Maytag Gets Dooced

More weeks-old ad news. Kind of. Web 2.0 news? Social media news? To play it safe I'll get an ad in here first, because, though this will have to do with mom blogs, poop, Twitter, and UNFOLLOW!, it'll all hopefully all come together after the (Gordon) jump:

Anyway, the Missus Squirrel is a regular reader of the legendary Dooce. And the other night treated me to a dramatic reading of this post; go ahead, it takes a few minutes, but it's worth it — I always forget what a funny writer she is.

The less amusing summary: new baby and all the laundry that goes along with that, bought an expensive Maytag washer that broke, couldn't get repaired, couldn't get help from customer support, and tweeted (twittered? twote?) about it. And because Dooce is, arguably, one of the most popular bloggers in the world, it drew a reaction.

A somewhat belated reaction from Maytag, one from Bosch — and, apparently a lot of anger from readers who thought she was abusing her position. That was a new one to me. I mean, I was so worked up after hearing the story, I would've been naming names in her place.

The adoblogosphere has taught me that we're all having "conversations" "with" "brands" these days, and that corporations better listen.

And, sure, I expect some backlash from those companies … but from fellow consumers? I still don't know what to make of that. Especially since the last time (I can think of) something like this happening, it was the mom blogs that banded together to get Motrin to pull their ad (a story that, as neither a Twitterer nor a parent, still kind of confuses me).

I mean, especially for Maytag, whose entire identity is built around reliability.

Advertising news or not, there's something to be learned here. And that's how I'm wrapping this up, nice and clean. Except for: this response to Dooce's post which has even less to do with advertising, but is many kinds of awesome.