WE NEED TO LOOK AFTER OUR OWN

The ritual humiliation that followed this schoolboy bullying on twitter gives an indication of an industry in stagnation:
http://adactio.com/journal/6232/

and the fallout:
https://twitter.com/search?q=kentwebhost

You probaby already know the scenario - certain people in the web industry make a living from banging on about the same old ideas again and again at countless conferences and the paying delegates sit and listen to them. They kindly retweet their dross in the hope of a mention but to me it stinks of a school-yard power hierarchy - it's as if they geeks in charge have forgotten what it was like to be the outsider, the awkward one, the loser.

This guy was exactly that - someone who subscribed to all the ideas that were thrown at them - who tried their best to follow what the gurus told them - he clearly respected his tormentor.  So why did he get such a public outing of his copycat website which the whole of the clever, clever industry laughed about, circling him and pointing, throwing his schoolbag up a tree.

Not even considering that the recording and distribution of this phone call without the other party's permission is illegal under UK law it just makes me sick that such a public humiliation would be supported by so many well known figures in the web industry.

As far as I'm concerned the whole stucture needs a big shakeup.  There were certain pioneers who made great conferences because they wanted to diseminate ideas - now every conference has the same speakers saying the same old stuff.  The irony is that most of them have not built a site or product in years.

We need to look after our own.  We need to develop new ideas. We need to stop paying to go to conferences which reward mediocrity.  We need to celebrate those that are truely doing inspiring work.

We need to stop kissing our own asses.