It may be that the “echo chamber” phenomenon much discussed 4 or 5 years ago hasn’t grown much past the original dynamics, except that there are more ways now to gather and reinforce attention .. and for those that are seeking to making a living in this chaotic mumbo-jumbo of every-which-way pulls on attention, those who have it will tend to want to keep it, grow it, renew it, etc.

Thanks for all the comments guys. We didn’t get Scoble to come comment, but Brian and Jeremiah certainly made their presence known.

In other words…people accept it more I suppose, begrudgingly perhaps, in other social forums but the social web was built on the idea of engaging with all people, those of “import” or not. Frankly when someone reaches a certain scale, unless I’m an “original” follower, friend, etc., I’ve never had anyone respond to me, only to their original faithful flock. Therein lies the hypocrisy I think.

So these guys you’re referring to, named and otherwise, no longer are relevant to new followers unless the new ones want to hear their spiel and don’t expect a response in return. I no longer follow the people you mention and many others because I know I’m just a number to them now. Jim Long is the only person I can think of who has responded to me recently and it was on a relatively common issue and he certainly doesn’t follow me back. I accept that with him but he’s an exception to my rule of dropping “big names” (who don’t follow me back) to follow/friend.

In summary, I think you have the right analogy of speeding down a ski slope. These folks don’t see what’s happening due to the trees whipping by so fast. A conscious decision should be made early in their engagement to avoid collision, no matter which path they take…in my mind:

“Far better to be a big fish in a small pond than a little fish in a big pond.”

I didn’t post analytics because I’m no analyst. I am making observations as I move through the technical/social world, if on the borders. These are my observations, my experiences and my suppositions. I couple that with real life communication with a variety of people at various levels of the spectrum.

Posting this certainly created dialog, and that’s worth something I believe.

The slippery slope of notoriety. Still, they did comment and acknowledge the struggle, so for that I am grateful.

I saw this light up in my alerts yesterday, but was generally unable to respond in a thoughtful way (as I had the day off), so excuse me while I’m a bit slower than Brian Solis jumping into the conversation.

I’ll be very honest. Your assessment is true, many of the top bloggers in any sector start to look like mainstream media. Instead of having a few deep relationships as they once did, they have a broad set of shallow relationships.

I’ve written about this here, “Looking Behind the Curtains on the Social Media Stage: Humans Don’t Scale” –I think we agree.

http://www.web-strategist.com/blog/2009/06/13/looking-behind-the-curtains-at-the-social-media-stage-humans-dont-scale/

On a side note, I refrain from two many individual conversations that don’t pertain to others (i’m trying to respect the time of others) and shift conversations when I can to DM, email or sometimes phone. Take for example my Twitter account, I’ve done 17k tweets, but have 10k DMs –this means I cascade the conversation closer, and much more private.

Here’s how I use Twitter, in which I’m attempting to think of others first.
http://tinyurl.com/24lv65

I’m mobile on Blackberry at the moment, but to one point Sheryl’s cell number is posted here and on every site we use. Mine too. I publisjed mine like that before Robert was so big – in 2000. Just check any page on this blog.

More later when we aren’t mobile. Or on Twitter @kencamp and @SherylBreuker.