This is too funny! Is this the tragicomic end of the Glenn Greenwald saga?

Greenwald is presently denying the claims, but I don’t think it helps his credibility that his own biographical blurb reads almost exactly the same as the alleged sock-puppet posts in question…

UPDATE: He seems to have changed the tenor of his bio. I wonder what else he’ll be revising?

Why Greenwald is probably doomed

I believe Glenn Greenwald is probably doomed to relegation. If the suspicions around his online activity are correct — and judging by his response of frantic denial, personal attacks, revisionism, etc., it feels like they are — then there are plenty of incentives for the truth to come out, and as we’ve seen in similar cases, the truth almost certainly will out; that’s pretty much an Internet axiom.

Once that happens, the barriers for him become almost insurmountably high, because blogs are an almost completely free information market — the very same freedom whose low barriers to entry allowed Greenwald himself to gather a large-ish following in “only 9 months.” If the choice is between reading Greenwald’s blog and reading one of the thousands of identi-Greenwalds who would gladly take his place, then everybody, including his current supporters and excepting pretty much only his immediate family, would have nearly infinitessimal motivation to continue reading him, and his readership will dry up. Would you choose to read a guy who goes around posting on the Internet under a variety of pseudonyms, talking up this “really smart” fellow Glenn Greenwald who has a New York Times best-selling book and graduated from a top-5 law school, when you can get the same content at the same price and with no difficulty whatsoever in switching from one to the other? Not unless you really, really liked Glenn Greenwald. (Hell, you probably wouldn’t even let him stand next to you at a cocktail party.)

In the world of blogs, unlike with the New York Times or a cable news station, there are few special protections and few market conditions that would likely benefit Mr. Greenwald. His small network effect is no match for the countless new bloggers waiting in the wings. He can’t drown out the coverage with his own perspective or coverage of completely unrelated topics. He can’t rely on being a monopoly source whose readers have nowhere else to turn, or in any way abuse a non-existant monopoly power. Essentially, I think he would be forced into relative obscurity, and no spasm in the world will prevent another hiltziking. (Michael Hiltzik: former Pulitzer Prize-winner, now a page of amusing Google results.)

Altogether a good excuse to exit the stage and spend time on something more personally meaningful, but somehow I doubt that would suit Glenn Greenwald’s personality!