more thoughts on cluetrain. . .

well, here's my quick take on the Manifesto:

*the 95 bulletpoints should be condensed to 10
*hyperlinks do flatten hierarchies: after I posted a piece critical of Quark to a public user forum, I received an email from Quark's director of communications. That would have never happened back-in-the-day.
*they were right about markets being conversations
*15. "In just a few more years, the current homogenized 'voice' of business—the sound of mission statements and brochures—will seem as contrived and artificial as the language of the 18th century French court." Well, we might like to think so, but mission statements and brochures are as omnipresent as ever.
*like so many other publications of the late '90s, Cluetrain smells of internet hysteria. As we learned, the New Economy was subject to many of the constraints of the Old, including the need for sensible business planning. It's not enough to be loved by your customers and to "get" the internet.
*42/43/65. "As with networked markets, people are also talking to each other directly inside the company—and not just about rules and regulations, boardroom directives, bottom lines.
Such conversations are taking place today on corporate intranets. But only when the conditions are right." "We're also the workers who make your companies go. We want to talk to customers directly in our own voices, not in platitudes written into a script." Corporate blogging (both internal and external) has certainly started a new conversation between employees and customers, and some of the advantages and pitfalls are just now becoming apparent.