I wondered when this was going to come up. John Robb is a pioneer in Business, which he publicly started talking about two years ago. It is understandable that he’s upset about the Red Couch deal…except for one thing, missed opportunity.

I think the record should be set straight. Robert Scoble and Shel Israel are not pioneers of Business. I’ve always attempted to make this distinction – there is a difference between an employee for a company maintaining a private blog talking about their employer and using blogs in a corporate setting. It’s like apple and oranges. I am not taking away the achievements Robert’s made because he’s earned them. They pushed for a book deal and got it.

Robert says that John is working on a book deal as well and I hope he gets it because it will most likely cover a different perspective. John has years of experience with implementing blogs in a corporate structure. He has a wealth of valuable information to share.

The honest truth is that John Robb was out there with this years before anyone else – and he should have pushed it. There was just one problem – John Robb is not as well know as Robert Scoble but whose fault is that? Robert took his blog and made it something. John Robb could have done the same thing – made more of a name for himself. Because the truth the Scoble name is drawing attention to this book. That’s the way it works and John admits this. If you pioneered something and someone else is getting paid, trust me, it would rub you the wrong way.

That doesn’t take away from Robert’s accomplishments. I don’t think people realize how much pressure is on Robert and Shel to do “the best blogging book” and only time will tell if it will be well received. They have a mountain of hurdles to cross – for example stopping the material from being distributed on the internet and determining what comments about their book are valid and which one steers them away from their goals. Doing it in public is not an easy task.

In the end only time will tell if they do the right thing. If the book is accurate they need to mention John Robb in the book because he was the pioneer of Business. If John would agree to an interview that would be even better. Dave made a post about this and he’s 100% correct – give credit where credit is due. I do not think John deserves anything financially – if you want it work to get it. I do think he deserves credit out of respect because he was the first – it’s a simple as that.