No Class McGrass
I made this nifty graphic when AZ Model tried to stifle the creativity and inventiveness of the 72 Aircraft News blog. I thought it was pretty cute. But when I expressed my outrage over at the
72nd scale forum I discovered that bad-mouthing jerks like AZ is bad form and I got shut down. Not banned (I don’t think) but told off. I didn’t get it then, and I don’t get it now. The only thing I like less than “companies” who go around bullying bloggers is goofs who support them, for no apparent reason.
Yah, I know that 72 Aircraft News was asking for it. But in my world. even if somebody is “asking for it” you don’t give it to them if you are a manufacturer. If you are, then you have to eat a certain amount of pie. “Pie” in this case is a euphemism. You’re making money off of people who often bad-mouth you. They’re called “customers.” Even suppliers and “partners” can get all up your face and there is nothing you can do except eat it (and tell your side of the story, discretely).
You just have to eat it–and no, the blogger is not in the same situation that you are. Bloggers make fun of you, attack you, do damage and get off scot-free. That’s just the way it works. If you want to defend yourself, you write your own blog and explain how that punk’s pie is in the wind. You ‘splain it.
But AZ is apparently run by some Euro-hipsters who don’t know that and don’t care. They pulled their permission for 72 Aircraft News to use any of their “intellectual property.” They threatened legal action.
What’s wrong with that, you ask? Everything is wrong with that. AZ should not leave the house and play with the big kids if they can’t take a little heat. They are on my “do not buy” list now, and I hope on the “do not buy” list of all right-thinking people.
But after I was chastised over at the 72 Scale Forum (no, they don’t get a link) I had second thoughts. I still felt the need, way back in February, to remain friends with the forum world. I thought, hey–it must be me. I must be a jerk, if all these right thinking, fuzzy animals think I’m a jerk.
Right?
So I actually deleted my blog posts about the whole thing and went off to think it over for a while, to see if I could see the flaw in my argument.
Well, I thought it over, and I don’t see a flaw. I mean, I may be a jerk, if jerk is defined in a certain way. But I do not care. I know right from wrong, and telling a blogger that he can’t use your IP because you don’t like the way he treats you is…it’s just…spiteful. Spite is bad. It reminds me of the behavior of certain characters on certain soap operas that I do not watch no matter what you now think.
Spite is the worst kind of behavior, in a world that is rapidly losing its cool. And I’m losing my cool and I’m not going to take it any more.,
In your culture, in your community, maybe the “proper” thing is to always be nice no matter how bad you think something is. But that is YOUR culture. In mine, the standard thing is to call ’em like you see ’em or stop wasting everybody’s time.
And if you’re the sorry sucker who is the target of this unfair (?) criticism, you suck it up, pull it in, and eat your pie. There ya go. Tastes pretty good now, don’t it?
They probably don’t want to offend any of these companies and lose advertising dollars. Whenever somebody gets upset and run a quasi commercial enterprise (and lets be honest here, that is what most news sites/forums are now) they rely on their ‘hosts’ for money. It is all about money, whether it be from AZ or some bigger modelling company. Sucks, but that is how may of these people operate now. Tail wags the dog. Same as happened in magazines.
So they yank advertising over perceived slights? That’s goofy. Does advertising even work in these cases? On a forum you’d be way ahead if you just hired your brother-in-law as a shill and had him ask if your products are any good and then your cousin can tell him all about it. “I don’t know where to find good information on SHARK MODELS. Anybody know where I can find SHARK MODELS?” “Shore buddy. There’s a guy…oh…what’s his name? Kramer. Cosmo Kramer at cosmokramersmodels.com makes the best shark kits, IMHO. I think our own Precious Pete (ex-marine and cute grampa) built one of his tiger shark kits and it was featured >here< Check it out." "Thanks for the tip buddy I was just OH SHUT UP!!!!!! I swear to God I am quitting forums altogether. Never in human history has so much embarrassment been perpetrated upon so many by so few.
Par for the course mate. Companies will and have pulled dollars from magazines/papers/insert various fora for perceived slights to themselves or products, even threatening sites/fora for posters that do the same. Some sites ask for donations from readers/users to keep things running in order to continue their freedom of expression, but many just rely on the dollars from their company overlords and keep a nice cash bonus/freebies for themselves.
I have read about forums being ‘off limits’ for employees of companies, and the mere mention of said forums being an instant ban for any posters that mention certain sites on the companies own forums. Spite and dollars. A lovely mix.