The nice thing about tools that run rampant across this interwebbly thing called the “Internets” is that you connect with a whole lot of people with whom you otherwise wouldn’t have the means or a reason to cross paths. Some people use these tools to make friends. Other people keep up on what’s happening in the world, and appreciate the human-ness of it all (minus the fact that ‘it all’ is happening on a screen).

And then there are folks that press on to become thought leaders and industry spokespeople…they strengthen, but at the same time seem to cheapen the ‘newness’ of tech innovation. By grounding it and helping to turn the web 2.0 hype into a thriving industry, bad habits and icky old school traditional gatekeeping/elitism seep out.

Okay, now with that – a little story.

In a week and a half, Adam, myself and several other members of the MusicIP team are headed to Vegas for a little show called CES. When Adam received an invite to a blogger party, he thought “heck, why don’t I see if I can get an invite for my coworker/wife who also blogs?”. What a great guy.

Well, that’s where the trouble began. He replied with a yes, plus one. The same person who did the inviting put someone else on copy and responded with this:

<Other guy>, are these guys on our guest list?

I figured this was just her passive way of saying “<Other guy>, could you please put these guys on our guest list?”. Well, Other guy replied to all, asking if the MIP blog was “ours”. I found this sort of odd – especially considering the invite had been left on Adam’s blog.

So, I responded, clarified that we contribute to the company blog but that both maintain (with far more regularity) our own blogs – and linked to them.

Still no big deal…right?

Wrong. Le response…from yet another new person on this thread (strangely, the original invitee is no longer on copy). We appear to have alerted their version of a code red.

Hi All:

I checked out all the blogs referenced, and feel that as CES exhibitors, Musicip falls firmly in the “should be sponsoring” camp IMHO. Brochure is attached. As a sponsor Musicip would be entitled to several passes for the management/marketing team.

FYI that invitees in the “blogger” category tend to be those for whom technically-related blogging is the main (or major) part of their job description and are ones who have been posting with great regularity (generally averaging at least 3 times a week for many months) The goal of all of us hosting the event is to focus primarily on those who define themselves as “bloggers” first and foremost. These are primarily non-vendors and regularly review a variety of consumer electronics products. We want to make sure that the people underwriting the event get a chance to expose their brand and/or products to relevant influencers via their participation. We’d love to have MusicIP be a part of that and gain those benefits.

This is about the time my jaw hit the table. So now, invitations have been revoked because we’re not blogworthy and we’re getting a lecture on what they consider to be a blogger…but heck, we could still maybe receive a drink ticket if the company wants to cough up some money and sponsor the thing. IMHO, that’s freakin’ hilarious.

My response (le Invitee added back to the thread).

I apologize if there’s confusion here about our intentions. <le Invitee> had commented on Adam’s blog yesterday asking if he wanted an invite and I suppose we wrongly assumed that it would be no problem for both of us to attend.

I’m confused by your email below, given it was not us who approached you but rather the reverse. I hope you have a great event.

Adam was fairly swiftly added to the registration list, digital apologies were made, etc.

I, on the other hand, remain not blogger enough, but have drowned my sorrows in new Moo cards and Designhergals stationary.

Since I haven’t the faintest idea how all this went down on their side, I can only venture to guess that a lack of communication on their side (which seems crazy, given the have FOUR people on their team page) and out of control arrogant assumptions that some young whippersnapper kids MUST trying to sneak into their blogger party…clouded their sound judgment. But as a group who “helps organizations and individuals understand and leverage social media”, you’d think they would be a tad savvier than this. But instead, they want to perpetuate the same standards and elitism of traditional media…yuck.

I may not blog about consumer electronics products, but I do blog about stupid crap like this.

And my cats.