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His anonymity and the truth of his statement have absolutely no correlation, not sure why you even think there would be a correlation. You have a tendency of m

His anonymity and the truth of his statement have absolutely no correlation, not sure why you even think there would be a correlation. You have a tendency of making people regret they ever get in to it with you so its not suprising a lot of people would prefer anonymity when getting sucked in to these little flame fests, lest they star in your next blog post. Marissa Mayer for example made the mistake of meeting with you and you apparently made her angry or frustrated enough she walked out. Your response, years later, is to write a one sided account of it on your blog to try to make her look bad. It was one sided because you neglected to really describe what you said or how you said it, or accept that you might have been at least partially at fault for making her want to leave. She may have done some calculus and deduced it was a no win for her. She stays in the meeting, listens to you, keeps her mouth shut and just gets angry. Or she gets in an argument with you which would have been even worse. By walking out she probably took the option with the fewest bad consequences. The way I see it you pretty much have two noble roads you can take in life: - You can be abrasive, stick to your guns, and deal with the fact a lot of people aren't going to like you for it. You take this road you need to grow a skin thick enough to deal with it instead of whining and demanding everyone who is mean to you back be blocked. You might not be popular but there is honor in this tack. - You can try to be nicer to people, especially people you dont agree with, and then its OK to expect people to be nicer to you in return. Its really easy to be nice to sycophants who agree with you all the time. That's what you do on your blog and Twitter all the time. It takes character to be nice to people who disagree with you and are willing to stick to their guns. Or you can take the ignoble road you seem to take time after time. You go out of your way to abrasive, insulting and dismissive and slag people who disagree with you. Then when people slag you back, or walk out of the room rather than get in to it with you, or don't invite you to SXSW to speak, you whine about the fact people aren't being nice to you and expect everyone whose not being nice to you to be muzzled and ostracized. Just some constructive criticism, please think about it. You have a lot of wisdom and technical brilliance. You would go much farther if you weren't hacking everyone off all the time. Its OK to hack people off once in a while when they really deserve it, but you do it all the time often for no reason.

davewiner 13y ago
I am nice to people. Esp people who don't start out conversations saying personal and negative things about me. With that kind of beginning I either ignore them or defend myself. Why I think anonymity correlates with cowardice? Because it does. Some things are just not worth arguing about.
- demachina 13y ago
  Exactly, unless people start off being nice, complimenting you, agreeing with you and telling you how great you are you shut them off, instantly. For as long as I've read your blog and twitter feed you simply will not have a conversation with anyone if they start out by disagreeing with you. Your feed swings between wonderfully interesting and insightful and arrogant and galling. On a daily basis I debate whether your insights are worth having to wade through all the angst. So far I keep finding in favor of your wisdom and insight but its always close. If you toned down the arrogant and galling parts you would be a much greater leader in the tech community, more people would listen to you, and you would probably be advancing your goal of an open web far faster than you are which would be a win win for everone. You seem to want to be a leader, but you don't want to adapt to the limitations that come with being a great leader, one that people want and like to follow. You didn't say "anonymity correlates with cowardice". You said anonymity correlates with untruth. Those are too completely different things. Anonymity does correlate with "cowardice" thats why /. has called them anonymous cowards since the dawn of web time. There can be a LOT of truth said under the cloak of anonymity. Do you think Bradley Manning was a "coward" and a liar for using Wikileaks to give him a shroud of anonymity when he was speaking truth to power in his way? When dealing with a personality like yourself anyone who who criticizes you under their real name knows they are going to regret it. You are the one compelling people to speak to you anonymously because you don't accept criticism, you instantly block people rather than engage in dialog and you broadcast your grudges on your blog like you did with Marissa Mayer. You have the luxury of being self employed, so am I. You can say whatever you want under your real name, as long as you are OK with the reputational damage yourself. People who work for other people can't if its going to explode in to a reputation damaging, and employment endangering, flame fest which is what happens to a lot of people who engage with you. Some people operate under different constraints in this world than you and you don't seem to recognize that. Not sure why I'm still trying to engage in a dialog here. Chances are you stopped listing right after your last post. That is most definitely your style.

davewiner 13y ago

I am nice to people. Esp people who don't start out conversations saying personal and negative things about me. With that kind of beginning I either ignore them or defend myself. Why I think anonymity correlates with cowardice? Because it does. Some things are just not worth arguing about.

demachina 13y ago
Exactly, unless people start off being nice, complimenting you, agreeing with you and telling you how great you are you shut them off, instantly. For as long as I've read your blog and twitter feed you simply will not have a conversation with anyone if they start out by disagreeing with you. Your feed swings between wonderfully interesting and insightful and arrogant and galling. On a daily basis I debate whether your insights are worth having to wade through all the angst. So far I keep finding in favor of your wisdom and insight but its always close. If you toned down the arrogant and galling parts you would be a much greater leader in the tech community, more people would listen to you, and you would probably be advancing your goal of an open web far faster than you are which would be a win win for everone. You seem to want to be a leader, but you don't want to adapt to the limitations that come with being a great leader, one that people want and like to follow. You didn't say "anonymity correlates with cowardice". You said anonymity correlates with untruth. Those are too completely different things. Anonymity does correlate with "cowardice" thats why /. has called them anonymous cowards since the dawn of web time. There can be a LOT of truth said under the cloak of anonymity. Do you think Bradley Manning was a "coward" and a liar for using Wikileaks to give him a shroud of anonymity when he was speaking truth to power in his way? When dealing with a personality like yourself anyone who who criticizes you under their real name knows they are going to regret it. You are the one compelling people to speak to you anonymously because you don't accept criticism, you instantly block people rather than engage in dialog and you broadcast your grudges on your blog like you did with Marissa Mayer. You have the luxury of being self employed, so am I. You can say whatever you want under your real name, as long as you are OK with the reputational damage yourself. People who work for other people can't if its going to explode in to a reputation damaging, and employment endangering, flame fest which is what happens to a lot of people who engage with you. Some people operate under different constraints in this world than you and you don't seem to recognize that. Not sure why I'm still trying to engage in a dialog here. Chances are you stopped listing right after your last post. That is most definitely your style.