Metafluence

An interview with Marshall Kirkpatrick

Marshall Kirkpatrick speaking at BarCamp Portland 2007 (photo by Josh Bancroft)

Marshall Kirkpatrick used to kick my ass in Lincoln-Douglas Values Debate back in high school. While I used to hate to compete against him, I loved talking geeky with him. At that time we discussed categorical imperatives, social contracts, and the state of nature. A few years after high school, we ran into each other again and this time our geek speak centered around blogging, RSS, and Web 2.0. Having had the pleasure to know Marshall during his rise to A-list blogger status, I thought it would be nice to share with aspiring bloggers the events that brought him to where he is today.

How and when did you first hear about blogging?

I was standing at one of those computers in the Gov Docs section of the University of Oregon Knight Library, pretending to do work studywork at the reference desk. I found a mainstream media article online about the Dawn and Drew podcast and a whole new world was opened up tome.

What prompted you to start your own blog?

My original vision was to start a bilingual (Spanish/English) consultancy for nonprofit organizations in using Web 2.0 tools. I used that blog to participate in conversations online and for lead generation. My intended business partner (the one who spoke Spanish!) wasn’t able to start a business with me and instead I started getting jobs blogging.

At what point did you realize that you may be good enough at blogging to consider blogging professionally?

When the first check arrived in the mail. No, if you’ll forgive the immodesty, I realized that I might be good enough as soon as I realized that anyone was making a living blogging. I’ve been writing a lot for years and got good reactions as soon as I started sending trackbacks from useful posts on my own blog. It helps to write a lot. I used to be a terrible writer, but then I joined the high school debate team and learned to speak. Once I started writing like I spoke, my writing was good enough to be considered good. It’s still not fantastic, I’d like to improve it, but news writing in an exploding sector of the ecomony isn’t that hard a place to find work.

What was the first blog you wrote for other than your own? How did you get your foot in the door there?

I can’t remember for sure but I think it was for a green-tourism project that involved biking. It was also my first experience working online for too little pay. I quickly learned that that’s only worth doing if it’s going to give you an opportunity to get a better paying job - or if you really, truly feel great about the subject of your blog posts. Creating content for someone else’s site can be a really crappy job though, unless you get good enough at it that you can command substantial pay.

How did you determine what to charge for blogging? How did you go about increasing your rates?

To be honest, I’ve only recently been in a position to take part in that decision. My first three paid blogging jobs paid me $500, then $1200, and then $2400 per month. No one wants to pay bloggers much, but I make much more than that now. I’ve just moved up from one job to another for organizations that have bigger budgets and prioritize blogging higher than the last gig. I think everyone paid me about as much as they were willing to, so it was a matter of getting jobs with people who were willing to pay me more. That’s always been a secondary concern though. Most of the time I’ve had more than one source of income, either writing multiple places or doing other work in addition to blogging. I think that’s pretty common. These days I do a fair amount of consulting in social media on the side.

How did you get on at TechCrunch?

By visiting while logged into MyBlogLog. No, that’s a joke - and a strange one! I was working for AOL’s Weblogs Inc. for peanuts on a blog that was built up really well by previous bloggers. That visibility gave me a platform to catch peoples’ eyes. Michael Arrington noticed that I kept beating everyone to stories (by using the heck out of RSS, but he didn’t know that at the time) and he called me up. He said “I’d like you to take over much of the writing at TechCrunch,” I peed myself and the rest is history.

Were you scared to leave TechCrunch?

Yes, changing jobs always makes me scared. Someday I’ll get over it. These days, in very large part thanks to TechCrunch, I’m in a pretty good position when I change jobs and it still drives me nuts with worry.

How was the transition from working in a journalist capacity to a product evangelist? Would you do it again in the future?

It was really interesting. I’ve written about it at length on my blog—it was often exciting, there was a sense of pride when the product was working well and I felt like I was exploring relatively new territory in the online economy. In time that excitement wore off and I ended up feeling like my writing was greatly constricted. I might do it again for the right product, but for now I am really exciting about working on my writing and consulting skills.

How important was your non-profit passion to your success in the tech market?

Dedicating a considerable amount of my heart and mind to making the world a better place earlier in my life gave me the knowledge and people skills to build good relationships now. I’ve been helped a lot by women in this industry, too, in no small part I’m sure because I’ve been a reasonably well-informed and outspoken critic of male dominance in tech. I’d say it’s been pretty important and to the best of my knowledge being an outspoken political leftist hasn’t hurt my career yet (fingers crossed.)

Looking back, what are a few of the key milestones that helped shape your career today?

Well, I haven’t been doing this for too long and that’s a tough one to answer. I’d put on that list the first month I made more money working online than I did working part time at the convenience store I used to work at, the first time I hit the peak of Techmeme, obviously getting that job at TechCrunch.

Why don’t you start your own blog to compete on the level of a Techcrunch or Read/Write Web?

I appreciate the vote of confidence when people ask me that. I may someday. To be honest, a big part of it is that I haven’t felt in the position to make the jump economically. I’ve got bills and family, may as well keep working for someone else for now. We’ll see. I also don’t want to be blogging about tech for the rest of my life. I don’t know what the future will bring.

What apps do you rely on daily besides a feed reader? (perhaps a screen shot of your desktop would help :)

Adium, Twitterific, Smultron text editor, PandoraJam, Resize from SuperPixel, Netvibes, Del.icio.us, Google Custom Search, Ask.com blogsearch, Skype and a mobile browser.

Where do you see yourself five years from now? Will you be able to and, more importantly, do you want to be a voice on the leading edge of tech?

I don’t have any idea. That depends on what my family is doing. I’d love it if more of the world caught up with some of the tech I’m interested in, that would make landing consulting gigs all the easier! I find a lot of this stuff fascinating and I hope I can keep applying it.

What areas do you see as holding a lot of potential? Anayltics, Information Architecture, blogging, mobile, etc.

I want recommendation engines. I want a Techmeme and Digg for every sector of the economy, or some equivalent. I remember the feeling I first experienced when I was discovering RSS - the whirlwind ofinformation screaming through my brain, all automated and incredible. I want to feel that feeling on a new level. I want to be able to operate with other people swimming in that same river and see what kind of magic we can all work. I actually think that training people in the use of high-powered, lightweight information systems has a lot of potential.

Do you think you’ll help Read/WriteWeb grow to be a Technorati top 10 blog the way you helped with Techcrunch?

Well, TechCrunch was the #9 most linked-to blog on the web when I joined it and #3 or 4 when I left. Read/WriteWeb is currently #25. I’d love to see that number get smaller. Long interviews are only good for one link though :) so you never know what will happen. I kid; I appreciate the interview, they were fun questions and you and I have known each other for so long that makes it even more fun. Good luck with your new site, I think it looks great.

Thanks, Marshall