The Glass is Full

Some folks maybe left scratching their heads on why Rackspace scooped up Robert Scoble.  Scoble is probably the best personal brand in the new media landscape and is considered by many the barometer on the social media.  So why would a managed hosting providing / cloud company  want to hire someone who appears to spend most of his waking hours reporting news on FriendFeed?

I think its a brilliant move by Rackspace.  The vast majority of consumers of cloud services are start-ups.  And I would guess most start-ups would consider themselves in the social networking and new media space.   So Scoble is reporting on Rackspace’s largest customer segment.  He has the potential to give immediate credibility to one of their fledgling customers.  It also looks like Rackspace is giving Scoble somewhat of playground in Building 43.  I see all sorts of interesting possibilities.   Companies that Scoble finds interesting, could get hosted on Building 43 (aka Rackspace) and it turns into show case.  Rackspace grows their customer base and if they are smart they can learn how to scale out new media and social networking companies in the a cloud environment.  Really does seem like a win-win.