http://liorlevin.tumblr.com/post...) says that my comment that FriendFeed searches my social graph is not accurate, because... - Louis Gray

46 more comments

/doesn't see any comments - Nicholas Kreidberg

His quote: "My guess is that it lets him search in his “techy” social graph. FriendFeed lets you search only your friends that are registered to the website." - Louis Gray

He adds: "In Status Search you are able to search all your friends on facebook which probably includes your family, childhood friends, non techies friends and so on. Types of people you probably would not find on FriendFeed." - Louis Gray

But Status Search only looks at Facebook and Twitter right now, which are in parallel, different sets of social people. - Louis Gray

You always have comments - Marie Domingo

And FriendFeed is just as versatile in terms of who I can be connected to as Facebook or Twitter. So why are you assumed to be "techies" and those on Twitter are not? It seems like he just dismissed the entire community. - Louis Gray

Louis, if he wants to see just how techy I am, please point him in the direction of my feed. Or have him do a FF search on "tacos". - Derrick

I blame Monday. - Bwana ☠

In writing about Status Search last night, which I thought was a positive article, I of course mentioned FriendFeed because it too has a very powerful social graph. - Louis Gray

I saw that and couldn't believe it - you give him traffic and attention and a great review and he starts attacking your favorite network. I'm thinking twice about trying it out now. - Jesse Stay

I'm not a techie, and I love you man. :) - Steve C

That's being "fair and balanced" as a writer. So why dismiss an entire community to make your product look better? Are not your updates just as valid as those from my family and friends on Facebook? - Louis Gray

And Status Search only searches friends that are registered on Twitter or Facebook (the same argument he uses against FriendFeed). Seems limited to me. - Louis Gray

Woo-hoo! I'm a techie now! ...yeah, I don't think so. - Anne Bouey

Yeah, I'm not a techie, I'm a LOLcat waiting for a caption. - Alex Scoble

Louis, your article was very fair, and painted them in a good light. His response changed my mind. - Jesse Stay

Right, Jesse. His blog post, while positive up front, almost seemed

Arleen Anderson › Likes