Saturday, October 29, 2005

The Forbes cover story about blogs by Dan Lyons was heartily disrespected by Forbes insiders on this morning's Forbes on Fox television show. Publisher Rich Karlgaard compared the scare-mongering to Y2K. Writer Victoria Murphy scoffed at the article's chief defender, managing editor Dennis Kneale, and columnist John Rutledge piled on with a joke about virility-enhancement spam. Again, the germ of a serious story is there: companies have to be aware of blog-borne attacks. But the hype and lack of balance -- Murphy pointed to use of blogs within Microsoft as an example of how blogs do good things for companies -- weaken the piece considerably. Update: Nick Carr agrees that Lyons has something to say. I think the pushback is valuable, but Carr lets Forbes off too easily for the hype. Yes, bloggers and blogs are open to criticism, and there is much to criticize. Too bad Forbes diluted its message. 12:33:44 PM   permalink   comment []

DarkTimes: Dowd ("Who's on First") and Tierney ("What Fitzgerald Didn't Say") do quick next-day pieces after the Libby indictment. MoDo says we need to know more: "But what we really want to know, now that we have the bare bones of who said what to whom in the indictment, is what they were all thinking there in that bunker and how that hothouse bred the idea that the way out of their Iraq problems was to slime their critics instead of addressing the criticism. What we really want to know, if Scooter testifies in the trial, and especially if he doesn't, is what Vice did to create the spidery atmosphere that led Scooter, who seemed like an interesting and decent guy, to let his zeal get the better of him." Tierney says journalists are among the big losers. "Why were we so eager for someone to look into the secret practices of our own business? What made this leak so scandalous that it merited the risk of empowering someone who could turn into another Ken Starr?" 10:30:34 AM   permalink   comment []

Byron York in NRO's The Corner: "[O]bservers are unanimously appalled by the performance of Libby's lawyer, Joseph Tate...Now, Libby is said to be in the market for a good criminal defense lawyer. If he had done that earlier, the observers say, he might not be in the trouble he is in now." 10:21:09 AM   permalink   comment []

Picasso, Nature Morte (Picasso, Still Life)                                                        Jacques Villon                                                              1927                                           Weatherspoon Museum, Greensboro 8:47:16 AM   permalink   comment []