They are the creations of arrogance and vanity.

There seems to be a movement among the self-impressed in the blogosphere to toss up walls around themselves to avoid having to interact with the unwashed masses. I don’t know who came up with this brilliant plan, but if it gets legs, it will set the blogosphere back by years.

First we have Steve Gillmor saying that bloggers shouldn’t link.

Now I read via Richard Querin’s blog that Seth Goldstein says:

Strong web bloggers no longer link.

Somebody please tell me this is a joke. Or satire that I’m too tired to detect. I simply cannot believe that anyone who can type words on a keyboard could write something that ludicrous.

This is the sort of arrogant bullshit that makes me want to stop blogging altogether. I am 100% certain that I wouldn’t spend a nanosecond hanging out with anyone arrogant and naive enough to believe that they are the only ones with anything useful to say in the real world, so why would I want to do it in the blogosphere?

Just because a few curious onlookers read your online diary does not mean you are in any position “to shape thought.” Take away the conversations that are engendered by right-thinking bloggers and the only thoughts that we are shaping is the thought that we are a bunch of geeks who ought to step away from the computer and go outside.

Have some of these bloggers really convinced themselves that they are rock stars? Are they about to start showing up in People Magazine? Anyone who has anything resembling a life would laugh their heads off at the prospect of some nerd trying to claim that because his online diary is read by a a few thousand out of the 6.5 billion people on earth, he has somehow arrived to the point where he can sit atop his pile of slide rules and pocket protectors and preach to the masses, without the need to join in anything resembling a conversation.

I am utterly blown away by the absurdity of what I am reading these days.

If this is where the blogosphere is going, count me out.