Zuckerberg SXSWi interviewer fans fire with Twitter post
Sarah Lacy's reply to those who criticized her for her interview of Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg at SXSWi was not entirely graceful.
(Credit: Twitter)AUSTIN, Texas--If journalist Sarah Lacy got some people riled up with the style of her keynote interview with Facebook CEO Mark Zuckerberg on Sunday, her Twitter response to criticism of her will not help calm things down.
As reported here and elsewhere earlier Sunday, Lacy interviewed Zuckerberg as the day's keynote at South by Southwest Interactive (SXSWi) and in the process, saw the audience of thousands turn against her for a series of stylistic faux-pas.
I won't rehash all the details here, since you can read up on that in my previous story.
But as pointed out later in the day by Wired News, Lacy followed up the controversy by adding her own thoughts in the form of a Twitter post. (Editors' note: Lacy also spoke on video after the Q&A with Omar L. Gallaga of the Austin American-Statesman.)
The text of her (very public) post? "Seriously screw all you guys. I did my best to ask a range of things."
To me and to many of the people I talked with after the keynote, the problem wasn't Lacy's questions. It was her style. Some have said that it was because she's a woman and attributed a tinge of sexism to the anger directed at her.
I don't buy that for a minute.
What I think happened was that she felt she should be part of the story--by making jokes about her upcoming book, by interrupting Zuckerberg and so on--and absolutely misread the audience. They simply weren't there to see her. They were there to see Zuckerberg. I think the response would have been the same if it had been any interviewer who took the focus away from Zuckerberg.
So for Lacy to respond in a way that indicates she thought that the anger was based on her questions just misses the point.
And it's too bad. I think she could extract herself from this if she understood why people were upset at her, but until she reaches that understanding, she's only going to make it worse by lashing out, especially on Twitter, a forum that is the currency of SXSWi.
See more stories in CNET News.com's coverage of SXSWi (click here).
Daniel Terdiman is a staff writer at CNET News covering games, Net culture, and everything in between. E-mail Daniel.
be beneficial for up and coming interviewers to learn a lesson from
this.
Who paid this person? If she has more than a one-time gig with them, she should be fired. She should never work as an interviewer again.
Her non-use of capital letters and punctuation should knock her out of writing for a living as well.
still, to her defense, this one instance does not make her a bad journalist, nor does it make her reaction to overwhelming outcry by an influential peer group should be taken with some measure of understanding...
besides, capital letters are over-rated.
<a href="http://omnipreserve.blogspot.com>~!jesseloop
editor? What exactly is his recalculated worth from this reaction
now? Thanks.
Defending Zuckerberg is akin to defending Ballmer, and most likely worse, what about entertainment value that she provided, and the fact that she didn't allow a desperate CEO to get the upper-hand despite a biased crowd...
grow up, boys...
Lacy is simply trying to generate pr for her upcoming book and doing so in a very poor manner. She is not a true journalist, as there are very few journalists (other than Mossberg) who live a 'high profile' lifestyle.
Most journalists in this country simply report the news. Lacy is a new breed -- the type that want the attention on them instead of their writing -- you can read more about her and other emerging media trends at the reidwegs report.
RW
- VIDEO IS ONLINE
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by Phil-IT
March 10, 2008 7:18 PM PDT
- On Sarah's own tech ticker on Yahoo! Finance
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Reply to this comment
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- Not yet, my bad
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by Phil-IT
March 10, 2008 7:23 PM PDT
- my mistake, it's just a small piece, about the Beacon...
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(17 Comments)http://finance.yahoo.com/tech-ticker/author/Sarah-Lacy