Without knowing Craig, it just seemed a little conceited to me that's all. That's because it WAS conceited. Any author who writes a strong piece should let readers champion it.
For instance, I've said many times that Tamar and Della Martin wrote one of the best Office Automation books I've ever seen. That book helped me out many times. A great book with tons of meaningful examples. I used the book from 2004-2006, which was long after the publication date.
In 2006, the guy who runs Polymorphic Podcast referred to one of my CoDe magazine articles on remoting as one of the best articles he'd ever seen on breaking down the fundamentals of remoting. Sure, I'm proud to pass that on, but it was someone else who made the comment.
