I shouldn’t do it. I know I shouldn’t do it. But I can’t seem to resist, not after seeing the claims that many “smart people” were urging Odysseus to “kick Inman’s ass.”
Inman has long been a whipping boy for Greg for reasons that never had been made clear. There was the discussion of Inman’s decision to have Glenn Kelman of Redfin as a keynote speaker … wait … let’s go to the tape.
To the extent that Glenn Kelman is a weblogger at all, he is a corporate weblogger. He doesn’t know anything about real estate weblogging, as he made plain in his sweet, charming, engaging keynote address at last summer’s Blogger’s Connect.
… Brad Inman seems to carefully identify and recruit coveted audiences so he can spit on them, but, in this case, I think the man simply doesn’t know what he doesn’t know.
Come to the Blogger’s Connect keynote address and learn how to… what?
Truly stoopid…
So stoopid, in fact, that Glenn’s on the bill for the keynote address for the Bloodhound Unchained event in less than two weeks. What his topic will be, I have no idea … the site still is promoting the now non-occurring debate between Glenn and Russell Shaw.
(It must take a lot of time to update a blog page. But the PayPal links still work.)
Say what you will about Brad Inman’s seeming dislike for real estate agents, or at least the commissions some of us earn, but he understands the basics of putting together an event. You know, little details like an actual schedule – for the main conference and the Bloggers’ Connect event alike.
Brief aside: It should be able to kick Blogger Connect’s ass … I mean do any of the following folks really know anything at all about real estate blogging?
- Kris Berg
- Mike Simonsen
- Ben Martin
- Jeff Corbett
- AG’s own Benn Rosales
- Jay Thompson
- Linda Davis
- Laurie Manny (hope she does since she’s also at BHBU)
- Mary Pop-Handy
- Teresa Boardman
- Joel Burslem
- Pat Kitano
- The ever-present David G. from Zillow
- Rudy Bachraty
- Joseph Ferrara
- Todd Carpenter
- Ardell Della Loggia
- Jeff Turner
- Jim Cronin
- Dustin Luther
- Nicole Nicolay
- Daniel Rothamel
I didn’t think so either. (My apologies for not including links to all but it’s damn late.)
Try as I might, I can’t seem to find a comprehensive list of what exactly is being taught at BHBU … there’s one post with oblique references to the reportedly intense curricula, there are posts about prices going up for the conference and the DVD boxed set (maybe even with directors’ commentary and deleted scenes), but nothing on the main page where people are being pimped to sign up except for events that are not taking place.
Odd? Perhaps. But probably also par for the course. Chutzpah always has been part of the show, even though that self-proclaimed arrogance – the certitude of being right even when it’s not necessarily the case – has led to writers who helped build BHBU into what it was leave the kennel for more reasoned pastures.
Realizing the accusation of kicking a dog when he’s down could be applied, I go back to one of Greg’s own statements – that vendors are fair game. And in this instance, he is working as a vendor as evidenced by the mountain of self-promotion that has come to dominate BHB over the past several months.
I do give considerable credit to both he and Brian for having the audacity and fortitude to put together such an event. But if you’re going to do it, do it right. Post a schedule. Tell people where the value is in specific terms, not generalities about being feral or a guerilla or whatever the buzzword of the day happens to be.
And be honest in the advertising. Given Greg’s programming abilities, it shouldn’t be too difficult to change the script at the top right of the page to reflect whatever Glenn’s going to be talking about.
Hopefully, it’s a different speech than he gave at Inman Connect last summer. Otherwise, you’d almost have to be stoopid to listen to the same thing again. You know, since “he doesn’t know anything about real estate weblogging” – according to BHBU’s host.
