Is blogging for a fee unethical, opportunistic or smart? We're going to find out pretty soon with the launch of PayPerPost, which pays bloggers for writing about a particular company. Here's the marketing pitch

"Think of an Opportunity as a posting on a bulletin board that an advertiser has made. They are looking for people to write about Web sites, products and services in exchange for cash. Select the Opportunity that you are most interested in and review the requirements set forth by the advertiser."

  While there will be some distinct philosophical camps about PayPerPost's mandate, it is also important to discuss how the concept of blogging-for-a-fee reflects the blogosphere's continual evolution as a communications medium. For months, we have been talking about whether bloggers are journalists. Now, we'll have to ask "Are some bloggers marketers or  for-hire shills?". The reality is bloggers will assume different roles. Some will be journalists, some will hawk products and/or services, and some will be ranters....and some will have multiple personalities.
  Regardless of what camp you fall in to, blogging is just another communications medium, albeit one with low barriers to entry. To suggest bloggers have to act in a certain way to be "ethical" is wrong. Like any new medium, different camps will be created. Over time, we may stop talking about the "blogosphere", and refer to certain blogs as blog-vertorials or blog-casts or blogs-for-hire. It will be what it will be, which is certainly not bad or evil. At the same time, there will be opportunities created for new blog service companies to filter each category so people looking for news blogs will know where to go, while people who want product pitches can quickly find what they want.
Bottom line: PayPerPost is not evil, unethical or positive - and blogging has not been "irrevocably tainted" as Scott Karp opines. (Karp also dramatically suggests "This is a sad, sad day for blogging, for publishing, for journalism, and for the new media revolution") It's a just a business launched by an entrepreneur who sees an opportunity to make some money. The one major flaw within PayPerPost's strategy is there is no requirement for bloggers to disclose they're receiving a fee. This needs to be fixed ASAP.
Update: My friends, Mathew Ingram (also a journalist) and Rob Hyndman have some measured thoughts about PayPerPost, while BusinessWeek has a story with the provocative title "Polluting the Blogosphere".