The tweet this a.m. came out of nowhere:

@PHXMusicdotcom Is everyone affiliated with @gangplank a creepy hateblogger or is that just an image some members are cultivating?

@PHXMusicdotcom is the nom de tweet of PHXated covergirl Young Martin Cizmar™, whose every deed we find interesting.

Gangplank is an digital business incubator. It’s based in downtown Chandler.

To say that the people who work there or who are putting together business startups at the space are “creepy hatebloggers is … odd.

PHXated has been down there two or three times and found everyone casually supportive and upbeat. (PHXated was even invited to speak recently, and had a great and interactive time discussing the growing influence of Scruffy McPoochie at the Arizona Republic and the future of online journalism, among other things.)

Anyway, it’s kind of—what’s the word—oh yeah, insane to use a phrase like “creepy hatebloggers” in association with this unfailingly positive and wholesome outfit.

As might be expected, Gangplank members responded with… well, restraint:

@hepnova: @PHXmusicdotcom : I think I speak for the majority of @Gangplank associates when I say that hate blogging has zero to do with the GP ethos.

@BrandonFranklin @PHXmusicdotcom I don’t know why you’d even think that. @dneighbors is far from a “hate blogger”, as am I.

@BrandonFraklin @PHXmusicdotcom and neither is @GRTaylor2 , nor a large slew of other @Gangplank -affiliated folks.

@Conrey @PHXmusicdotcom human nature to guess the ideals of a large community based off of one or two people? Also who hateblogs from GP?

@Conrey followed up this display of hate-blogging with the following intemperate tweet to Cizmar:

@PHXmusicdotcom also if you’d rather discuss not in public – feel free to email me directly

… and pressed the point home with this jeremiad:

@Conrey @PHXmusicdotcom I haven’t seen where you share your experiences is the thing. As someone passionate about GP-I’d like to effort to resolve

Of course, to silence those questioners, all Martin had to do was cite just one or two instances of Gangplank-affiliated “hate-blogging.”

This he did not do. Instead, incredibly, he pressed his point:

@PHXmusicdotcom Well @GRTaylor2 is certainly a good guy… Maybe you, @BrandonFranklin, and @dneighbors are too. Hate to judge based on a few folks, but…

And then followed that up with:

@PHXmusicdotcom @BrandonFranklin also let me say I am talking about people with leadership positions, not just randoms

Notice that Our Martin has as yet not substantiated his claim of “hate bloggers” bivouacked at Gangplank, but has widened his initial claim to include people in “leadership positions.”

What we like about Martin are these qualities: He’s got thin skin and a glass jaw, and he keeps coming back for more.

We nodded in familiarity at Martin’s next tweet:

@PHXmusicdotcom @conrey I’m done discussing.

It is a sentiment he has expressed to use at PHXated as well, and has always been, as here, merely a preamble to more discussing:

@PHXmusicdotcom @conrey I shared my experience. I’m content to believe it’s just a few bad apples and try to reserve judgement. Hope others do as well.

(Note he has still not revealed who the “bad apples” are.)

A few minutes later, he begins to beat a retreat:

@PHXmusicdotcom @jamesarcher I asked a question – a loaded one, but a question – I got an answer & will refrain from judging the org based on my experience

(You’ll remember Martin’s original question wasn’t so much loaded as rhetorical: “Is everyone affiliated with @gangplank a creepy hateblogger or is that just an image some members are cultivating?”)

By mid-afternoon his tweets tapered off, after claiming he’d sent explanatory emails to the parties involved. PHXated will share his explanation if he gets one.