Robert Scoble

"I wanted to support TechMeme. It has brought me so much value over the past couple of years that I wanted to repay Gabe for all his work. But, on the other hand, this is the only way to get links to videos onto TechMeme. And, more and more of the influencers in the industry are on FriendFeed and Twitter and not on TechMeme and that's who I want to reach." - Robert Scoble

The Techmeme quandary for Gabe. I get his need to grow it by mainstreaming it, but he's losing the influencer crowd in the process, and that to me was always the perceived value proposition in advertising on Techmeme. - Duncan Riley

Duncan: yup, and by not putting comments like FriendFeed has on each item, he's really losing a big opportunity. But, I get it too. It's too bad, I used to be a total addict to Techmeme. Now I'm lucky if I check it once a day. Last week I didn't even do that a couple days and I found myself not missing it at all. Interesting how my own usage has changed so much. - Robert Scoble

Robert, Duncan, the idea that Techmeme is losing influencers to FriendFeed is something you only hear on FriendFeed, usually by people who aren't very influential, and who in fact still read Techmeme. In short, it's a complete farce. Robert, I very much appreciate the support and am pleased Techmeme is introducing your videos to influencers who aren't FriendFeed users. - Gabe Rivera

Gabe just dissed those of you on FriendFeed! Awesome. Food fight! Yes, only Gabe Rivera really knows if you are influential or not. Fortune videos get millions of views per month and, yet, aren't on TechMeme. "Not influential!" Rivera cries. FriendFeed gets me more traffic to my blog than TechMeme. "Not influential!" Rivera cries. Ahh, the influence of it all! - Robert Scoble

It's this simple: The answer is "Both". Now stop picking on Gabe. :-) - Louis Gray

Gabe, dissing the competition wont win you any friends at all, and that you choose to insult the many fine people here on FriendFeed...well, I'll let others make a call on that. - Duncan Riley

Duncan: he can diss away. After all, you aren't influential, in Gabe's world. No go to sleep and leave the real bloggers to their jobs! - Robert Scoble

The rate-card for Techmeme isn't bad, $5500/month. I might just be tempted to 'sponsor' Techmeme myself: http://techmeme.com/sponsor - Brandon

Robert, if you read my comment really carefully, you'll note I didn't say any of that. So please go ahead and tear apart those straw men. I'll congratulate you when you're done. - Gabe Rivera

Scoble, if you look at the data, I only ceased being influential after I fell out with Arrington, indeed I'm coming up to my 1 month anniversary of the last time The Inquisitr had a headline on Techmeme (despite about 2 dozen the month leading up to that). I've got a nice bottle of Moet Chandon in the fridge for the day ;-) - Duncan Riley

Duncan, I didn't insult any FriendFeedtards. Until just now, oops. - Gabe Rivera

Duncan: Gabe's right on second reading. He basically just said that Scoble and Riley don't have any influence. :-) - Robert Scoble

Duncan: I haven't had many headlines on Techmeme either, but then, I've been FriendFeeding instead of blogging so I've made an explicit choice there. - Robert Scoble

Scoble, me I get not being there, but for you not being on Techmeme....that's beyond any rationalization. - Duncan Riley

By the way, 30% of the Fortune audience tonight says they read FriendFeed. The influence is building. I'm investing my time here because this is where the action increasingly is. I invested a lot of time on TechMeme long before anyone knew what it was, too. - Robert Scoble

Duncan: actually, seriously, I haven't been doing much blogging lately. You've gotta blog to get on TechMeme. FriendFeed doesn't get onto TechMeme, even when I break news here. And, even worse, really great videos that break news and get large and influential audiences don't ever get on TechMeme. Only blogs. - Robert Scoble

While I'd love a world where all bloggers succeed financially, it's not realistic. I'd "trust" TechMeme more if it only ever included stuff from content providers who didn't give a rat's behind whether they were on TechMeme or not. If TechMeme is vital to the survival of your blog, I probably don't care what you have to say. - Robert Seidman

Until I can post a video-comment directly on your FriendFeed thread, I don't really see the added value of this. The current rise of laziness does not directly correlate to the fall of blogs. - Andy Sternberg

Andy: go leave a Seesmic and post the URL in here. That's a video comment. :-) - Robert Scoble

Robert: my survival does not rely on being on TechMeme. That's one reason I don't care if I blog anymore or not. I'll blog when I have something to say that requires more text than about 200 characters. - Robert Scoble

Speaks volumes about the mutable definition of influence, and the great rolling feast of popular attention. - Chris Baskind

Robert, Techmeme wasn't a huge driver of traffic if when I did get headlines on it. - Duncan Riley

It seems to me you're doing more interesting things now than ever. Time is scarce, I know, but don't say you don't have what to write about anymore. - Dragos Ilinca via twhirl

Duncan: still isn't. I was on the top of TechMeme last week and got something like 1,400 visits the first day. My Tapulous video got 30,000 in the past week, I think it got onto Digg or something. Still am not sure. The BBC home page brings 10,000 usually. But I know a lot of influencers read TechMeme, so it was good for making a conversation happen. You'll get on again, I'm watching your content and it's quite good. - Robert Scoble

Dragos: thanks. Life is over the top interesting for me right now, agreed. And that's translating into videos and FriendFeeds that are very interesting. - Robert Scoble

I read all your blogs more than I visit techmeme, though the WeSmirch.com (TechMeme's entertainment/gossip sister site) "river" is in my Google Reader and I read it religously. The great thing about the Internet -- you're never trapped into using only one thing (Louis Gray is right again) - Robert Seidman

Robert you need to look at how you got those visitors. TM leads to other bloggers reading, links, diggs etc. People use TM because they dont have time to even follow 10 feeds in a reader - let alone sit on FriendFeed - Nik Cubrilovic

I am sure you know all that though ;) - Nik Cubrilovic

Nik: You also have to look at which visitors you get. People who use Techmeme because it's easier likely won't take the time to watch a video, or better, interact with the content they see. (comment on stuff, talk about it, etc.) - sebmos

Duncan: I hated your sensationalist crap on Techcrunch, I love The Inquisitr. Thanks for not trying to be on Techmeme. - sebmos

I realize that the algorithm to Techmeme is its "secret sauce" and I'm sure a trade secret (as it should be). But Gabe needs to do more to discuss, in general tems, what the algorithm uses as criteria. I haven't seen much on this and I've read, over time, many people questioning what the criteria of the algorithm are. - Alex Hammer

i'm a new user, this is a test. - Patrick