Spinopsys

Phil, I agree with what you’re saying… sort of.

It’s pretty apparent that Landis isn’t the most well-spoken dude on the planet — in every interview I’ve seen, he looks nervous, struggles to stay with his canned answers, and behaves the way I think I would in a media storm / circus.

For me, this nervousness explains the conspiracy theory angle. I think all he’s trying to say is that the test wasn’t conducted in a politically-objective vacuum — remember that the results weren’t supposed to be released until the B Sample came back negative. And the fact that Landis is getting these results at the same time as the rest of the world makes defending himself difficult.

As for the blog commenting stuff, I understand why the feature’s been disabled, even if it might not be the best PR move in the world. But it’s hard to ignore the negatives that crop up in a negative situation, and with the immediacy of e-mail, blogs, and the ‘net, it’d be hard for a team of admins or a single guy to keep a handle on it.

Now that I’ve apologized for Floyd, know that I don’t necessarily believe him. I WANT to believe in his innocence but the past couple of months have made it difficult to swallow anything that is coming out of the mouths of pro cyclists, their handlers, and the officials who manage the show.

So I’ll just stay indifferent and remain on the fence. That way I don’t get stuck on one side when the frogs come raining down.

Go have a look at the level of intelligence in your average thread over at bikeforums. Now decide if you’d like to have your blog filled up with that.

Steve Rubel has a couple of luxuries while he’s commenting on Floyd.

1. He’s getting a fraction of the traffic.
2. The people inclined to comment are a little smarter.

If I was running Floyds blog I wouldn’t want to clean up the mess left by an open comment thread. I’m sure they have plenty of other things to spend their time on.

I think it’s a bit naive to expect a public figure facing such a controversy to open his site to the comments and diatribes from the wack jobs of the Internet.
Like it or not, Landis is getting skewered in the press and by public opinion. Truth and reason, unfortunately fly out the window, and in such cases you need a well run, disciplined PR campaign to fight for your interests. Doesn’t matter if you are right or wrong, unless you have a unusually skilled PR team, politics and power almost always prevail.

Good comments all.

I agree with the difficulty of moderation, but it can be done, all it takes is an effective administrator for a post…..if Landis is serious about telling his story, listening comes with that, he should hear what real folks are saying, the days of one sided conversations are over.

Damian, I agree with you about the nature of the respective conversations going on at bikeforums V someone like Rubel, as a result I don’t read any bike forum beyond a cursory look and read Rubel, and Rubel knows what he’s talking about as far as PR issues are concerned, as for authority, he’s #58/#10 in the Technorati top 100 and has thousands who link/subscribe to him.

While he may not know much about cycling, Landis or doping he does know about crisis media management and the medium of blogging, I’ll take his advice if I were Floyd.

Lastly, I note that on todays Jay Leno appearance he received a grilling and mused about another excuse, this time maybe it was something he ate…..maybe someones homework.

Actually, Floyd just needs to shut up.

My dad is a risk management consultant, and he usually gets called in after it’s too late and the stuff has hit the fan and his clients have made CNN for all the wrong reasons.

The number one advice he gives his clients is to prepare the media response before disaster hits. Those companies that try to figure out the PR while they’re also trying to fix the problem almost always get it wrong. They’re trying to fix the problem and they don’t have any time to deal with the media, so they screw it up.

So, that’s what Landis and his handlers are doing — screwing up the media relationship because they didn’t have a plan for this ahead of time.

Well I don’t believe in any Gods but I’m afraid I am just as bad the religious fundamentalists when it comes to accepting blindly.
I have no evidence to support my belief, just faith that cyclist can win without drugs. I will believe Floyd and Lance and even Tyler until I have the proof they doped in my hand. Its no good arguing with me because my mind is made up, that’s the beauty of faith, it stands apart as no evidence is needed other than belief. And believing thus I have an inner calm.
The sad thing is this rant is mostly true

OFGOB (Old Fat Guy of Bondi)

I know we’ve had this discussion before Jamie, and I accept you position, but the difficulty with that is it’s similarity to the intelligent design movement among christian fundamemtalists, it’s just a denial of the science behind the testing.

We have conclusive evidence on Hamilton, why can’t you just accept that?

Landis is now in play, he can protest the process till the cows come home but he still needs to explain an exogenous source of testosterone, and by the way whatever the current media and politics that process will still allow him to do just that.

Armstrong on the other hand has never failed a test, so I’m willing to accept that he has no case to answer whatever the circumstantial evidence.

That is an evidence based position. If Landis is cleared then I and everyone else have no other option but to accept the decision of the jury and process.

Comments on the site are open again, following his open letter of 8/15. They appear to be moderated, and no criticism has shown up yet.

I think he’s getting better PR advice now.

-dB

[…] Phil over at Spinopsys commented a couple of weeks ago about the Landis blog being closed to comments, something that kept critics and supporters alike from engaging in vigourous online debate. Some PR person in the Landis camp was obviously aware about the criticism, which left us with today’s selected words of support. But now, the comments are closed, and in this world of irony, e-sarc, and lols, some people might suggest that the comments are fitting, because although all that’s really left is a lot of snickers and muttered phrases from cycling followers all over the world. […]

[…] As I thought they would be, the few comments posted are decidedly positive in their defence of Landis, but there are a few questions that have to be asked about this sudden yet half hearted change of blogging direction. […]