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Why Didn’t Pepcom Recognize Leo Laporte?

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Right now, the Internet is buzzing with CES news as bloggers check out the latest consumer technology offerings. Last night, though, there was a break in the tweets about tech as people expressed outrage over popular podcaster, radio show host, and blogger Leo Laporte was denied access to a pre-CES press event called The Digital Experience put on by PR company Pepcom. Apparently, they didn’t know who he was. Leo’s pretty much a go-to guy in the tech field, so as you can guess, most of his fans were baffled.

Sad panda picture Leo posted on his blog after being denied access to The Digital Experience at CES 2012.

In a quick audio clip, Leo says that he was denied access because they didn’t have credentials – proof that he qualifies as press in the tech field. I don’t know if that was a mistake on Leo’s end by not sending in paperwork or a mistake on Pepcom’s end by misplacing the paperwork. My attempts to contact Pepcom have gone unanswered.

Because Pepcom is being tight-lipped about what happened at The Digital Experience door, I’ll be clear about one thing: I don’t think an a-lister in any industry has the right to demand, “DON’T YOU KNOW WHO I AM?!?!” when they haven’t followed the registration process for an event. It’s rude, and more importantly, event staffers need the numbers ahead of time to make sure there’s enough food and they’re following fire code laws. That said, I really doubt that this is what happened. This isn’t Leo’s first time at a major event, and he’s not known for being a diva. I think this was simply a case of crossed wires (appropriate for a tech event, right?). I think there was a mix-up with the registration and Leo was mistakenly left off the list.

No matter who was to blame, though, what really matters is that Pepcom staffers – those at the door representing the company – should have without question allowed him access.

See, if you’re a business owner, especially a PR agency, you’re responsible for knowing who the content creators are in your industry. Access for Leo would have meant a ton of additional press for their event, and for all of the companies at their event. Word on the street is that the companies involved paid $15,000 to have a booth at The Digital Experience, and when you’re shelling out that kind of dough, you want access to the best media personalities and analysts in the industry. The fact that Leo instead went somewhere else that evening was a huge blow to those companies.

It can be difficult to know everyone in your industry, especially when you’re new. I’ll never forget the look of shock and horror on a friend’s face when I asked, “Who is Chris Brogan?” several years ago. As a relatively new blogger, I legitimately didn’t know. So I don’t really blame the people working the door for not knowing.

The first person I blame is the person who put together the list. If the people working the door were newbies, they should have had a group of people under the header, “These people didn’t complete the registration process correctly, but they need to be allowed access anyway because they’re a-listers and we want them at our event.” Okay, maybe the header needs a little work, but you get the idea.

At the very least, there should have been protocol – someone at Pepcom who well acquainted with people in the tech industry should have been on call to give approval (or not) if someone arrive who wasn’t on the list. Especially when they arrived with a camera crew who was on the list. It was obviously a mistake.

The second person (or team of people) I blame is whoever was running Pepcom’s social media accounts.

It’s bad enough that this was exploding on Twitter and Pepcom didn’t respond. After Leo’s initial tweet, tons of his fans tweeted about it. When looking to see if Pepcom responded…I couldn’t even find a valid Twitter account for them. Their site says @PepcomEvents, but there’s no profile under that name, and @Pepcom is a egg profile with no tweets. Maybe I’m missing something? How are you a PR events company without a Twitter account?

Update: I’ve been told be a few people that @PepcomEvents was their Twitter handle, but when they started getting all sorts of negative attention over the Leo incident, they changed it so people couldn’t find them and eventually just completely disappeared. I can’t confirm this because, once again, Pepcom ignored my emails and phone call…but…WOW. There are no other words. Just wow.

What they do definitely have is a Facebook page…which says nothing about the Leo Laporte incident. in fact, they very quickly deleted every post mentioning it as it was uploaded to their page. You can see now that their wall is squeaky clean with no negative posts at all.

But this is the Internet. Once something is posted, it doesn’t just disappear. Facebook user Adam J. Kragt was smart enough to start taking screenshots as posts were being deleted. Pepcom took that post off their wall of course, but you can still see the images here.

People were mad. In his audio clip, Leo sounded more disappointed than angry, but in any case, this was a huge Pepcom mistake, and they didn’t do anything to correct it. Social media gives us the awesome ability to screw up in public…but it also gives us the chance to easily and publicly apologize and make things right. As soon as he was denied access, Pepcom should have reached out to him on Twitter or Facebook and corrected the problem. Somebody was obviously monitoring their social media accounts (at least, on Facebook), so why didn’t anyone try to fix the mistake? Why did they instead try to hide it by deleting negative posts?

Will this blow over? Yes. I’m sure an equally big scandal will rock the Internet soon (if it hasn’t already during the writing of this post). People will be saying, “Pepcom who?”

But what really matters to Pepcom, to any business, is the button line – the money. And if I was a company involved with their event or thinking about getting involved with it, I wouldn’t be so quick to jump on board next year. I would be more inclined to spend my sponsorship budget on other events where major players in the industry aren’t turned away at the door. Leo has said that he won’t be going back to their events and I’d be worried, as a sponsor, that others would follow in his footsteps. So while the general public will probably easily forget, the people who write the checks won’t…and when they search for press about The Digital Experience, this post is what they’ll find.

** Update by Rick**

When I read Alli’s post, I pretty much agreed with her entire Post. One thing that struck me is that Leo’s TWiT is one of the most high profile press entities at CES. He has one of only two networks I am aware of that have a booth at the front of the show. The other is CNET.

I had our Deb go take a couple photos of Leo’s booth. Here is the TWiT booth at the very front of the South Hall at CES.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Pretty hard for any attendee at CES including the PR flacks to miss.

The World Loses Steve Jobs: What Happens Now?

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Steve Jobs passed away peacefully, surrounded by his loved ones, on October 5, 2011. Although no official cause of death has been reported, Jobs had suffered from pancreatic cancer in the past and underwent a liver transplant in 2009. He stepped down from his role as Apple’s CEO in August due to his health problems, and when the news of his death hit the Internet, Apple posted a picture of him on their homepage (see above) alone with this simple message:

“Apple has lost a visionary and creative genius, and the world has lost an amazing human being. Those of us who have been fortunate enough to know and work with Steve have lost a dear friend and an inspiring mentor. Steve leaves behind a company that only he could have built, and his spirit will forever be the foundation of Apple.”

Jobs leaves behind his wife Laurene, the person he called the love of his life, along with four children.

But you know all this already.

I found out about Jobs’ death on Twitter, and for at least ten minutes, I don’t think I saw a single tweet that was about any other topic. His death took over the trending topics and, I’m guessing, is the reason why the fail whale came out to play for the first time in a long time. I saw messages of mourning from every corner of the world. One of my favorites (and I apologize that I can no longer find who originally tweeting this was “Stevie you’ll always be the apple of our i” and another, which I thought was beautifully perfect simply said “iSad.”

You don’t need another blog post to tell you that we’ve lost one of the greatest minds in the world, whether you are an Apple fan or not. Despite that fact, you’re here reading this, so I would like to pose a question to you instead: What happens now?

The world goes on. Despite the death of someone so world-changing, the earth won’t stop rotating. Even in our tech microcosm, life will continue. What happens now is that great people will go on to build upon the foundations that Jobs has given us to create things that even he couldn’t have imagined. Hundreds of years from now, new technology will be possible because of what Jobs did in his lifetime. What happens now is that we all are challenged to fill the gap, that hole created in the world when he passed away.

No one can replace the incredible Steve Jobs, but if we all try just a little bit harder to be amazing at what we’re doing in life, whether that’s blogging or social media or community management or raising llamas or driving race cars or something else…if we all try just a little bit harder, I think we’ll honor his memory well.

In closing, I’d like to leave you with a video of Jobs’ 2005 Commencement Speech to the students at Stanford. He was standing before that class to deliver his speech, but I feel as though maybe he was actually speaking to all of us.

[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UF8uR6Z6KLc[/youtube]

Another TechCrunch Writer Leaves, But on Good Terms

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TechCrunch writer MG Siegler announced early yesterday morning he’s leaving the tech blog as a full time writer. The timing may seem odd given the latest TechCrunch drama, but Siegler insists this latest move has been a long time in the making.

In a blog post titled “On the Next Venture”, Siegler says that yes, he is becoming a VC.

Enough with burying the lede: yes, I’m becoming a VC. I couldn’t be happier to announce that I’m joining CrunchFund as a general partner. It’s my honor to join Mike and Pat in that role. And I thank them for the opportunity.

Erick Schonfeld also announced Siegler’s leaving on the TechCrunch blog. He says that although Sielger is leaving TechCrunch as a full time writer, he will still write for them as an outside columnist, but on one very specific topic: Apple.

“While MG will only be working full time as a writer at TechCrunch for another month, I am pleased to announce that he will continue to write for us after that on a regular basis as an outside columnist. The scope of what he will write about will be very narrow: Apple. He won’t write about startups or venture capital. And just like he has always done, he will continue to follow our editorial standards, which require strict disclosures for any kind of conflict whatsoever—financial, business, or personal.”

Of course the web is covering this story with headlines such as “The Tech Blogger Bubble is Here” and “Tech blog writers hit the big time“. Some are skeptical about the announcement, while others are focusing on why hiring tech bloggers seems to be a popular thing to do right now.

What does Siegler have to say about this “tech bubble” and crazy valuations?

For all the talk of “bubbles” and crazy valuations, I think most overlook something very fundamental: technology continues to permeate all of our lives in ways we couldn’t imagine just yesterday. This will only continue to increase over time. Technology startups are at the forefront of this. What we’ve seen up until now is just a taste of what is to come.

We wish MG Siegler (read this if you are dying to know what MG stands for; not that it will answer the question for you) the best of luck in his new venture.

So tell us – what are your thoughts on all of the happenings within TechCrunch and the technology blogging realm as a whole?

Image: Twitter

TechCrunch Editor Michael Arrington Steps Down After Six Years

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Michael Arrington, the editor of the uber-popular tech blog TechCrunch, has announced he is stepping down after six years on the job.

His next step is to head up the $20m private investment fund, CrunchFund, which is backed by AOL (who purchased TechCrunch last year) and several other venture capitalists.

Here’s a brief description of CrunchFund:

CrunchFund is an early stage venture capital firm founded by Michael Arrington and Patrick Gallagher. The fund invests in and works with information technology companies at any stage but is primarily focused on seed and early stage investments.

You can see all of the big name investors here.

Arrington will still have a role as a writer for TechCrunch, but no editorial control. His departure is raising some eyebrows as to the future of TechCrunch under AOL. Rumors of an AOL sale have also been circulating.

The Guardian reports, “More recently, rumors of a sale or plans to go private have swirled around AOL. The content company’s shares have soared 24% since Monday, to $15.19, amid speculation that the company had met bankers Allen & Company. AOL was also rumored to be considering a sale of its dial-up internet business, which accounts for about half of the company’s $1.62bn market capitalization.”

This announcement, the state of TechCrunch and the state of AOL has everyone in the tech blogging world talking.

Here is some clarification as to the relationship between TechCrunch and CrunchFund, written by TechCrunch writer Paul Carr.

How to Get Published on a Premium Tech Blog

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The word “influence” has become one of the most popular buzzwords across the blogosphere and apparently there’s a right way to garner influence, and a wrong way.

For most tech bloggers, influence is about becoming a thought leader on a specific topic in order to reach a business or personal goal. So whether you’re the world’s foremost Android expert, a hardcore coder or a complete gadget nut, the reason to strive for influence is to establish credibility – and you can’t do that alone. Someone already influential needs to vouch for you.

Last March I wrote an article about CDBaby founder Derek Siver’s TED Talk. In the video, Sivers shows how an influencer/leader is nothing without an influential first follower. As far as I can tell, blogger credibility falls along similar lines with the basis of influence coming from:

  • Consistently adding value to readers’ lives; and,
  • Having that value publicly recognized by credible first followers.

PUBLICATIONS CAN BE YOUR FIRST FOLLOWER
When you write for an acclaimed web property, it’s as if the site’s editors are ushering your ideas in with their seal of authority. While they may not agree with everything you say, there’s the recognition that what you say matters to their audience – and in many cases, that audience is extremely powerful.

Why do you think I’m writing for BlogWorld? In addition to putting my name on a page next to industry heavy hitters, I also want to encourage more bloggers to contribute to the pool of good tech resources. Below are a few tips on how to pitch tech editors in the hopes that you’ll consider taking a stab at the tech blogging profession.

PITCHING FOR PUBLICATION: THINGS TO INCLUDE IN YOUR QUERY
Prove Your Abilities: There’s always someone that thinks they can write a better post than the one that’s published in front of them. If you’re that person, then quit flapping your gums and prove it. Think about everything that’s missing from a story, list those points, and fire off an email to the editor establishing your expertise on the subject. If you write a tasteful pitch that focuses on how you can help (rather than criticizing someone else’s work) you’re proving both your subject knowledge as well as your ability to write a persuasive argument.

Prove Your Existing Credibility: If you’ve written past articles, uploaded relevant podcasts, spoken at subject-related events or worked at a well-known and relevant company, then those are all points that speak to your credibility. Other establishing bullets include testimonial from industry luminaries and quotes in established online publications.

Prove Your Reach:While this wasn’t always the case, more blogging sites are interested in bringing in writers that extend their reach to new communities. If you’ve got a huge Digg or Reddit following, you’re active on HackerNews and Wikipedia, or you’ve got more than 10,000 Twitter or YouTube followers, then an outlet might choose you over another less social writer. When you’re considered a leader in an online community, editors realize your posts are more likely to gain traction with those audiences.

Prove Your Integrity: Editors want you to write for them because of your expertise, not because of your business interests. You need to establish how you’re going to add value to readers before you can fulfill your own agenda. Outlets don’t want to read a repurposed press release about your company. They want candid news, reviews or tips. If you can cover one of those three bases, then it’s fine to highlight a company case study. You just need to disclose your financial interests openly.

Now that you know how you’re going to pitch your story, here are a few publications you can pitch to get started.

A number of technology blogs take pitches from guest writers:

Dana Oshiro is the Senior Analyst and Publishing Strategist at NetShelter Technology Media. In her spare time she continues to contribute to ReadWriteWeb’s startup channel as well as her personal site Villagers With Pitchforks. You can follow her on Twitter at @suzyperplexus or email her at dana.oshiro@netshelter.net.

Not Another Tech Blog

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I have a lot of respect for tech bloggers. Their job is tough because the industry is ever expanding and the competition ever growing. The seemingly impossible today becomes tomorrow’s standard. The rapid pace of change makes it difficult to keep up with new information, while providing current and relevant information to readers in a timely manner. Despite these challenges, many great bloggers do it and they do it well. So, if you’re going to start a tech blog, you’d better be ready to work because you’re going to have to stand out to get noticed. It’s not enough that you write well and know a few people who will read your blog. To really create a successful tech blog – and to avoid wasting a bunch of time – you need to become focused, committed, and ready to work. You’re up against a lot of blogging greatness but if you follow some of this advice, you just may become one of the greats yourself.

First Things First
Regardless of the subject of your blog you really need to focus on a particular niche to be successful. I know, I know – we’ve all heard the term niche ad nauseam and I went there. That being said, the technology field is far too expansive for any single mortal to provide insightful and relevant content on all of its workings. As such, focus on a particular subject to provide better and more relevant content to your readers vs. trying to be all things to everyone. Your readers will appreciate it and you’ll have fewer sleepless nights as a result.

Position Your Blog as an Actual News Source
Blogging today is becoming more and more about the here and the now. We are increasingly living in a real-time world and as such, your blog should be as close to real-time as you can make it. Blogging is arguably becoming the de facto publishing standard in our society today. While many blogs are still being used to express the personal opinions and rants of the owner to the world at large, I feel that the most successful blogs of tomorrow will more closely resemble successful news agencies of today. We’re already seeing a growing trend of citizens and bloggers, rather than journalists, breaking news around the world. As a blogger keyed into your particular niche, why not break the news yourself? You can do this if you position your blog correctly.

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