Good post, John. The challenge is with Edelman and the others, it will be interesting to see if and how they respond.
I found the post offensive, and can think of a few other bloggers who refuse to link to other blogs - and they should know better, since they've positioned themselves as the top PR bloggers.
I would be interested to know if the other large agency PR bloggers link to others, like MWW or B-M or Ketchum. For Shel to just point out Edelman without looking at the others - you know, a balanced piece - is laziness. Why just point out Richard's lack of links?
Hmm, I'll go post the same thing over there, I think.
Jeremy:
It may be unfair to point a finger at Richard Edelman alone, but the question remains the same ... can big companies (in any industry, really) show they are willing to participate in conversations by linking to others?
Yes, I believe so. But, I'm an optimist. 
But, that's only for industries where the people are comfortable with mentioning competitors. I believe that Richard is such a person - come on, it is the largest independent, and they've done quite well.
But, I don't know. I'm not privy to internal stuff there, but I thought the post was unfair.
On the whole linking thing, I think this is a childish argument. I really don't care if Edelman links to one of my posts, it'll send a huge surge of traffic my way and lend to my credibility, but if I was a reader of my site and his do I really want to be reading the same news twice?
We seemed to have a surge of complaints a while back about people simply linking to other people's posts and not having anything relevant to say for themselves, but now we're complaining about someone who is constantly penning new content!?
Piaras:
I don't agree that it's childish ... it's really a question that goes to the heart of blogging as an interactive, conversational tool.
I can build off of your posts -- and credit you -- and you can do the same with mine. Everyone benefits because there's depth and insight gained.
To me, it's not so much about linking for "links sake" as it is about building on the topic of the day or "giving away authority" by using other PR pros as supporting -- or contradicting -- evidence.
Yes, but that's building off other people's posts which I have absolutely no problem with and do regularly. However the majority of linking that goes on doesn't build upon the original post, it either rehashes it or is a plain old link.
By childish I just think it's funny that we all seem to be arguing over some unwritten code and quoting manifestos when a lot of people don't even know what a blog is.
... By childish I just think it's funny that we all seem to be arguing over some unwritten code and quoting manifestos when a lot of people don't even know what a blog is.
Yes, Piaras ... good point. Thanks for visiting and commenting. I always appreciate your point of view.
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