Michael Arrington and the Gillmor gang: exclusive transcript [1]

transcript leaked from Mturk

Arrington: ...with them, are you trying to sell your company to them. Because the stuff you're saying is utter bullshit.

Canter: No one's going to buy my company, dude. No one's going to buy my company.

Arrington: Then why are you compromising your position on this? Why aren't you saying, "We need to work with these guys and make sure..." Why aren't you saying, "These are our rights, this is what we need, you guys need to deal with it," and force them to do it? Because I don't think you're saying anything wrong.

Canter: Michael, I'm sorry if you think I'm compromising. I don't believe I am.

Arrington: You keep saying, "Pragmatism. Compromise. Work with them." You're saying those words, Marc, why?

Canter: Hold on. Michael?

Arrington: This is our data. This is our data.

Canter: Hold on. Michael, it is out data.

Arrington: How am I supposed to compromise over that?

Canter: Well, dude, let's talk to your buddy, Mike Andresen, then? Let's take it to everybody, not just Facebook. I mean, come on, this is across the board. This is across everwhere.

Arrington: I'm sorry, but Ning doesn't matter yet. Ning doesn't matter in that respect yet. All that matters is Facebook and MySpace. And Google and Microsoft, and some would say Yahoo, right now.

Canter: Michael, when I say I want to compromise and work with somebody, I'm not saying I'm bending over. I'm saying as an equal partner. That's a difference.

Arrington: But I don't understand why they're a partner. This is our data.

Canter: They already have our data, dude. I use Facebook every day.

Arrington: That doesn't mean they get to keep it. That doesn't meant they're going to be the place I go to...

Canter: Of course not.

Arrington: And federate an average of 20 pages a day, which is what the average Facebook user generates in the future. There's a reason we're talking about Friendster here. Friendster screwed up in different ways. But what I'm saying is that you and Chris and others who are thought leaders in this space should have written the post that I wrote last night way before I wrote it.

And you didn't. You guys are talking about working groups, and like I said, it's bullshit.

Canter: Michael, if you check my posts....

Arrington: And what is this going to accomplish?

Canter: If you check my posts, I've been commenting on this. And like I said, go back to when I...

Arrington: No, Marc. I'm sorry.

Canter: The same technique.

Arrington: I'm sorry. I'm sorry. I've lost all respect for you on this issue.

Canter: Oh, now you want me to paste my URLs, because you're talking about my facts here. Because when I noticed this trend...

Arrington: I've got it on my browser. It's right here. You had to agree with me...

Canter: Hold on. Hold on, Michael. It's called "The Religion of Bringing Social to Software." OK, it was published on May -- hold on one second. OK, I've got it right here, paste it in here.

Arrington: Where are you pasting it?

Canter: I'm pasting it into the Ustream Chat, OK? It's called "The Religion of Bringing Social to Software."

Arrington: Ustream?

Canter: May 12th.

Gillmor: Yeah, this is podcast on Ustream worldwide, Mike.

Arrington: What's the URL?

Canter: May 12th.

Arrington: Ustream.com/ -- what?

Gillmor: Ustream.tv/channel/techaura.

Arrington: What the hell's that?

Canter: Michael, it's called "The Religion of Bringing Social to Software." The users' data stays locked up in the originating site. That's why openness is being reinvented here. They're trying to change the game here.

I put in a nice little data portability logo, my shout-out to my man Chris. OK? I'm working here. I was plugging in the data sharing stuff in, and I analyzed the four platforms and how each of them were reinventing openness in their own way.

That's not to say I support it. But I'm a blogger. I have to figure this shit out for people. All right? So I was analyzing this story.

Saad: I think basically what's going on is their first steps. There's somewhat of a land grab. They're trying to see how much they can get away with in their first steps, and it's up to people like Michael and Marc and Scoble and to some extent me -- although I have to be more diplomatic -- to basically continue to put the pressure on and to say, "Well, that's very nice, but it's not the portability or it's not the best practices, and we need to continue to move in that direction."

And it'll take start-ups and B-tier companies to actually that effort and actually implement that true, best practices implementation and create a bigger ecosystem.

Gillmor: No, that's bullshit. It's going to take Facebook -- and it's like what Arrington said, the big boys have to come to the party right now.

Saad: These guys are coming in their own 900-pound gorilla way, but it doesn't really matter, we need to continue to apply pressure.

Gillmor: When you've got three or four 900-pound gorillas, it's different than one.

Saad: But that's a good thing, though.

Gillmore: It's not the same as Microsoft.

Saad: But that's a good thing, Steve. They're both racing toward the best, most open implementation.

Canter: Can I read a quote here? Please, please, please, OK? Hold on a second -- all right, here we go. "These three announcements prove that MySpace, Google and Facebook assume that once a user enters into their domain, that they own that user, that they control what happens with that user's data and that they fully intend on squeezing every last dime out of monetizing that user until the cows come home. This is essentially the mantra Jonathan Abrams spoke to me about -- when I first met him in 2003 -- and it's the mantra of every single large social networking platform since then. This is why we created the Bill of Rights for Users of Social Media."