Right, what took so long? A z-lister wants to know.
Jason
· 1 year ago
You can't be too Z-List, your showing up on Techmeme this morning.
Scobleizer
· 1 year ago
The Z-List is the new A-List.
Jason
· 1 year ago
Dangit, and I still don't show up on techmeme yet. I must be ZZ list. LOL. Oh well, I'm not too butt hurt about it. :)
Jim Kukral TheBizWebCoach
· 1 year ago
Ok, I'm officially not on any list anymore. I'm writing a letter to the commander. :)
digidave
· 1 year ago
I too think it's about time. The blogosphere needs to grow up a bit and that won't happen if we rely on A-listers all the time.
Still: I don't think they will "die" - they'll just lose some influence and "awe-ness." If I run into Scoble now, I don't need to be a fan boy, I can just talk to him blogger-to-blogger.
I think Scoble (above) also knows that the A-list isn't going to die. Situations and circumstances just don't disappear overnight. So - unless everyone goes Calacanis on us, tomorrow's techmeme will still be dominated by a few and I'll still feel "privileged" when I occasionally get on.
digidave
· 1 year ago
2nd try.
I think anything that will help the blogosphere mature is a good thing. We still need to grow up and into our own clothing, so to speak.
But I also don't think the A-listers are going to "die." They will always be around - and I think Scoble knows this. Circumstances don't change overnight - so unless they all go Calacanis on us, I expect there will always be A-listers.
That said - they might be less important than A-listers are today. And that's good. Next time I run into scoble I can speak to him blogger-to-blogger instead of blogger-to-fanboy.
jackst
· 1 year ago
That's right. It is an outstanding idea that made them dead. Don't you think they will come alive? :)
gloriakt
· 1 year ago
Jim- interesting take on this and an entertaining read!
Not sure I completely agree; although there is definitely a leveling in the influence sphere thanks to the Internet. More so, it seems to follow a very Hollywood-esqe cycle. There's just a new generation of A-listers/Digirati whatever you want to call them.
Shawn Collins
· 1 year ago
I think there were many factors in the demise of these mythical creatures.
You've got the democratization of tools and technology. It's not so exotic to put up videos and podcasts anymore.
And the companies releasing the latest Web 2.0 vapor service stopped making these guys the gate keepers. The invites started going to the unwashed masses, too.
Not to mention that the "a-list" shifted from being cutting edge to tacky and entitled. A smarmy bunch with multiple devices on their belts and inside jokes.
In the end, they were the last to realize the punchline, for it was them.
Jim Kukral TheBizWebCoach
· 1 year ago
GREAT points Shawn.
wil reynolds
· 1 year ago
Shawn, tacky and entitled is SOOO true.
Mark Dykeman
· 1 year ago
Well, technically the A list isn't dead until Technorati is a permanent 404 or "site not found"....
Sam Harrelson
· 1 year ago
Good points, Jim but I think platforms like Twitter and FriendFeed help reinforce, not tear down, the traditional notion of a tech/geek a-list. It is lame that Rose, Calacanis, etc use these as personal mailing lists but people do flock to them b/c it's entertainment.
To me, the a-list is all about aggregation and sorting. People like Steve Rubel or Louis Gray or Wayne Sutton are "a-listers" for me b/c of the info sorting they do. However, they don't play the drama games, so they're not San Fran style a-listers. Like you said, that notion is becoming very subjective.
Regardless, my wife will always look at me like a loser when I try to fill her in on the latest exploits of Puppet Shel b/c this stuff just doesn't matter outside our little bubble.
As Hugh McLeod (is he an a-lister?) drew, "Change the world or go home."
Sam
Sam Harrelson
· 1 year ago
Just as proof of my point about FriendFeed and Twitter, there are more comments on Scoble's FriendFeed flow b/c of his aggregation of his Disqus comment below than there are here: http://friendfeed.com/e/68ccb1f2-8371-db2f-7f73...
ruggedlaptops
· 1 year ago
Best observation you have posted lately . R.I.P. to A-List.
Michael_Markman
· 1 year ago
Depends on your frame of reference, doesn't it? To my dog, I'm an A-lister and Scoble is, well...I'd only be guessing. Most of the people I know have never heard of any of the folks mentioned in this column. But they've all heard of Stephen Colbert. Eddie Izzard is filling the Seattle Paramount two nights this weekend. Who's an A-lister.
On the other hand, Scoble has managed to hijack the the discussion of this post on FriendFeed. Someone is obviously paying attention to him.
Jim Kukral TheBizWebCoach
· 1 year ago
Yeah, people are still paying attention to guys like Scoble. There's nothing wrong with that. I follow him and I like reading his thoughts My point was that "his kind" is not needed as much anymore.
Rob Dolin
· 1 year ago
The first point about social networks is extremely cogent. Instead of reading TechCrunch or Daily Kos, I'll read folks like Dare Obasanjo for tech and Kevin Bondelli for politics. In many ways, with tools like the Facebook's news feed + share functionality, Windows Live What's New, Twitter, and FriendFeed; instead of reading the "a-list" my social network filters quality posts for me.
Jim Hillhouse
· 1 year ago
Un oh, Arrington is NOT going to like this. Could have happened to a better...(noun I can't write).
Jim Hillhouse
· 1 year ago
Darn, that's what happens when I post before coffee. Meant to write that,"...this couldn't happen", not could happen.
Like everything, the..., well downward is the only word coming to mind, distribution on social networks follows a well worn path that others have faced with the increased penetration and use of that cliché, the Net. That this has happened to the a-list was inevitable.
I think this also happened because these folks were not doing anything to adopt to the changes around them--their relevance was lost to the passage of time and technology. They did not adapt but instead used the time they had, not to grow, but to indulge in, especially in Arrington's case, an themselves and who they had become.
ChangeForge | Ken Stewart
· 1 year ago
Spot on... I still look to folks like this for some interesting stuff, but they are really becoming like any other source of information. I do not intend to take away from what they have done, or continue to do...
Other forms of distribution have made access to information easier, but I still think people want a home base... the question is really where that home base will land.
Great post and great opinions... thanks for sharing.
Tibi Puiu
· 1 year ago
How true. Your words truly echo my thoughts entirely. The time of blogging evangelists have fallen, the knowledge is now in the hands of the people. Ding, dong the A-listers are dead.
There'll be something new...some new way to make a new A-List...I guarantee it...
kolson29
· 1 year ago
This post was SO right - we might need great bloggers, but we don't need celebrities. The great bloggers and writers will naturally rise to the top because of their great content, that's all it takes. Thanks for this great post, just stumbled it :-)
Dimitris
· 1 year ago
I still think once an a-lister always an a-lister. Imagine for example what will happen if Calacanis decides to restart blogging, microblogging or whatever it is ppl do in 3 years from now. Quite likely his older 'following' will still remember him - and give him their attention. Even if as a test to begin with.
daveevans
· 1 year ago
There is a big difference between an A-list and early adopters. In a year it's going to be a whole new crew, I agree with the Hollywood comment, we will create our own stars.
Look at Lewis Grey (just an example, I don't know him but his writing is ok.) Who is he and why should we care? Just because someone with a lot of followers says he is worth a read doesn't mean he's worth our time. The masses blindly follow because they are told to. Take very little reputation to sway peoples attention. Interesting to see how this will all shake out over time and we get past the ongoing echo chamber effect.
Eric Rice
· 1 year ago
Louis Gray is a GREAT case study. He came out of nowhere, he seemingly writes intelligent stuff, and thus the hype machine started around him--- that hype machine is run by people, not him, unwittingly catapulting him higher up a list. He got the attention of the A-list who, mention him to a HUGE audience, etc etc, you see how the cycle happens. Out of 20K fanboys, someone is bound to go 'oh yeah this guy's all right' and then boom. Multiplication.
daveevans
· 1 year ago
Time to start a tribe of A-list commenters, Let's call it America's got Comments, or Comment Idol. Who gets to be the 'Hoff?
Jim Kukral TheBizWebCoach
· 1 year ago
But will these new stars be as big as the old stars were? I don't think we'll duplicate what happened once do to the reasons I stated above.
daveevans
· 1 year ago
Select blog stars will become much larger and morph into global columnists. Makes me think of HuffPo, that's not even a blog anymore.
Some bloggers will always post 10x a day, the usefulness of this schedule will become less important to most readers. Think NYT op-ed page.
People love the quickness of blogs, but I would does that help them do you job better or become more efficient or make more money? Not for the majority of readers.
Maybe I'm too focused on the post-anytime nature of blogs today, but still, I'd rather read and write longer though pieces than 150 words several times a day. Still, I think today's A-listers are brealy breaking the surface. Just wait until blog translation services start to emerge and China is reading you.
Thaed
· 1 year ago
Not all content is created equal. The bloggers with higher sociometry will always have more hits and make more in ad revenue.
Keith Shepard
· 1 year ago
The "A-List" as just a made up list anyway. Another device used to create "classes", to discriminate, to create a fake hierarchy because that's the way humans are.
A-Lister's drinking fountains; non-A-lister's drinking fountains. It's 1950's America redux.
Good riddance to the "A-List".
Lisa Russell
· 1 year ago
OK- good point, but what the heck was that picture about?
madpotter
· 1 year ago
Whatever you call early adopter/leader-geeky-techy whatever, professional new media is rising out of early, quirky tech stuff. More will be revealed. I love speculative fiction, but in real life, I'm happy to wait and see what happens.
meisenstadt
· 1 year ago
There's a simpler explanation, that I call the "Two orders of magnitude overload conjecture"... in a nutshell the (entirely legitimate, IMHO) leading lights, who helped improve the signal-to-noise ratio by being ahead of the pack and frequently providing insightful analyses, get swamped as the rest of the pack catches up (in this view, A-listers are heavily correlated with early adopters, though I agree with daveevans that the two are not synonynous); in general some percentage of these 'leading lights', 'thought leaders', whatever one wants to call them, will successfully find or create a new niche, and it turns out that "merely" following a select few can still improve the signal to noise ratio for people keen to keep up with "what's happening", until the noise level once again becomes overwhelming. I wrote about this about 3 years ago in a brief guest stint on a top-rated blog (hah, now I've stopped blogging, go figure), that's in the archives here:
Thanks for all the comments and feedback on my little rant I wrote at 2am last night on a quick thought. And yes, I do see the complete irony that this post is currently at the top of Techmeme. Haha. Welcome to all the new people.
Mark Evans
· 1 year ago
Another angle is the A-listers have been around for a long time - and it's the fact they started early that has given them some of their A-list stature. Not surprisingly, their acts are getting tired.
Scoble is a good example. He has his 15 minutes of fame, and then some. But - and I don't mean to be at all disrespectful - Scoble's biggest advantage a few years ago was he worked for Microsoft and had extraordinary latitude in what he write about. Then, the novelty wore off so did Scoble's act.
Meanwhile, other interesting voices came on the scene that while they may not have had the same access as Scoble, they brought something different to the table.
It may not be that the A-list is dying as much as it's being supplanted or infiltrated by new people.
Mark
Jim Kukral TheBizWebCoach
· 1 year ago
That's pretty much what I alluded to in my piece Mark, we agree.
Mike1115
· 1 year ago
Should I be amazed that I've been in online operations for years and never read anything by Scoble or Arrignton? However large you think the interwebz is, it's even bigger than that.
Eric Rice
· 1 year ago
A-lists never die, they just evolve, through every industry, media type and beyond. We are animals, and we put people on A-lists whether we think we do or not.
Being considered A-List puts you in a position to get things others can not. We are deeply aware of this (especially if we don't have access to things that we want access to). And that brings up envy and greed, and a whole pandorian box of stuff to face.
fmckenna
· 1 year ago
The d-list is the new A-list. Viva la opportunidad to talk to whomever I want to talk to any way I want to whenver I want to.
templestark
· 1 year ago
excellent - the d-list is the new A-ist ;-) shades of but for a typo in the original, "the geek shall inherit the earth."
fmckenna
· 1 year ago
Not sure I consider myself a geek, just an accountant who has an interest and aptitude for technology more than the average CPA. I heard about this post from Twitter, which all of my accounting readers are scared to death of. Except the ones at the beginning of their careers (and a few other hybrids like me.) The 20-somethings are into everything , 24/7, and don't call it "social media." It just is. And they don't wait for permission from anyone to reach out or to give their opinion. I like that and they push and pull me to to do what I've always done, network, only using new tools. Scoble, Calacanis, Arrington? Might as well be Rocky and Bullwinkle to me and to the 20-somethings. As obscure as those cartoon characters except for the fact sometimes they show up and assume everyone is going to be entertained.
Neal Jansons
· 1 year ago
Very nice little post. Definitely gives the ins-and-outs of the power structures in the online world and how they change. Notice it is no different than the physical world, but online the power to spread information and communicate is not so easy to take away as it is in the physical realm.
This is why grassroots movements are so powerful and why the online world scares old media so much...they can't keep their position's entrenched anymore. Change this fast is something their entire world can't cope with, and they are quite aware that they are becoming rapidly obsolete.
Pluperfecter
· 1 year ago
I am the A List now, and all you Web 2.0 wankers and Social Media slackers must become my slaves and promoters. I command you now to help Loren Feldman find a girlfriend and get a real job, so I don't have to listen to sock puppets anymore. And help me find a way to get Jesse Jackson to say he wants to cut something off of me.
PurpleCar
· 1 year ago
Have we all lost our minds? Maybe I should let us all fantasize in this little bubble where everyone is famous, making no-one famous in our echo chamber or beyond. But that just isn't human nature. We will always look to raise some people (and their content) above the rest. We will always make value judgments. And that's ok. That is how we are structured.
There will always be an A-List. We will simply replace Scoble and Calacanis with Louis Gray and Corvida. Honestly. It's like none of us ever suffered through sociology 101.
cdaitch
· 1 year ago
I kind of alluded to "you don't need to be jaffe to make your mark" in my last blog post. You said it WAY better than I could. Excellent article.
-Craig
Jared
· 1 year ago
What a great post! I have been so annoyed by Scoble, Arrington and Feldman lately.
They really think they are the "A Team". They are the nothing team.
Because of this post I am going to stop following them on Twitter. I suggest you do the same.
The reality is that TechCrunch is a piece of SH__ site now. You can get much more relevant information on other blogs. Did you see the site this week? I thought I was on Apple.com
Great - Great article!
PodcastSteve
· 1 year ago
I don't know if I will be able to sleep tonight after seeing that photo of Shel and Scoble.
Jim Kukral TheBizWebCoach
· 1 year ago
Yeah, I thought about not using it Steve, but there it was in the #3 google images result for Scoble. I figured it was fair game?
PodcastSteve
· 1 year ago
Absolutely fair game, and very funny. I had the opportunity to get to know Shel at the SNCR New Communications Forum in California in April. He and I are both Senior Fellows of SNCR, so it was nice to meet in a peer setting. He's quirky, snarky, and very funny. Don't know Scoble, but he's made a very successful brand of himself.
JoeDuck
· 1 year ago
Enjoyed the sentiment of the post, but methinks that picture crosses the line of the news that's fit to print..
I hope you are right that the A list is fading away, though I think that's too optimistic. Link patterns really favor the initial bloggers, and they like to stick together. That said I am a big fan of Scoble and think he has done a lot to bring new people into the mix thanks to the way he links out and produces such a huge volume of content and does not use the strategic, commercially driven linking we find at most of the other top blogs.
Billy_Dennis
· 1 year ago
The growth in the Bllogosphere is toward the local, or hyperlocal, if you prefer. There will always be an A-List, because quality rises, but the names on that list will vary from city to city.
sabat
· 1 year ago
I never thought of those guys as A-list anyway, and barely paid any attention.
John
· 1 year ago
will enjoy seeing TC slowly wilt on the vine and die
it really was just one dude's blog anyways
funny how there isn't much follow up on FF, who's afraid of big Mike Woooooooooooooo perhaps an over investment in TC has happened over the last little while
i'm calling this TC50 the last one
that's not to say that Mike and JC aren't smart dude's, they are thought leaders, but they're not sergey and larry
GeekMommy
· 1 year ago
I don't know that there ever has been an "A-List" - because if there were, we could all go access one site and pull them up. There will always be people whose voices we listen too - and always be those whose voices are more popular at any given moment than others. Internet "A-Listers" are not unlike Football stars - any given season, there are some who are breaking all the records and getting all the headlines. But you've mentioned some names that I think more relate to "Hall of Famers" - because whether or not they are setting the record this season, their names will be remembered and written about for years to come.
The metaphor really works for me, because there are always hot new quarterbacks or runningbacks or receivers - but they may not live up to the hype, or they may not have had any hype, but have come from a walk-on at training camp to being MVP at the SuperBowl on any given year. Still, it takes time to see whether or not someone will have the kind of game that makes you remember them past this season.
The "A-list" you mentioned were more like the Joe Namaths and Jerry Rices and Mean Joe Greens of the blogosphere. We'll have new "A-listers" but whether or not they'll be Hall-of-Famers remains to be seen.,
Paul
· 1 year ago
The a-list died because they became arrogant, obnoxious and gay
Jim Kukral TheBizWebCoach
· 1 year ago
LOL. How prophetic!
Parakeet
· 1 year ago
A-list or not, I find TechCrunch interesting and even valuable sometimes. Scoble -- iditotic, self-agrandizing windbag. Calcanis, never bothered reading. Winer, read once or twice and found nothing interesting (he seemed pissed off in both the visits I made in fact). I'm not interested in celebrity in the slightest. Provide useful and interesting content that is original and not just repeating what others say (a la Scoble) and I'll read.
mack collier
· 1 year ago
Somewhere along the way, many of the (self) annointed A-Listers forgot that it's social media, and started using these wonderful tools as BROADCAST media. They stopped promoting smart ideas, and started promoting themselves.
And that just ain't too interesting...
Jim Kukral TheBizWebCoach
· 1 year ago
Great points Mack.
Schwegler
· 1 year ago
Meh, there are far more people willing to lap up any content created by Kevin Rose than those living in the social media world. There's still an A-List (for now). I don't even see it as wounded.
In the future, I think I will see a lot of independent and niche-driven "Mini-A-Lists" if you will... but looking to a small group of people that end up as celebrities will never go away. It's the way of the world.
sbullo
· 1 year ago
There's an a-list? Wow, ok so what happened to reading and following those who happen to have the background, experience and perhaps a little bit of difference to them that your attention is grabbed regardless of whether or not they are well-known or well-loved by all around them? It's high school all over again.
templestark
· 1 year ago
No freakin comments? Well, I for one enjoyed the piece. Right to the point, not a word wasted and no blame attached. I don't know if it's because I just don't care or what but these A-listers have not factored into my life AT ALL. The same as network primetime news - never watched em, never cared.
PS. oh the comments are down there below this field. Nevermind.
templestark
· 1 year ago
PPS After reading the comments, some people are in serious denial. These peopler didn't get to he A-list by being self-appointed. They got the traffic from somewhere. ... I am not in a tech / geek (used in the nicest possible way) industry and simply had no need to follow these people.
steve
· 1 year ago
The a-list died because individuals with minimual journalistic talent and/or experience adopted the blogging medium early. Because it was novel and because a lot of people were out of work due to the dot com bubble bursting, they garnered a following.
Now its five years latter. The professional journalists have adopted the medium, writing quality content on a regular basis is hard, and for most of the audience the novelty has warn off and they are back to work and don't have the time or interest to read sub par content.
templestark
· 1 year ago
It's a little black and white but I like Steve's answer.
Ozegold
· 1 year ago
True,as social media has changed, the present 'A listers' have failed to change with it.
There's probably a natural arrogance that tends to go with being on an A list of any sort, but if those on it don't learn to flow with the tide, they go the way of the dinosaur!
JimBob51
· 1 year ago
I agree - the social network and the ease of the tools gives everyone the opportunity to make their point "pimp" their blog and have their say. The mere fact that I came to this via a "re Plurk" makes the point entirely. Welcome to the new age - but please learn the etiquette. That is the message - despite what we think there are rules and if broken like any form of communication you will be excluded.
Brian Clark
· 1 year ago
Great post Jim. I think the one point you don't address is that tech used to = blogging. Now it doesn't (not even close), but the tech guys don't realize that most people could care less about geekery... blogging is not about technology, it's about people. The more "normal" the blogging demographic looks, the less relevant the nerd herd.
Jim Kukral TheBizWebCoach
· 1 year ago
Yeah, great point Brian. Tech used to "be" blogging mainstream, you're right.
Chetan
· 1 year ago
Good post there.. This is what i agree with entirely -
The a-list died because we’re tired of them and their incessant drama and posturing for attention. We all just decided enough was enough and called bullshit. It was bound to happen.
Jon Kepler
· 1 year ago
What about the concept of the A-list now being supported by the media? Mike Arrington remains large because he jumps on TV every so often. Maybe the A-list isn't as strongly defined as it used to be, but I still think getting on CNBC is a milestone that separates you from those who haven't been on.
paulmccord
· 1 year ago
Man you did a very good job of putting it in perspective. Paul
Sonny Gill
· 1 year ago
Great post and so true. The numbers game is getting kinda weak - time to put up or move aside.
And btw - that picture is going to scar me for the rest of my life.
amirulcyber
· 1 year ago
Thank for such a wonderful idea.really thanks.
DomesticMouse
· 1 year ago
Stupid question of the day. You are claiming the A-list is dead because of twitter, friendfeed and co, yet all the stats I see on twitter usage show power laws. Which to me imply the continued existence of an A-list.
Whether the a-list still includes calcanis and scoble I have no idea. In fact, I unfollowed scoble because he made lots of twitter noise that i couldn't be bothered keeping up with. His breathless excitement was off putting.
Sheamus
· 1 year ago
Until a single so-called A-lister becomes anything more than a Z-lister in the real world - I mean, really, as others have said, even within the Internet itself most of these people are complete unknowns to the majority of everyday folk - I'm not sure anything of this really matters, does it? I can't think of a single blogger who is famous outside of the blogosphere. Even Kevin Rose is a complete nobody to the non-Digg user. David Spade owns him. Heck, Freddie Prinze Jr owns him.
Relatively, we're talking 'A-list' inside a very small bowl.
All Comments
Still: I don't think they will "die" - they'll just lose some influence and "awe-ness." If I run into Scoble now, I don't need to be a fan boy, I can just talk to him blogger-to-blogger.
I think Scoble (above) also knows that the A-list isn't going to die. Situations and circumstances just don't disappear overnight. So - unless everyone goes Calacanis on us, tomorrow's techmeme will still be dominated by a few and I'll still feel "privileged" when I occasionally get on.
I think anything that will help the blogosphere mature is a good thing. We still need to grow up and into our own clothing, so to speak.
But I also don't think the A-listers are going to "die." They will always be around - and I think Scoble knows this. Circumstances don't change overnight - so unless they all go Calacanis on us, I expect there will always be A-listers.
That said - they might be less important than A-listers are today. And that's good. Next time I run into scoble I can speak to him blogger-to-blogger instead of blogger-to-fanboy.
Not sure I completely agree; although there is definitely a leveling in the influence sphere thanks to the Internet. More so, it seems to follow a very Hollywood-esqe cycle. There's just a new generation of A-listers/Digirati whatever you want to call them.
You've got the democratization of tools and technology. It's not so exotic to put up videos and podcasts anymore.
And the companies releasing the latest Web 2.0 vapor service stopped making these guys the gate keepers. The invites started going to the unwashed masses, too.
Not to mention that the "a-list" shifted from being cutting edge to tacky and entitled. A smarmy bunch with multiple devices on their belts and inside jokes.
In the end, they were the last to realize the punchline, for it was them.
To me, the a-list is all about aggregation and sorting. People like Steve Rubel or Louis Gray or Wayne Sutton are "a-listers" for me b/c of the info sorting they do. However, they don't play the drama games, so they're not San Fran style a-listers. Like you said, that notion is becoming very subjective.
Regardless, my wife will always look at me like a loser when I try to fill her in on the latest exploits of Puppet Shel b/c this stuff just doesn't matter outside our little bubble.
As Hugh McLeod (is he an a-lister?) drew, "Change the world or go home."
Sam
On the other hand, Scoble has managed to hijack the the discussion of this post on FriendFeed. Someone is obviously paying attention to him.
Like everything, the..., well downward is the only word coming to mind, distribution on social networks follows a well worn path that others have faced with the increased penetration and use of that cliché, the Net. That this has happened to the a-list was inevitable.
I think this also happened because these folks were not doing anything to adopt to the changes around them--their relevance was lost to the passage of time and technology. They did not adapt but instead used the time they had, not to grow, but to indulge in, especially in Arrington's case, an themselves and who they had become.
Other forms of distribution have made access to information easier, but I still think people want a home base... the question is really where that home base will land.
Great post and great opinions... thanks for sharing.
Thanks for this great post, just stumbled it :-)
Look at Lewis Grey (just an example, I don't know him but his writing is ok.) Who is he and why should we care? Just because someone with a lot of followers says he is worth a read doesn't mean he's worth our time. The masses blindly follow because they are told to. Take very little reputation to sway peoples attention. Interesting to see how this will all shake out over time and we get past the ongoing echo chamber effect.
Some bloggers will always post 10x a day, the usefulness of this schedule will become less important to most readers. Think NYT op-ed page.
People love the quickness of blogs, but I would does that help them do you job better or become more efficient or make more money? Not for the majority of readers.
Maybe I'm too focused on the post-anytime nature of blogs today, but still, I'd rather read and write longer though pieces than 150 words several times a day. Still, I think today's A-listers are brealy breaking the surface. Just wait until blog translation services start to emerge and China is reading you.
A-Lister's drinking fountains; non-A-lister's drinking fountains. It's 1950's America redux.
Good riddance to the "A-List".
http://getreal.corante.com/archives/2005/06/01/thought_leadership_and_the_twoordersofmagnitude_overload_conjecture.php
Scoble is a good example. He has his 15 minutes of fame, and then some. But - and I don't mean to be at all disrespectful - Scoble's biggest advantage a few years ago was he worked for Microsoft and had extraordinary latitude in what he write about. Then, the novelty wore off so did Scoble's act.
Meanwhile, other interesting voices came on the scene that while they may not have had the same access as Scoble, they brought something different to the table.
It may not be that the A-list is dying as much as it's being supplanted or infiltrated by new people.
Mark
Being considered A-List puts you in a position to get things others can not. We are deeply aware of this (especially if we don't have access to things that we want access to). And that brings up envy and greed, and a whole pandorian box of stuff to face.
This is why grassroots movements are so powerful and why the online world scares old media so much...they can't keep their position's entrenched anymore. Change this fast is something their entire world can't cope with, and they are quite aware that they are becoming rapidly obsolete.
There will always be an A-List. We will simply replace Scoble and Calacanis with Louis Gray and Corvida. Honestly. It's like none of us ever suffered through sociology 101.
-Craig
They really think they are the "A Team". They are the nothing team.
Because of this post I am going to stop following them on Twitter. I suggest you do the same.
The reality is that TechCrunch is a piece of SH__ site now. You can get much more relevant information on other blogs. Did you see the site this week? I thought I was on Apple.com
Great - Great article!
I hope you are right that the A list is fading away, though I think that's too optimistic. Link patterns really favor the initial bloggers, and they like to stick together. That said I am a big fan of Scoble and think he has done a lot to bring new people into the mix thanks to the way he links out and produces such a huge volume of content and does not use the strategic, commercially driven linking we find at most of the other top blogs.
it really was just one dude's blog anyways
funny how there isn't much follow up on FF, who's afraid of big Mike Woooooooooooooo
perhaps an over investment in TC has happened over the last little while
i'm calling this TC50 the last one
that's not to say that Mike and JC aren't smart dude's, they are thought leaders, but they're not sergey and larry
There will always be people whose voices we listen too - and always be those whose voices are more popular at any given moment than others.
Internet "A-Listers" are not unlike Football stars - any given season, there are some who are breaking all the records and getting all the headlines.
But you've mentioned some names that I think more relate to "Hall of Famers" - because whether or not they are setting the record this season, their names will be remembered and written about for years to come.
The metaphor really works for me, because there are always hot new quarterbacks or runningbacks or receivers - but they may not live up to the hype, or they may not have had any hype, but have come from a walk-on at training camp to being MVP at the SuperBowl on any given year. Still, it takes time to see whether or not someone will have the kind of game that makes you remember them past this season.
The "A-list" you mentioned were more like the Joe Namaths and Jerry Rices and Mean Joe Greens of the blogosphere. We'll have new "A-listers" but whether or not they'll be Hall-of-Famers remains to be seen.,
And that just ain't too interesting...
In the future, I think I will see a lot of independent and niche-driven "Mini-A-Lists" if you will... but looking to a small group of people that end up as celebrities will never go away. It's the way of the world.
PS. oh the comments are down there below this field. Nevermind.
Now its five years latter. The professional journalists have adopted the medium, writing quality content on a regular basis is hard, and for most of the audience the novelty has warn off and they are back to work and don't have the time or interest to read sub par content.
There's probably a natural arrogance that tends to go with being on an A list of any sort, but if those on it don't learn to flow with the tide, they go the way of the dinosaur!
This is what i agree with entirely -
The a-list died because we’re tired of them and their incessant drama and posturing for attention. We all just decided enough was enough and called bullshit. It was bound to happen.
Paul
And btw - that picture is going to scar me for the rest of my life.
Whether the a-list still includes calcanis and scoble I have no idea. In fact, I unfollowed scoble because he made lots of twitter noise that i couldn't be bothered keeping up with. His breathless excitement was off putting.
Relatively, we're talking 'A-list' inside a very small bowl.