I blog for business, I blog to learn, and I blog to share. I also blog as an “outlet” — for writing, and occasionally for venting.

Of course my favorite thing in blogging is to get a client. Selfish maybe, but I help people buy and sell real estate for a living. Without clients, we don’t eat, and the teenagers don’t get all the stuff teenagers think they need to survive.

But there is another wicked cool aspect of blogging that comes up more often than people probably realize.

There’s a guy, we’ll call him “Frank”. Frank likes to utilize our shiny new Phoenix MLS search system. And he uses it a lot. Being new, the system has a few kinks and quirks. Frank has been incredibly gracious and has been providing feedback to both myself, and one of the software developers at our IDX (home search) provider, Diverse Solutions.

He takes his own time to let us know how things are working (or not). There’s not much in this for Frank. Oh sure, he’ll ultimately get a better “search experience”, but his feedback does me, other users, and Diverse Solutions far more good than it does him. Kinda helps restore ones faith in humanity knowing there are folks out there willing to help out when there really isn’t a direct benefit to them.

How cool is that?

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There’s a new splogger on the loose…

Blog.NoDebtMortgage.com (nofollowed, naturally), has found our humble abode and is stealing posts verbatim to populate their Adsense filled splog.

Unlike many of the content thieves out there, these folks actually have an email contact posted. We’ll see if they do the right thing.

Here’s a tip for you tschilling@nodebtmortgage.com, when this is displayed in “your” posts, you are committing a crime:

© 2007 Jay Thompson, Phoenix Real Estate Guy . If you are reading this outside your feed reader or on any blog other than The Phoenix Real Estate Guy, the site you are looking at is guilty of copyright infringement. Please contact legal@ThompsonsRealty.com so we can take legal action immediately.

“Man up”, be a good net citizen, stop stealing and try writing your own content.

Now I’m off to relegate dozens of trackbacks to the spam bucket.

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I just updated to the latest release of Wordpress (2.5.1). The PHP executable plugin I was using didn’t play well, so I’m trying a new one. So far, that seems to be the only problem.

If you see something wonky, please let me know!

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I’ll be moderating a panel at Inman’s Blogger Connect in San Francisco on Wednesday, July 23. The topic is:

Case Study: How Four Bloggers Are Closing Sales
What’s tactics work for generating business?

Should be interesting…

Inman Connect is one of the largest real estate technology conferences (maybe the largest) in the country. I attended my first one last January in New York City and had a blast. Looking forward to seeing old friends, meeting new ones, learning and sharing.

The speakers line up is impressive, and growing daily. Mr. Dalton over on the west side will be speaking on the “Tapping the Global Real Estate Market” panel on Thursday. Sadly, that conflicts with the “Real Estate Brokerage of the Future” session. Looks like I’ll be bouncing between the two…

Inman is currently offering special “Blogger Pricing”. Hurry…

The day before Blogger Connect is the
“RE Bar Camp” – an “unconference”. It too should be most educational and entertaining.

If you are planning to attend Inman Connect, you have to come a day early for Bar Camp. And that evening, you can mosey over to Zillow’s “Beer with Blogger’s” Reception. Trust me, the Zillow people know how to throw a party…

Drop a comment if you’re planning to attend and we’ll Connect at Connect!

Here are some of my photos from Connect NYC in January.

Closer to home, some of us Phoenix real estate blogging / Twittering fools are planning to do lunch this Tuesday (May 6). Let me know if you’re interested. Seating is limited!

May 29 should bring around another session of the AZ Real Estate Blogging Network. Details forthcoming.

And on a yet to be determined exactly date in June, I’ll be conducting a real estate blogging workshop sponsored by First American Title.

And there’s a three-day to Rocky Point coming up too! Ahhh, Corona’s…
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I have about 250 real estate blogs in my feed reader. As such, I read a LOT of real estate blog posts. They range from pure brilliance to not-so-swift.

Today Carol Hian with Redfin in San Diego, posted what has to be the most asinine blog post I’ve ever read.

Carol starts off her diatribe with, “I am not a big fan of “competitor” bashing” and then proceeds to do nothing but that.

Her target is Kris Berg, an agent in San Diego. Kris wrote a post about Redfin’s shift to providing more buyer side service, and apparently Ms. Hian felt compelled to respond.

If you can call her post a response.

Calling Kris and her husband Steve “Barbie and Ken” sounds shockingly similar to something you might hear on a pre-school playground. Oh well, those of apparently limited intelligence are prone to such childish attacks.

What really strikes me as asinine is Carol Hian’s assault on the food drive that Kris and Steve headed up over the weekend (See “Time to Give Back” for details).

Hian writes nonsense like:

Anyone can organize a canned food drive, but without can openers, a cook top and plastic ware, what good does it do?  Isn’t that pretty superficial?

Uhm, hello? How is collecting 3/4 of a ton (and counting) of food to be donated to a food bank “superficial”? What good does it do? Try asking the people that get food on their tables and can now feed their children what good it does.

Comparing a drive to replenish a food bank to a party Redfin throws for clients (and paid for no doubt by their venture capital investors) is just utterly ridiculous. And it is a slap in the face to not only the Berg’s but to every man, woman and child that donated food and worked on collections.

According to Hian’s bio, she once specialized in housing rehabilitation and affordable housing construction — noble causes indeed. She claims, “Her background in social housing gives her an eye for the human aspect of real estate and its effects on our society.”

You’d think that would make her a little more compassionate toward something like a food drive, and toward the people that organized one, donated to it, and gave their time to ensure its success.

Carol Hian, in my opinion you are a fool, a hypocrite, and a disgrace to the real estate profession.

UPDATE: Glenn Kelman, the CEO of Redfin apologized sincerely for Ms. Hian’s post. Glenn may often be maligned in the real estate blog world, but he’s a stand up guy. Ms. Hian no longer writes for Redfin. Kudo’s to them for doing the right thing all around.