connecting*the*dots

I was introduced to David Kline as a public figure, per chance, by catching him the other day on The O’Reilly Factor. While I almost exclusively review O’Reilly segments by visiting Media Matters (O’Reilly’s favorite site, mind you), I tuned into this particular segment about slanderous websites. I admit it; I wanted to see O’Reilly spinning reality within a realm I know a thing or two about.

As the "balanced guest from the left" Klein was immediately blown away by the conversation topic. O’Reilly’s patented tactical approach to force feeding his guest the Billy Boy perspective overwhelmed Kline, as he was completely uninformed regarding the blogosphere. He actually admitted, on-air, to have never heard of Media Matters (the site that O’Reilly focused his vengeance upon for the entire segment).

Media Matters is one of the most popular media watchdog/misinformation sites on the web, so much so that many well-known political bloggers use them as a source for their posts. Intrigued by such a naive understanding of the media ecosystem, I proceeded to browse over to Kline’s blog and become involved in a few of his posts. The first is basically an open apology to the left and to bloggers for how he allowed himself to be used and abused by O’Reilly. Hundreds of people posted comments, with the majority slamming him for his lack of preparation when appearing on such an obvious ambush show.

My reaction? As uniformed as he seemed to be, I shrugged it off as a poor showing and gave the guy a break. Today, my perspective has changed. Go to his site—blogrevolt.com—and scroll down to the lower right side of the page. His site is being managed by Christian Sarkar, a marketing guy that has coined his own website marketing strategy called, "Double Loop Marketing."

Let me get this straight.

1. A guy with practically zero hours put in as a blogger (his archives go back two months at the time of this post) writes, authoritatively, about the future of blogging—"Blog! How The Newest Media Revolution Is Changing Politics,
   Business and Culture"
2. He has someone managing his site? A marketing guy? Apparently, creating a blog template is too much for this "blogger" so he hires a marketing guy to build his blog, along with providing a strategy to pitch his book on the future of blogs to a specific demographic, which includes bloggers that come to his blo… I mean… site?
3. He somehow is booked to appear on The O’Reilly Factor, completely unable to defend the position of free speech and media accountability via the means of blogging.

No wonder Billy Boy’s staff picked this guy; he was ripe to be "found." I wonder what part of the "Double Loop" we were experiencing during the O’Reilly segment, let alone the part this post plays in it’s cycle of awareness and sales. Bill O’Reilly didn’t "stoop" to anything…

I’m sorry, but how can you not call this spade a spade.