You missed why I was pissed about Alfred’s post. It wasn’t because I didn’t get a ticket. Although I know many other people who are getting free tickets, including several journalists.

The thing that pissed me off is that Alfred was saying I was irrelevant to Web 2.0. That, despite me doing hundreds of interviews in the industry. Despite having a sizeable audience. Despite doing dozens of interviews with MIcrosofties and people at Adobe and other companies.

Mix is only on its second year. Last year I got a free pass cause I was a Microsoft employee.

And, as to journalists making money off of conferences. That is sort of true. But, it’s a two-way street. Microsoft makes a TON more money than I do if they sell an additional copy of its toolset.

At all Microsoft conferences I’ve been to (TechEd and PDC) the journalists are given free passes and are seated in front of everyone else so they get better access than the paying customers.

Alfred should go to the conference team internally at Microsoft and ask why that is.

I don’t do event journalism, though. If you watch my show at http://www.scobleshow.com you’ll see that I never do event reporting.

I am there to make relationships with people who I then film elsewhere. Or, maybe once in a while out in the hallway.

You missed that I DID NOT ASK for a free ticket to Mix. I don’t want one. I don’t need one to do my job. I’ll get the news just as well out in the hallway.

Or, come back to my blog later tonight (at 9:01 p.m.) when I’ll break some major news from a major multi-billion-dollar company. No conference needed.