Wow. This came off negative. And I hate it when people think the right thing to do is go out and mention where I work, and drop the company name in. Any exec worth their salt will get a Google Alert and try to see if there's anything questionable. I firewall my activities on the blog and on the office for a reason, and this doesn't give me warm and fuzzies. - Louis Gray

Sent you a link via Twitter, Louis. Don't let it get you down. Now if you'd like to see the sites that SHE owns... LMK. ;) - Cyndy

Donna Bogatin is a troll -- negative is what she does. From what I can tell, she simply looks for startup stories on Techmeme and then trashes them in order to be part of the techmeme "discussion". It's a reliable way to get traffic for whatever startup thing she's pushing (which is promoted at the bottom of all her posts). - Paul Buchheit

Good to know. I should frame this comment from Paul, who momentarily removes his angel wings to call someone a troll. Beautiful. - Louis Gray

I don't know if Donna is a troll or not (first post of hers i've read) but negative compared to what or whom? Mike A. isn't exactly Mr. Happy if you know what i mean. If her point is that Fred Wilson is a business person and therefore is strategic in part on his blog and not completely open, my response would be duh. He's a super savvy type and didn't get there by being an idiot. - leigh himel

I don't think it was a fair blog post and came off as link bait, but there is a point to consider about the blending of personal and work across these aggregated feeds...like journalists listing companies they own an interest in. That aside, did you notice the upper case bold link to post start up pitches on her site at the bottom of the post? - Marc Vermut

Oh, and totally agree with @leigh (btw I want carriage returns in FF comments!) - Marc Vermut

ALL CAPS? Yawn... - Yuvi

Fred Wilson posts all kinds of details on his blog, and he was using Disqus long before he invested in them. The "troll formula" (find something that is getting a lot of attention, then attack it) is easy and reliably draws attention, unfortunately. - Paul Buchheit

leigh: Paul is right. Donna does nothing positive to add to the community and only rips people down. Even Mike Arrington takes us to the movies once in a while and/or tells us about cool stuff. There's at least some balance to his negativism. I don't read Donna because there's absolutely no balance. That's what we call a troll. - Robert Scoble

Also, who is Donna? Never heard of her before.. - Yuvi

Just because a company does not want to share their plans to generate revenue does not mean they don't have plans, it is simply illogical for her to assume that. It irks me when people automatically assume that startups are stupid for waiting to generate revenues. Focusing on making a $1 today is a lot less important than focusing on how to make $1,000,000 tomorrow. - Caleb Elston

Caleb, logic and truth are not important to the troll :) - Paul Buchheit

Paul, that is the sad truth. - Caleb Elston

How feasible is it to firewall your office from your blog Louis? I'm surprised that you being such a prominent figure among the tech bloggers would even consider it possible to achieve such a thing. Perhaps I'm being naive about this. Keep up the great posts. - Jon-Paul Bussoli

Jon-Paul, I've got the LinkedIn button on every blog page, so it's not as if it's hidden. To continue to have the option to be visible on the blog side, I made a choice to not talk about the company, our plans, our competition or even the market, if possible. If I were to be as visible for work in some circles as I am for the blog in this circle, things could get confusing. Thanks for the notes though. - Louis Gray

@sprague HA *laughs* - Leslie Poston

Wow, I'm learning so much. Veiled identities should be outed if the person in question is double dipping or taking advantage of his/her resources. But, I wasn't aware of Mr. Gray's profession until now and I still don't feel violated... This must be a members only turf fight. Bravo Louis for having the guts to show this even to the people not in the club. Oh and she's definitely just trying to get some techmeme luv! - Anthony Farrior

Louis, its interesting how you tend to separate where you work from your blog by just not mentioning it. Its not like you say "I work at Company X," you just dont talk about it. I tried to do the same (now just do it as little as possible) until I realized that no matter what I do, "micah the blogger" is tied to "micah from lijit" and so I try to be aware but not restrained. - Micah Baldwin

Paul showed admirable restraint in his comments about Ms. Bogatin. I used to read Donna's posts on her two blogs, and found myself so annoyed and angry each time that I finally wised up and learned to steer clear of her blatherings. And it kinda tells you something that she doesn't allow comments on either of her blogs, eh? ;) (I think there are comment fields, but comments seem to just go into the ether) - Adam Lasnik

Adam, trolls are just a part of nature, kind of like mosquitoes :) - Paul Buchheit

i want DDT for the trolls now! - Ashwin Bharambe

Ashwin... can you imagine how cool it'd be if we could do "hide" or "block" like on FF, and never ever see certain folks' stuff ANYWHERE on the Web? POOF go their links on Techmeme, their comments on Digg, their whining on Slashdot, etc. Wow :-) - Adam Lasnik

This is soooo cool. Read the piece as objectively as I could. (I always give people a second and third shot) ... then come here. Instant transparency. I LOVE Friendfeed! Awesome. - Charlie Anzman

@adam: an adblock filter with an auto-updated subscription list for trolls :P - Ashwin Bharambe

So they don't feel it's necessary to talk about their business model? This is a story? Makes me glad I'm so far from Silicon Valley. - Chris Baskind

I know this is late, but I just wanted to echo Paul Buchheit's comment -- Donna is a classic troll; never writes anything unless it's negative, and worst of all barely makes any sense at the best of times. Make it a point never to read or link to her. - mathew ingram

Mathew: I remember at once point thinking that every negative blogger would be taken seriously. I'm glad to see that I was wrong and that the system DOES clean itself out over time. Makes me want to go out and get a great interview for all of you rather than get caught in the gutter. - Robert Scoble

I'm curious if Bogatin took the time to read Gray's series of writings on his experience with Disqus. I'm going to ask her about this, but I note that first time commenters are held for moderation. We'll see what happens. - Ontario Emperor

At least she chose a happy picture to start the, erm, article off. - Daniel Ha

The picture was probably the best part of the article, Daniel. - Ontario Emperor

Flickr shot of my comment http://flickr.com/photos... (awaiting moderation). My blog post http://mrontemp.blogspot.com/2008... Turns out she quoted from Gray back in 2007, but felt no need to name his employer back then, primarily because his comment supported her opinion. - Ontario Emperor

she writes something negative about me or union square ventures at least once a week. i had no idea why she was so angry at me. so i invited her to lunch and had a nice conversation with her. didn't change a thing. i am done reading her and i would never ever link to her or leave a comment on her blog. i don't think anyone ever comments on it. ugh - Fred Wilson