Wired called me after our article was posted (and I’m pretty sure before John did his post). They were concerned about the issues we’d raised, but as I explained in my subsequent apology, I became concerned about the trouble we’d caused in talking with them. That’s what prompted the change to the article and the initial apology within it.

Wired could have come out with an attack on us. They didn’t. Any anyone who thought our article was wrong could have commented within it to bring it to our attention (a few did) or dropped us a private email saying “What’s up with that” (no one did).

The point is this, I guess. It’s fair to publicly criticize any company if you feel you need to spread the word to correct a problem you perceive. You can even do that without actually contacting the company, though you will be on more solid ground if you’ve actually done that.

But if you’re trying to correct a problem, you don’t always have to take the public route.

John, I didn’t mean to imply you were being critical purely to attract links, I think your motivations are honourable.

But a search marketing professional like yourself is likely to understand how an individual can benefit from being the one to keep authorities in check.

The point of the blog post was really to point how and when it’s okay to create a critical item (like both dannys original post and yours)

Without valid critical thinking, many “authorities” would successfully bend issues in their favor far beyond reasonable. And correcting things at that point would be very costly to society. So some “checks and balances” are required.

This is a perfect example – left unchecked, that Search Engine Land post could have led to the destruction of the wired wiki, which in turn would dampen innovation (as others realize it is a waste of time to try something new because the spammers will kill it). Once checked by criticism (including mine), the article was adjusted, issues were debated and clarified, and apologies were delivered.

You are completely right to suggest there are avenues to pursue concerns, often more appropriate than posting in public.

That said, if you’ve got a beef… why not? Get your criticism out there and you might get some backing from some fellow consumers. There’s nothing worse than ringing a call centre to complain, just to spend £9 in phone charges listening to Michael Bolton on repeat.

I think opinions matter when it comes to business too. So, perhaps it’s more about what you say than the link itself?