He says he's credible because he has a sponsor who pays him. Hey, I do too. http://www.building43.com is paid for by Rackspace. - Robert Scoble

So what about it Dennis? He's here: http://twitter.com/dahowlett - Robert Scoble

Money and/or sponsorship does not make one credible. - guruvan (Rob Nelson)

Rob: exactly right. And I'm not going to do a Skype interview with him. I will only fight him here on friendfeed. - Robert Scoble

im credible and i don't have money OR sponsorship ;) - Tyler Gillies

Dennis says that he's willing to take me on, but so far has been chicken. He already has a friendfeed account here: http://friendfeed.com/dahowle... - Robert Scoble

Credibility is to some extent gained through approval by others. Commercial approval is not the easiest kind to get. So to a certain extent I agree. However, having sponsorship for your blog does not make you uber-credible. - Ian Holton

Ian: usually sponsorship happens because you have an audience, not because you are credible. - Robert Scoble

"A Fool and his money are soon parted" and I have seen plenty of writers who have foolish rich friends. That does not make them more credible. You gain authority from your readers. - guruvan (Rob Nelson)

But isn't an audience large enough to make you worthy of sponsorship not a sign that a certain minimum amount of people think you are credible (in what you are saying/doing)? - Ian Holton

Why is fighting so important to you? And telling who's wrong? Exchange opinions, learn from eachother. Don't fight so much! - erwin blom

agree with erwin. no idea why this has to be debated at all. - geoff hines

I have to agree with Erwin. You always take "attacks" to a new personal level, Robert. - Ian Holton

I'll get you at recess! - BryanSchuetz

I have no sponsorship, my credibility is based on my reason, judgement, and writing. I had been under the impression that sponsorship implied something else (Robert said it, audience/reach) - Mark Essel

Credibility doesn't share a corollary relationship with volume or ferocity. They're unrelated. - Ken Camp

What started this fight? - David Lloyd

Erwin: I'm passionate and some things are worth fighting out. - Robert Scoble

And anyway I didn't pick this fight. Dennis did. - Robert Scoble

what about the readers who are already pissed off? - Zachary Adam Cohen

Zachary: they can come here and say why. - Robert Scoble

That's true, he fired the first shot thats for sure, unprovocked too according to twitter history - David Lloyd

i dont know how you replied to that so quickly, im not pissed off by you, go get em tiger...i was pissed off before - Zachary Adam Cohen

An audience !(=>) [does not imply] credibility - even Michael Jackson will tell you this. However an audience does imply marketing ability which is what makes the $$$$s. - Shaf

I'm passionate as well, and i'm a Scoble fan. But i don't think making things black and white so often gets us anywhere. - erwin blom

Zachary: friendfeed is real time. - Robert Scoble

Hope it's a good argument (one you can mutually learn from). I had one today with a good friend about an absolute reference frame/guiding laws of nature vs. local relative patterns. - Mark Essel

erwin: black and white all the time doesn't work, but sometimes we must adopt this template of absolutes - Zachary Adam Cohen

Erwin: I'm actually a lot more into the grays of life than you might know. But saying things clearly and definitively often gets a conversation going that I learn from. - Robert Scoble

Robert - You'd me more credible and accurate if you said FriendFeed is "very near realtime". I'd concur with that. - Ken Camp

Exactly right Erwin, also I think that this is purely a stab at eachothers ego. Nothing more than that. - Wim Mulder

Wim: yes, and I want to engage with Dennis. The fact that he isn't showing up here says volumes. - Robert Scoble

I just had the pleasure of 3hours of rational debate, discussion and arguments today. Reductio ad absurdum is an effective tactic one friend often uses, which generates polarized comparisons. I try to balance the debate into "regions of stability". We're rarely at the extreme boundaries we often use in our discussions. - Mark Essel

what was the debate? representing a fair point of view on a sponsor's product? That could be interesting :D - Mark Essel

I'm not sure the fact him not showing here says volumes other than to say if you look at his history he doesn't use FF for anything but a feed dump. That's what I see when I look at his profile. I would never expect to see him engage here over this. I think you know that too Robert. Go for neutral ground, but you calling him into your turf isn't something he's going to go for, and that is what you did. Not that you stared this silliness, but to tautn him to com ehere when you know he never does isn't productive. - Ken Camp

Robert it doesn't say volumes - he's being sensible. I like what Dennis writes and tbh doing 'this' is a non brainer. - Shaf

Mark: no debate. He just said that I wasn't credible. I called him out and asked him to come here and explain himself. - Robert Scoble

Ok, this whole issue just took a turn into schoolyard for me. I'm off this thread. Lost all interest. - Ken Camp

Ken: it was schoolyard from the very beginning! :-) - Robert Scoble

Me too - I'm out ... $15 wasted just like pay per view. - Shaf

WAIT ! Robert can you ask your sponsor to refund me the $15 ? ;) - Shaf

Shaf: heheh! That's what friendfeed needs: pay-for-participation rooms! That way Dennis and I could start a fight and get some money like professional boxers! - Robert Scoble

I was hoping for some good debate, my xbox360 just got 3 red rings and after some powering on and off , and looking up the problem it'll cost me $99 to fix. Somehow I thought this was covered (its 4 years old). I sent an @Microsoft_Xbox asking about it - Mark Essel

Robert - Pay per tweet ;) Take care gentlemen - Goodnight - Shaf

@scobleizer I enjoy all your posts and they seem very credible to me - p_poarch

Dennis recommended a conversation via Skype video. How about using tinychat? You guys can debate the credibility issues and others can join in chat. - Debi Jones

speaking on which. anyone know software that you can record video of two people? - Tyler Gillies

Debi: no. friendfeed is perfectly fine for having a conversation. - Robert Scoble

Robert: it's like Ken says. Why not choose neutral ground if the conversation is important? No one would enjoy having their credibility challenged, but not sure if the conversation environment is the point you want to engage. - Debi Jones

Debi: neutral ground? Yeah, like calling me out on Twitter is neutral. :-) - Robert Scoble

I do not want to have this argument in private or somewhere else. Thanks. - Robert Scoble

stick to your guns robert...dont let the shift the debate onto where to debate or method in anyway, that is a distraction.... - Zachary Adam Cohen

I think that credibility means one thing to an accountant and something very different to a community of people fanatical about the internet. Dennis admits that his problem is that he can't wrap his head around what you do. Robert, your ability to embrace ambiguity is part of what makes you so good at what you do. - Matthew Schrock

who is this guy? he has sent me msgs in the past too. seems like a bit of a troll. - sean percival

I'd pay $15 to see you box Dennis. It wouldn't make either one of you more credible though. Of course, I don't always agree with you, but you always seem credible to me. - RobinDotNet

He's tweeting that you guys are good friends, but you're pushing folks to FF when they don't want to do that. Can't people just not go to FF if they don't want to? Are you twisting anybody's arm? - RobinDotNet

sean: he is a troll and RobinDotNet Dennis is a hypocrite. He pushes people to his web site all the time. - Robert Scoble

interesting that he thinks you're friends; do you think you're friends? - RobinDotNet

Every single day, and I mean EVERY day I get a follower or two like this http://twitter.com/MoneyMakers who link to posts on their blogs such as "How twitter can make you $2000 a month" and "Get 40000 followers in 30 days!". At least I don't get this crap on FF :D - David Lloyd

RobinDotNet: no, I wouldn't call us friends. Especially after the way he's been acting online and he refuses to come over here and explain himself. - Robert Scoble

Of course they are "social media experts" etc ;) - David Lloyd

He doesn't seem like much of a friend. If I make an accusation, I'm either going to apologize or explain myself. It's a stand-up thing to do. - RobinDotNet

Children... take a deep breath, walk outside and smell some goddam roses. Life is really too short for this kind of BS - Ben Kepes

If you have to argue your credibility... well, there's everyones answer... - Ian Wright