I don’t know how anybody with a remotely high profile on the internet stops themselves from climbing to the top of a tall building to pick people off with a marksman’s rifle.

A little while ago I posted something about ‘conspicuous compassion’. Like a lot of what I do on this blog it wasn’t tremendously considered. Sure, it’s my honestly held opinion, but I didn’t spend a lot time composing the post or thinking about what people’s reactions to it might be. Hardly anybody reads my blog (except you, dear and precious friend) and I think that most people who do read it are probably just waiting for a next dick joke or link to an obscure old music video.

Mr Merlin Mann used my link as a springboard to a longer, more considered piece. It was maybe a little more polemic than what I had said, but if it was, it wasn’t by much. As he reblogged a part of my post, now every time someone responds to his post by reblogging or hearting it I get to see it.

It’s been a small dirty window to internet fame.

A lot of people like what he wrote, as well as the premise of the original post. But there’s also a core of people who hate it, and are looking for a way to express their disapproval in a way that strives to make Mr Mann feel ashamed.

I think my favourite so far has been the person who wrote a long post taking Merlin to task for suggesting that if you want to make a difference, first step is you should walk out the front door. You see, this lady is in a wheelchair and Mr Mann is just being thoughtlessly ablist.

So to anybody* with a modicum of internet fame, I apologise for whatever I have said about you and the way you react to others on the internet. I do not feel the need to walk a mile in your shoes because I walked in them mere yards and needed to stop and have them re-soled.

*Offer does not extend to Wil Wheaton.