Andrew Keen, Doc Searls And A Case Of Pabst Blue Ribbon

This is going to be great fun. I've dragged my 30 year old green-webbed folding lawn chair out of the back of the garage, filled my styrofoam cooler full of ice and a case of Pabst Blue Ribbon, and staked a front row seat to the catfight unfolding between the Cluetrain boys and a quite cheeky Brit by the name of Andrew Keen who has written an entire book basically calling the Cluetrain Manifesto a pile of happy horseshit (ok, he didn't call it a pile of happy horseshit, I did, and since Andrew graduated with First Class Honors from London University - he is much more eloquent in his characterizations than I am, and probably drinks a much better brew). This is what Andrew has to say about Cluetrain:

In place of expertise and authority, the Web 2.0 crowd offers us interactivity and “conversation.” One of the most radical of all the digital utopian visions is The Cluetrain Manifesto: The End of Business as Usual. The book begins with 95 Theses, the same number that Luther had (these Cluetrain folks have the cheek to think of themselves as contemporary Luthers, sparking a new revolution, pinning their thoughts to the electronic gate). These theses all focus upon undermining the idea of expertise in business and commerce. Some sound so opaquely childish that they could have been authored by a tipsy literary theorist...

Andrew's book will not be published until June but it is already creating a firestorm. Stay tuned.

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