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Sphinn Home » SEM
My Plea to SE Conferences: Turn Calacanis Away
SEM News Source: http://www.ericlander.com
Published: Apr 23, 2008 - 11:55 am
Story Found By: EricLander 1387 Days ago
Category: SEM
As an industry, let’s just put ourselves in a position to stop dealing with this type of juvenile behavior. How you ask? With one simple step. Get him off of the conference keynotes. This blog post shouldn’t even need to be written, because like Calacanis — it’s irrelevant to the search industry.
 Comments12 Comments  

Comments

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from SlightlyShadySEO 1387 Days ago #
Votes: 2

Can I get an amen!

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from stuntdubl 1387 Days ago #
Votes: 0

Real easy to get rid of the guy.  Stop listening to him - and stop talking about him.  Until then, he sells seats, gets attention, and gets to put on the Jason show.

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from randfish 1387 Days ago #
Votes: 1

Despite the fact that he was very disrespectful, this is a silly proposition. I’d be happy to attend conferences where he’s speaking, I’ll just skip his session. Others might find value there, and there’s no reason to block them from getting it.

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from EricLander 1387 Days ago #
Votes: 0

Rand, I agree with you.  I’d go to conferences where JC was speaking, and maybe even attend his panels.  I’m just tired of the keynotes by Calacanis because they create this media frenzy afterwards.Jason is an incredibly talented marketer.  I’ll give him that, and would love to gain a fraction of his skillset in that department.  I just don’t want to see SE conferences become his forum to rant and rave while the paying public leaves feeling offended.

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from dannysullivan 1387 Days ago #
Votes: 2

I’ll cross post:http://sphinn.com/story/42262http://sphinn.com/story/42285People tend to think that Jason speaks at all the same conferences on all the same things -- and they fixate on his anti-SEO comments the most. I’ll recap the shows I’ve had him speak at and why.SES Chicago 2006: When I booked Jason, he was heading Netscape, which had grabbed some attention as a Digg rival. Plus, he’s been an interesting character with a long history on the web overall. I think this was the first SEO show he did on his own (I think he was on an AdSense panel at a previous SES, along with others -- and since he ran a major site earning off of AdSense, good sense -- no pun -- for him to be there). At SES Chicago, we did get into his SEO attitude which was a hot button and remains, in my view, a product of his misconception (either intentional or accidental) that SEO = gaming.SMX Social Media 2008: Jason heads Mahalo, a major human-powered search engine doing interesting things. There’s a social aspect to it, and for search marketers wnating to understand how social and search might intersect, he’s a front line guy with important things to say and learn from. As was the same for Jimmy Wales on that panel, as too for Steven Marder from Eurekster. The bulk of that panel was about social and search, not "oh, SEOs suck."Those are shows I’m responsible for, and I totally feel Jason being involved added value. Jason also spoke at SES Local 2008 and SES NY 2008. I’m not up on what he covered in those sessions and how they differed from the roles he was doing as part of the shows I was responsible for. I was no longer programming SES at those times.As for yesterday, when Jason talked again about SEO and issues with it, I then countered to him saying that SEO does not equal gaming -- that SEO equals understanding how search engines gather information and taking steps to make your content visible with it. And for Mahalo, that means engaging in a dialog with the editors, suggesting links and so on. And Jason agreed that SEO as defined like that is totally accceptable and should be encouraged. As did Jimmy Wales.Sadly, Lisa Barone who was live blogging all this got very ill and missed this important discussion. And Rand, who defends the right for others to hear what Jason says would have heard it too if he hadn’t walked out in apparent disgust. By walking out, he also missed hearing other things about how social might change search.You don’t have to like people or agree with them. Matt Cutts is fairly well loved but not all SEOs like him or agree with his views on SEO or how say, links should be policed. So do you ban Matt from speaking? Do you plug your ears and refuse to hear what he says? Either of those lead to less knowledge, not more.

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from SimonHeseltine 1387 Days ago #
Votes: 0

@DannyHis quote out of SES Local was that "Local is a sh@tty business", he did say however that there were some SEOs he respected, such as Bruce Clay, and that he himself was an SEO because he’d got his dog walker well rankedSES-NYC - I missed that session, but from what I was told, that was his "I’m going to stop being dismissive of the SEO community" presentation.  People that I talked to said that it came off rather well.

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from EricLander 1387 Days ago #
Votes: 0

So, if i publicy say that I wish I were there to HEAR JC’s keynotes -- would it render all that I’ve said useless?Even with that risk aired, I’ll certainly acknowledge that I didn’t hear anything from Jason directly yesterday.  If that makes me a bad person, I’m okay with that.  I realize that my haste in making an assumption makes me look like an arse.

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from johnandrews 1387 Days ago #
Votes: 2

I’m with Rand on this one as I posted here. http://sphinn.com/story/42139#c40275But I wish Sphinners wouldn’t put his name in the post titles... it’s counter productive, feeds his ego, and makes you look like you’re trading on his name.

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from janecopland 1386 Days ago #
Votes: 0

I was there, front row, and I must say that for quite a good portion of the session, Jason was good. I was totally on the bus with him, so to speak, until the comment which was (paraphrased after four hours’ sleep in two days), "The SEO industry is going to die. You’re wasting your time." (Jason, sorry if that’s not what you really said & see above lame disclaimer).There were two or three things he said that were either unfortunately worded or deliberately baity. No one’s really paying much attention to anything else he said, but the grand total of about 100 words have made him the story of SMX Social Media. Calacanis wins.I wouldn’t want anyone as good at attracting attention turned away from the search marketing world. Look at it from an objective perspective: the man knows how to get noticed, which is what the rest of us are trying to do for clients and / or our own companies.

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from EricLander 1386 Days ago #
Votes: 1

Strong commentary Jane, and I concede that he’s a tremendous marketer, good for generating buzz, etc..  I still fail to see how his consitent keynote appearances are truly helping the industry though. 

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from Jill 1386 Days ago #
Votes: 0

You guys crack me up.Just change when Jason says "SEOs" to "SEO Spammers" and he’s right on the money. Just because he hasn’t figured out that there’s good SEO and bad SEO doesn’t mean the guy should be banned from speaking.  If you don’t like him, don’t listen to him!

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from randfish 942 Days ago #
Votes: 0

This is ridiculous. Left a comment in the thread, as my comment here was too long.

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