Tag: Blogging

News Media by Joe WilcoxJun 22, 20102:10 am

Eight Reasons I Love Pop17

If Sarah Austin is the future of journalism, I have hope that accuracy, authenticity and accountability may yet survive. Yesterday, Sarah tumbleblogged something she posted 16 days earlier that I missed: “Blogging Code of Ethics.”

Now there’s a strange concept: Blogging and ethics. It’s strange because I’ve seen too many blogs acting as marketing fronts—and too many others scraping other sites’ content and reposting it for profit. In neither case does much fact checking go along with the blogs. I identified the problem in posts “The Difference Between Blogging and Journalism” and “Gossipers of the InterWeb.”

Web by Joe WilcoxJun 17, 20104:58 am

Comments, No-Comments Debate gets Noisy

People love catfights, which perhaps explains some of the interest in the comments/no-comments debate between me and Mac blogger John Gruber. It’s a pseudo-debate, really, since the only engagement is blog posting. John and I haven’t directly communicated.

I started it all, by calling out John for not having comments on his blog. I told him to “Be a man,” which I actually meant with some backslapping good nature. But some people are morally offended. Stacia Van Doll reblogged the post as: “QUIT being a douchebag Joe Wilcox.”

People by Joe WilcoxJun 10, 201011:57 am

Be a Man, John Gruber

If John Gruber allowed comments on his blog, I wouldn’t need to write this post, and it has been long-time coming. I considered writing it every time I read something outrageous at Daring Fireball but couldn’t directly respond because John doesn’t allow comments. Finally, this morning, I had enough.

Apple by Joe WilcoxApr 20, 201012:36 pm

Gizmodo Made the ‘Next iPhone’ a Great Story

I have deeply mixed feelings about siding with Apple and not Gizmodo regarding the iPhone prototype the Weblog paid to acquire. After all, as a seasoned journalist, I should strongly advocate no-questions-asked free speech. Instead, last night I blogged for Betanews: “Apple should sue Gizmodo over stolen iPhone prototype“. I had planned to write something here, but Betanews founder Nate Mook asked for a story, which I gladly delivered.

Apple by Joe WilcoxApr 10, 201010:33 am

OMG, They Cloned Steve Jobs

Earlier this week, I set up a Google Alert for “Joe Wilcox”. Hey, I’m not being egotistical. The alert is to see where my posts are being aggregated. I’m deeply conflicted about aggregation, but that’s a separate blog topic. The very second alert contained post “Too Stupid to Own an iPad” from the Fake Steve Jobs blog. It was pure nastiness.

Apple by Joe WilcoxApr 9, 20106:37 pm

I was gouged by the Macalope and Lived

I am not the most popular journalist among the so-called Mac faithful. I’ve written some tough stuff about Apple over the years, and most of my analyses proved right long after my public lynchings. One of my posts from summer 2009 set off John Gruber, aka “Daring Fireball.” The blog post was a personal challenge to Apple chief executive Steve Jobs to return to work and do well.

Apple by Joe WilcoxApr 8, 20109:45 pm

A Mashable Post Mortem

Yesterday, I raked Mashable’s Ben Parr for his assertion that Apple’s then yet unannounced mobile advertising platform posed a credible threat to Google. Now that Apple has announced iAd, and seeing how Ben’s rumor reporting was right about it coming, I circle back for a postmortem. Simply stated: I stand by my assertion that his sourcing was weak and that he didn’t support bold assertions that Apple’s still unreleased mobile ad platform is way ahead Google’s.

News Media by Joe WilcoxAug 26, 20094:39 pm

What Good Is RSS Anyway?

Yesterday, ZDNet’s Sam Diaz harped that RSS was “a good idea at the time, but there are better ways now.” ReadWriteWeb’s Marshall Kirkpatrick responded on his personal blog: “If you think RSS is dead then that’s your loss and a big one.” Their opposing positions go oddly together, and both make some valid points.

News Media by Joe WilcoxJul 21, 20095:54 pm

Audience vs Traffic

One of things you rarely hear spoken about in internet business is traffic. I don’t mean traffic numbers—those are everywhere. I mean traffic itself. What it is, what it means, what constitutes value, etc. You don’t see blog posts talking about how page views can be (and very much are) gamed to create the appearance of more page views. Or, that one million uniques means little if the length of time visitors are on the site (aka, session time) is less than one minute without their returning back to visit. That’s like a million people driving by McDonald’s but never actually going into the restaurant. I won’t even get started on flawed analytics services. Unfortunately, the market as a whole hasn’t evolved to where it’s begun to notice things like this. Blogs and media still cite flawed analytics sources in articles, and few ever reference important stats like session times and repeat visitors. That says a lot about the place the market is in.

Continue reading Audience vs Traffic

News Media by Joe WilcoxJul 18, 20092:54 am

The Michael Arrington Matter

There is quite the ethics flap going on over the last 72 hours or so about TechCrunch’s handling of leaked Twitter documents.

Looming questions: Is Michael Arrington wrong to distribute any of the leaked material, which a hacker stole? Is the posting of the documentation unconscionable? Is there journalistic excuse, or justification for it?

Photo by Joe WilcoxJul 9, 20097:17 pm

Macs in J Schools

Every picture tells a story. Apple presented this one during the October 2008 launch of unibody MacBook Pros. So many Macs among so many students seems outta sorts. Where are the Windows laptops? The students and Mac laptops go so oddly together.

Apple by Joe WilcoxMay 13, 20094:56 pm

Officethemovie: The Confessional

Yesterday, a seemingly official Microsoft Twitter accounted fooled popular blogs and mainstream news sites to write that Microsoft would introduce a new Zune platform in June. But the account wasn’t from Microsoft.

Allegedly, David Z from Haklab set up the account. I e-mailed Haklab today asking:

I love guerrilla marketing, and know how to recognize it, which is why I didn’t get sucked into the vortex like other bloggers and journalists. But it’s confession time. Who are you really, and what are your objectives? Not that I’m sure I will believe you. But try me. I want to blog on the problem of Twitter and shoddy journalism. You’re the case study.

This afternoon, I got a response. David claims to have exploited a Microsoft mistake—that the Twitter feed from Microsoft’s Office 2010: The Movie Website went to an unclaimed account. So he registered the Twitter account, @officethemovie. My suspicion: There was a typo on the page, and the account should have read: @office2010movie, as it does now.