Anyway – your advice is worthwhile and appreciated – cheers!

When we write about someone else’s business, remember that their business is their love and joy, their child. It’s real and it’s personal.

Anyone writing a blog, or a blog comment, should be mindful that they are not talking privately in their home. They are making a public statement for all to see. This brings with it a great responsibility.

So what was that advice? Whatever you have to say, say it nicely, keep it soft, and leave yourself some wiggle room (for those occasions when you have stuffed up and everyone knows it).

Finally, try to use the following words often: seems, perhaps, possibly, maybe, unsure, and inconclusive.

"He’s used an email from Duane Jackson of Kashflow where Duane trashes Ubikwiti."
It was their marketing I was trashing, not the company or the product.

"Duane didn’t send the email to me because he knows I’m not going to run with that kind of stuff."
I posted on Twitter that if anyone wants my thoughts on it, to let me know. Ben did, you didn't. Hence he got an email and not you.

"to trash a competitor on what amounts to the same line of reasoning is unacceptable. It’s hypocritical.
So a price comparison on our website that includes a competitior is the same as or even comparable to putting out a press release directly targeting their customers?

"Duane has also set himself up as the arbiter of what a blog should look like. "
I know nothing of what a blog should look like. I just know that I've got no interest in a blog that's just a copy'n'paste of other blogs. We all have opinions, if we didn't state them then the blogosphere would be a very quite place

I think this point is worth emphasizing. We should behave according to our own standards of behaviour, not react to other people's… that way lies barbarism.

I am a polite, decent human being (at least I like to think so). That's not influenced by whether others around me are being less than that – I live up to my own standards, independently of how others behave. The same should be true of your company. Just because someone else goes low doesn't mean you should too.

Understand the timestamp thing but couldn't you be bothered to check first? He's answered your points whether you agree or otherwise. There's this wee thing called 'right of reply' that seems to be missing from so much of what you say.

How a company chooses to conduct itself is for it to decide. And while we're at it – name me a tech company that makes a great job of tech PR? I'd love to find one.

1) My post clearly stated that it wasn't a review but rather a reaction to the press release – I will review fully in due course. The concept I actually love (as I mentioned)
2) I understand your apples vs apples comment but Ubikwiti were claiming something wrong – ie that the Xero single user/single business offering is $49/month. This is not the case AFAIK
3) re the timestamp. I wrote the post this morning my time at 530am. I suffered the errors at that time however they were completely secondary to the core thrust of the post which was the marketing campaign Ubikwiti are leading. But to answer your direct claim – the post was written and published within a 15 minute timescale
4) Quoting blog posts verbatim is bad practice – not hugely important in the scale of things but still bad practice. Normally it wouldn't have been worth mentioning but taken alongside the PR I saw it was relevant
5) Given the rant that the CEO of Ubikwiti left me, accusing me of being in the paid employ of Xero, I further contend that they need to work on their PR – even if they feel they've been slighted