June 10, 2004

Oh for the love of Pete--Now we've got BlowGun?

Apparently no one told these folks that blogging surpassed the "hot trend" category last year and is now on its way to passe-ville. Well, at least blogging the way they understand it. Really, someone should have clued them in that blogging is dead (long live writing).

DIG, if you will, exhibit A, also known as the intro page, which attempts to jazz up conference attendee wannabes and speakers. Okay. I am a cunning linguist myself, and I understand that the writer is trying hard, if badly, to create in his or her readers an ultra-orgasmic state, or at least a longing for this brand new, hot-so-hot trend called blogging.

For instance, the welcome message urges us to take advantage of this fast-emerging technology and the unique language it uses.

Unique language? Oh no. Oh dear. I've begun to perspire.

But there's more:

Yet, despite this phenomenal growth, no one company has prospered from blogging or social media. BlogOn will show you why this day is imminent. The real question is: Who will be in position to ride this new wave?

no one company has prospered?

why this day is imminent?

who will be in position to ride this new wave?

Well, for one thing, people who can WRITE, or at least have something meaningful to SAY.

The Blogon (Pronounced Blow Gun by the common folk who already speak the unique language known as pigeon-bloggish) people are urging you to LEVERAGE ! AND QUICKLY!

They want you to understand and harness this gathering disruptive phenomenon.

[[what's a gathering phenomenon? anyone?]]

That's right--rein it in. Harness it, capture the power and use it to sustain your competitive advantage. Sure: Harness, which in business speak is kin to leverage. Believe me. I wrote the book.

Best of all, you will notice that all of your favorite (mostly self-proclaimed male) A-listers are speaking at BlowGun, except at this conference they are called leading bloggers.

One of my favorite absurd claims of the BlowGun folks is that the conference will enable you to Discern for yourself the difference between vision and hallucination among key players.

Well, I don't know for sure who the "key players" are, but I sure as hell am hoping that this whole BlowGun thing is a hallucination.

And while we're at it, I'll take hallucination over business vision any day of the week.

I have to wonder: when will a conference come along that Our Regular Representatives decide NOT to attend--not to give credibility to? When will they say, "naw--this sounds way too goofy" to the kind of anti-voice crap mantra bullshit this page reeks of?

When?

Someone, load the blow gun and shoot me now.

Shelley?, Stavros? Anyone?