BlogMedia Are The New Bullies On The Block
First let me state that I have nothing to do with this and am only talking about it because I don’t like to see people bully others around, especially when they are doing the same offense and sometimes doing things even worse than the offense they are getting upset about. Adam Marquart has an entry up describing an email sent by Matt Craven, VP of BlogMedia, Inc., demanding that he remove an entry that doesn’t speak too highly of them.
Mr. Marquart:
You’ve posted material on jaob.wordpress.com in regards to our corporations’ actions accusing us of design theft and other patently untrue material.
I am asking that you remove this material immediately and post a retraction or we will turn this matter over to our corporation’s counsel for action.
I do not take issue with you expressing your opinions about us, our sites, our employees, or our contractors - I do take issue with public statements that are harmful to our corporation that are patently untrue. In addition, you are referencing our trademarked corporate name in a manner that violates federal law.
I appreciate you taking care of this issue before it becomes something more serious.
Sincerely,
Matt Craven
VP, Online Services
BlogMedia, Inc.
The problem with this though is that this is the same company where David Krug bashes companies non-stop. Now I hate it when people go after my company, but not once have I threatened legal action against them for stating their opinions and I have definitely had worse things said about me and my company than what Adam has said.
Why try and bully one individual? Isn’t this what larger corporations do when they can’t handle negative feedback? Are they not looking in the mirror and seeing that you can’t go after someone if your own writers are doing it as well?
If the Content Director has been using “snarky” content to generate traffic I am sure it has been working and if this is a PR stunt then I have no doubt it will get them a couple more hits, but at what price? One of the hardest things to remember when running a company is that your actions not only reflect on you, but also everyone around you that has put their trusts in your hands.
Last week Krug posted a private 9rules email that had a disclaimer at the bottom forbidding any republishing of the email, something that is standard in corporate emails and I asked them to kindly remove it. Their response:
I have a very low regard for email disclaimers and their legality - and so does our counsel. News is news, so we reported what we felt was news.
Okay so I let it go because it wasn’t that big of a deal the “news” that they reported. I just didn’t appreciate the way they handled things.
I would have to do my research, but didn’t Matt call Duncan Riley a ‘bigot’ not too long ago? I know he apologized for something, but how do you go around saying such things and not think the same laws apply to you? I know the only people that care about blog networks are the egomaniacs that run them, me included, and if you want to know which ones will rise to the top it’s quite simple to figure out. It’s going to be the ones where the owners shut the hell up and execute. Obviously more women need to run Networks because us men are getting a tad bit out of control.
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POSTED IN: Personal Thoughts
28 opinions for BlogMedia Are The New Bullies On The Block
Jamsi
Jan 16, 2006 at 12:19 am
haha, BlogMedia doing the bashing with people like David onboard?! Crazy!
I look forward to Dr Krug’s bashings. He finds humor in all the seriousness that is the blogosphere.
Cowboy
Jan 16, 2006 at 12:59 am
My official response will be coming in a few hours. In the mean time let’s talk about something else negative.
Mike
Jan 16, 2006 at 12:59 am
I know I’ve been more profitable and have added more content to our 14 blogs since I quit commenting so much on others blogs.
I’m also glad our little network doesn’t worry about what other networks are doing. to the point of posting about them. We just try to learn from them, not worship or bash them.
Forums, boards and gossip are the sure way to poverty.
Hard work, good decisions and thoughtful content are the ways to success.
Bloggers are really having a hard time remebering that they are only bloggers.
David Krug
Jan 16, 2006 at 2:33 am
Doesn’t that Adam guy work for you Scrivs? Interesting how you condemn your own creation “Cowboy” for going after other companies. It’s not the snarkiness we have an issue with. It’s the outright lies about stealing a design. Jeremy Wright,the president of B5 came out and made a public comment in disagreement with Adam’s libelous statment. See “Cowboy” may cross the line now and again. But he’s always factual. If B5’s servers are down. Yeah “Cowboy” attacks them. That’s who “Cowboy” is.
Yeah I posted an email. Wooptee. Again factual. And your disclaimer doesn’t mean anything in a court of law. Double check to make sure you took me off the email list. Oh no that’s right I got a tip. Do you know the facts behind that whole leakage. Nope. So again running around with no facts telling lies. See this where I don’t cross the line. Im honest brutally honest. Mean someimes. Yes. And you always stood behind me. Now its you in the crossfire and you can’t deal with it.
I called you out about making 9 dollars on all of fine fools. I called you out about Mike Rundle your executive posting spam on our companies blogs under an annonymous name which is a violation of new US Code. Again this is about the legality of an induvidual libeling a company,another excutive spamming a corporations blog. It’s also about me standing up for my company. I will expend any resource to protect my writers, and the company from a lie. If I remember I learned this from you. And truthfully this is where I take issue. I have avoided dragging “Redd Omaha” into a conflict at JOAB because this is clearly a legal issue. That needs to be addressed after he blew us off and posted lies up on the internet. Again I have no problem with opinion. I have a problem with lies that affect the company’s image and my image. Mostly the company’s.
Yes, Matt called Duncan a bigot. I, David Krug also helped get in the middle of that problem to work out an apology. I have tried to ignore the emails, the harassment by employees of 9rules.
I have tried to ignore the personal attacks that come out of your mouth in particular. I even tried to apologize for any harsh words, and I publicly thanked you for all you did for me And you blew me off. Talked a lot of smack and continued talking smack for a whole month. I publicly question how you run 9rules because truthfully I believe you jeapardize the reputation of high profile professionals like Om Malik, and others by your management style. I question your executive positional maturity in dealing with these issues. And your general theme of negativity over the last month.
You continue your diatribe just about anywhere you can. And truthfully I think its more out of jealousy, anger, and plain square up bitterness. It’s time you stand up and act like an executive. Paul Scrivens is not a persona. “Cowboy” is. And when you have worked for the big name companies, dealt with huge business deals like members of our corporation have then I will stand up like I always do and give you props for doing good work.
Just like I have B5 recently. Now David Krug doesn’t like to be real public. But on occassion he has to be. An occasion like this calls for moral integrity. Something I have. And as the CEO of 9rules, and Fine Fools, and presumably in some executive position with the sex network. I’m questioning your integrity, and the integrity of your staff for their behavior. Especially Adam.
Now we can deal with these issues legally and properly or we can talk a lot of smack and make everyone look bad. Let’s stand up do the right thing shut the comments down and move on towards developing great content. Im tired of this.
Marco
Jan 16, 2006 at 2:35 am
This ‘bashing’ thing will get the person doing it absolutely nowhere. I’m convinced of that. It looks like shit to most advertisers and the general public gets bored with it really quick as well. I know I did. It just gets old too damn soon.
As a blogger it’s much better to keep a less negative attitude towards others. It will be better in the long run.
Mike Rundle
Jan 16, 2006 at 2:45 am
David, if you’re referring to your post where you criticized Douchebrity where I wrote a comment under a pseudonym about how you were actually the one behind that libelous site, it should be noted that I came back to that entry and manned up, saying that I was the commenter. Even though I happened to use a pseudonym on that comment, at least I came back and let everyone know it was me. To date you have not manned up and admitted you were behind Douchebrity. Let’s place blame and anonymity where it actually lies.
David Krug
Jan 16, 2006 at 2:56 am
Again Douchebrity is a separate issue. No libel ever took place. It was a parody site. I was involved on some level yes! Want to know the level. Ok, I hosted the blog. I wrote a post none of the controversial ones though. I helped compile the list. And I helped on the technical side. The owner of the site who is annonymous and doesn’t need to get drug into this had some involvement and a few other people were involved. It was a group project. You as an executive also without factual data run around diatribing with hearsay about people you don’t have either proof or evidence to condemn. I’m glad you manned up. It’s about time someone from 9Rules started manning up. Take responsibity for your mistakes. Then start fixing them.
Who holds your guys accountable. As a potential advertiser. I question whether I would want to invest my dollars with BlogAds or with 9Rules. Purely from the simple fact of how you approach, and attach yourself very willingly to libel.
Let’s say I represent a company with 100k to invest in blog advertisint for MSNBC and I look at 9rules and the traffic is great but they just seem to have a bad reputation for negativity. Im running with Blogads. Especially when the CEO blatently accuses other of acts you wouldn’t accuse me to my face. And would I realy want a comment spammer who is an exec running my ad campaigns?
No.
Scrivs
Jan 16, 2006 at 3:04 am
Haha, again you make me laugh man. First Adam stopped writing for me a while ago. Check those facts. As for the whole money issue you claimed that I was basically robbing you of cash and I said the money I get from the sites that I don’t run was like $9/mo. That’s a fact.
I don’t condemn what you do, just how your company is reacting to this whole thing. As for your apologies and whatnot, don’t be mad if I don’t accept them and certainly don’t say I have been talking trash about you for the past month. I mean if you want me to have a go at you I could so for once you could actually be right about me talking trash about you, but till then let’s be real man. You have gone after me a number of times and only removed the content when Tyme railed you.
What exactly are you tired of? You changed the whole landscape from friendly competition to all out war. I mean I went after networks and whatnot, but did so with the intention of letting them know how they can improve. Sure I come across as an asshole at times, but in the end I know I can still talk to these people. You simply went after them and nope I didn’t stop you because that’s what you do best and I was more than prepared to handle the backlash. Whether you wish to take credit or not you are the center of this storm and now you think you can flip the switch to stop it because certain things don’t go your way?
I’m glad your network is all about making the bloggers big time and whatnot. Sounds like the exact same message b5 originated last year (btw, good job b5 guys from staying out of this). What’s sad though is that I am sure most people couldn’t name 2 people in your network besides you. You have become the network and in doing so haven’t helped make your writers any more popular in the public’s eye.
Nice response though.
Mike Rundle
Jan 16, 2006 at 3:09 am
“As a potential advertiser. I question whether I would want to invest my dollars with BlogAds or with 9Rules. Purely from the simple fact of how you approach, and attach yourself very willingly to libel.”
First off, you’re not a potential advertiser, so those sentences make no sense.
Secondly, I think we all get our egos ahead of us and think that people actually care about these little pissing wars we’ve all been so occupied with lately. How many pageviews a day does JOAB get? A few hundred? A thousand or two? It’s gotta be around there since the T-Rati rank is only around 6000 or so. It’s not as though executives at MSNBC are coming to your weblog to find out the latest and greatest weblog world news or something, so you shouldn’t flatter yourself.
“Let’s say I represent a company with 100k to invest in blog advertisint for MSNBC and I look at 9rules and the traffic is great but they just seem to have a bad reputation for negativity. Im running with Blogads. Especially when the CEO blatently accuses other of acts you wouldn’t accuse me to my face. And would I realy want a comment spammer who is an exec running my ad campaigns?”
Oh I would accuse you to your face if I had the opportunity, let’s not get it twisted. When you move to New York, hit me up, we can have some lunch and play a game of chess.
Scrivs
Jan 16, 2006 at 3:09 am
If BlogAds is a better service and fit for you as a potential advertiser then by all means go with them. Again though I must laugh because you think I’m the one with the “bad repuation for negativity”?
Don’t take this the wrong way, but I have to ask this question and I am being dead serious here. Do you have multiple personality disorder? Really not trying to crack a joke, just trying to get a better understanding for who you are.
Wonder if the readers are being entertained with this discussion?
Scrivs
Jan 16, 2006 at 3:15 am
Oh and I don’t condone what Mike did either on your site. We have talked about it and understand it wasn’t the best way to go about things. Like Mike said though this is all an ego thing, which doesn’t get the ladies.
Jacob
Jan 16, 2006 at 3:42 am
“Now we can deal with these issues legally and properly or we can talk a lot of smack and make everyone look bad”
The only one who’s really looking bad right now is you David. Going through legal channels, or pretending to go through legal channels so quickly is not going to get your network any fans.
David Krug
Jan 16, 2006 at 4:10 am
Scrivs:
Tyme didn’t rail me. I doubt she would want to be quoted as a railer. She’s actually a pretty damn good writer and I value her opinion. That’s only one reason why I changed the context of the blog. Yes, you have been on the personal attack. I have emails and forwards, and a whole lot of nice evidence sitting on my desktop of comments you made regarding Cowboy. Some even to my face. If you’d like I can zip them up and send them over along with a nice cover letter asking you nicely to behave. In the real world I’m a soft nice guy willing to do just about any thing for my people. If that means sticking my neck out there and pursuing a legal case. Fine. If that means paying bloggers out my own pocket if I had to fine. Thats who I am.
When it boils down to it. Your right its an ego thing. I have one. You have one. Adam has one. Egos, are part of who we are. Having or not having an ego has nothing to do with “getting ladies”. If you knew the real David Krug you would know that when it comes to business, he leaves the ladies out of it. That’s not even part of my thought process when making a business decision.
As far as reputations go, Scrivs you are a much more high profile name. So this does affect your reputation. And it does mine too but to a lesser degree. I have to look at that and evaluate it. It’s been great the last few days getting emails from friends asking me about reputation. And how this or that will effect it. I think by standing up and doing the right thing this will make our company better and stronger in the long run.
Your statement:
Whether you wish to take credit or not you are the center of this storm and now you think you can flip the switch to stop it because certain things don’t go your way?
What didn’t go my way? I’m perplexed. This has nothing to do with things going my way. It’s about the company making the right decision to ask Adam to take down his libel. Plain and Simple. Personally. I’m not the decision maker. Matt and Bryan and our entire executive staff have decided to pursue this on a legal front. They asked me my opinion. I stated it. That I would support them 200 percent either way. I laid a couple of options on the table. One of which was to pursue legal means to protect the company from wrong. Im glad we did. Im sticking to that.
And I never made any of the design decisions concerning bnw, so Im not the center of this “storm”. Adam is, but you really wanted to be. So I’m letting you. Again like you said ego thing. You don’t see me on my non snarky blog blasting you or Adam about this. I did before and that’s a mistake I’m glad Tyme taught me. She’s a real winner. Who knows how to take the high ground. I’m trying my best to learn from people like her. Im young. 26 years of it. I’m open to learning from wiser people. In a few years I hope I look back and say ugh. That was horrible. But that was a great learning experience. And Tyme thank you. And Scrivs thank you. And Jon Watson thank you. It’s all about learning and becomin g a better person. A better leader. Sometimes you learn the hard way. Maybe this time I did.
As far as your cheapshot about my multiple personality issues. Maybe your right. Do you have the number for a good psychiatrist. Seriously a CEO telling another’s companies employee that he has multiple personality disorder. I find this a case of slime. Especially coming from your non-entertainment blog. I’m saddly disappointed in this and will begin by stating nicely: Stop. You and Mike are teetering on facing some mighty big problems. This is advice. Your own members aren’t going to stand for this kind of unprofessionalism for long when dealing with a real issue like time and money. I don’t find it amusing. I find it sad.
Mike:
As a network we would look at advertising with the 9rules community. You guys wouldn’t want another network doing that? Strange. That’s disheartening. So is this just going to be an ad network for people who belong to 9rules? I’m confused more and more by your plans. Now, no blogs, or services companies are your advertisers. I’m jazzed to see what you guys roll out. I hope its profesional. I’m sure it will be. And I will probably invest a little to see how it works. If its so revolutionary. I’m in this for money. And if you product allows my company to make money. I’m all about that. I give you props. I’m looking down the road at investing some serious cash into an advertising program that works. I have partners willing to do the same thing.
JOAB actually only gets about 7 pageviews a day. 3/4 of them are 9rules executives. But I don’t care. It’s not about the amount of my readers. It’s about me trying to laugh the more serious issues. Like libel.
I was using an example by stating informaton concernging advertisers. However, If you noticed that’s advertising network wide not on one site. Purely an example. You can take my words and twist them all day long. Im still going to stand up and do the right thing for my company, my writers, and support staff.
Anthony
Jan 16, 2006 at 4:12 am
Best statement ever!!!
I think we all get our egos ahead of us and think that people actually care about these little pissing wars we’ve all been so occupied with lately.
Scrivs
Jan 16, 2006 at 4:37 am
David: Thanks for the kind words man. They really mean a lot to me. We are striving everyday to improve and can only do this by listening to the constructive criticism provided by readers such as yourself. As for the ad network we weren’t even sure you would be interested since you were raving about starting one on your own.
Oh and thanks for reminding me about Tyme and her talents. For a split second there I almost forgot why I invited her and her site into the 9rules Network (I love you Tyme!).
Paul Watson
Jan 16, 2006 at 5:34 am
I see it has been “resolved”: http://jaob.wordpress.com/2006/01/16/apology-to-ewebscapes/
Matt
Jan 16, 2006 at 8:16 am
Mr. Marquart has posted an apology of sorts at his site - our only concern with his posts was over the accusation of theft and his use of our trademark in doing so. The rest of his post - critical though it may be, I have no issue with.
Let me clear up one other misnomer here - the decision makers on this issue were myself and my partner who own BlogMedia along with the firm that represents our company.
The whole blog network war crap is really not my cup of tea. I much prefer to hang out in my bunker here in the sub-basement, keep my nose to the grindstone, and get things done. But I will not let baseless accusations of theft go by without making the appropriate business decision on how to handle them.
Matt
adam
Jan 16, 2006 at 11:22 am
Oh this thing is not over. I noticed before anyone else that Lisa was an inoccent bystandard. I explain that.
Matt and David although your claims of a lawsuit was exciting, as it turned out, like most of your content a load of crap. You can bitch and moan you are being mistreated but in the end, you are getting what you deserve. Ever watch the show My Name Is Earl? ( By the way scrivs, went to an interesting website, eff.org don’t know if you have heard of it. I can say that and you will not get in trouble or better yet sued.) ;)
David, Matt, BlogMedia, Erati….Karma Bitch!
David Krug
Jan 16, 2006 at 12:34 pm
I would never in my right mind sue scrivs. Back to work.
Bye Adam.
Blog Marketing, Blog Promotion for Newbies » Blog Archive » Integrity, Self-Respect and Professionalism
Jan 16, 2006 at 1:09 pm
[…] There has been an ongoing discussion/war amongst folks I am both grateful for and others who irritate the daylights out of me. (That’s a personal deal which I’m sure we all have. Our own irritations.) […]
Andy Hagans
Jan 16, 2006 at 3:16 pm
I am honestly very regretful that I took the time to read this post and the comments. No offense everyone. But Really. Get. A. Life.
Brian
Jan 16, 2006 at 7:14 pm
I made a zillion-gabillion dollars yesterday on my blog.
Cameron Olthuis
Jan 16, 2006 at 7:55 pm
I have to say I’ve pretty much lost all respect for both parties involved, 9rules and BlogMedia. I’m sure I’m not the only one either.
chartreuse
Jan 17, 2006 at 1:57 pm
Andy took the words write out of my mouth.
If you are going to bitch please try to keep the comments short and witty. Long-winded insults/explanations are so…boring.
chartreuse (BETA) » Blog Archive » What if you had a war and no one came…
Jan 17, 2006 at 2:19 pm
[…] The blog wars happened. […]
Martin
Jan 17, 2006 at 7:50 pm
This has really gone way overboard. We all take pot shots at each other, heck - I’ve had my fun with Scrivs but it’s all in jest at the end of the day.
David, ever since you’ve come on the scene it’s all turned rather nasty. Now I wouldn’t go so far as Scrivs re: multiple personalituy disorder - but reading your various sites and your flip-flopping style of posting I also have to wonder about your mental stability.
I have no agenda here: but honestly, David, I have never seen such extreme range of writing as I’ve seen with you.
I really thought it was all a bit of link-baiting and controvery stratgey - but now I’m not so sure.
Tyme
Jan 18, 2006 at 9:58 am
This “war” is over. David apologized on Jack of All Blogs (not only to Scrivs but to everyone), apologies were accepted (and exchanged) and everyone is moving on.
Thank you Scrivs and David for the kind words. I truly appreciate it and I’m glad things worked out. :)
Blog network battle of the stars at WebImpresario.com
Jan 18, 2006 at 1:03 pm
[…] Anyway, I digress, and wish I had something more interesting to say about the subject. Even though its over, feel free to read this post outlining the whole fiasco. blog networks blog networks […]
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