Michael Malone must be breathing some kind of vapors at these blog conferences he’s attending.

Because he sure got feisty about Forbes, his former employer, taking certain blogs and blogging practices to task in their recent cover story. See Malone’s piece here.

My first reaction to his diatribe was, “Well, I guess you showed them for never being invited back to Forbes on Fox!”

But I see two things wrong with it. First, the Forbes story cited legitimate instances of unfair practices by certain blogs (I know one of the firms cited that were wronged by this ilk), and it sends a needed warning signal about a dangerous lack of accountability; it does not put down the entire blogopshere.

Secondly, how can Malone equate his estimate of 200,000 “serious” blogs out there to dot-com startups, in his comparison to the last boom? How many of them even have a business plan — or, hello, a business model? Maybe 200? (20?) To say that blogs are somehow now the next economic boom is a real stretch. Sure, they’re setting the media business, where he lives, all a-flutter.

But the next big boom? Michael, you need to get outside and take in a big…breath…of…fresh…air.