You have arrived at the web home of Noah Brier. This is mostly an archive of over a decade of blogging and other writing. You can read more about me or get in touch. If you want more recent writing of mine, most of that is at my BrXnd marketing x AI newsletter and Why Is This Interesting?, a daily email for the intellectually omnivorous.
1. Explaining that blog is short for weblog: Alright, there are two things that bug me on this one: First, I think everyone knows at this point that blog is short for weblog and second, who cares what it's short for? Does weblog really do that much of a better job of explaining what a blog is? Has anyone ever wondered what a blog was and miraculously understood when informed for weblog? No. It's stupid and I'm sick of reading it.
2. Discussing the ethics of blog writers versus journalists: Stop! Stop! Stop! It's just dumb. It totally misses the point. It doesn't matter what the ethics of blog authors are. It's not the same as traditional journalism and it never will be. That's not to say that bloggers aren't "journalists," just to say that making the comparison is dumb. You can't always trust the media and you can't always trust blogs. What the hell is the difference?
3. Hearing about how blogs will "rock" the business world: Blogs as a whole will not rock the business world. Certainly a (single) blog will rock a (single) business, but it's pretty serious to make a broad pronunciation about business as a whole. Yes, some of the lessons of blogging will change the business world, but "rock" implies some immediate impact and that's not what happens. Blogs reinforce Cluetrain ideas. They help push conversations and make companies start to realize that in the future they're going to have to speak to customers as equals. But "rock" the business world? Enron rocked the business world. Maybe it's only semantics, but there's a big difference.
I'm sure I'll think of more in the future, but this seems like a good start. What do you think? What have you read that bugs you?