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Biased Bloggers?

by Mark Evans on Thu 09 Feb 2006 11:48 AM EST | Permanent Link

As a journalist, objectivity and credibility are everything. So the Wall Street Journal's story on how FON is using a group of influential bloggers such as Dan Gillmor, David Weinberger and Wendy Seltzer, who may be compensated by the company for advisory services, is a troubling eye-opener. It may be that Gillmor and Weinberger wrote objective, fair posts but there are significant perception and conflict of issue problems. How objective can you really be if FON's success could lead to a monetary windfall? As much as journalists like to think we're pure, unconflicted observers, it's difficult, if not impossible, to be completely objective if you have a vested interest in a company's success or failure. This is why I don't own any telecom stocks even though it is the sector I know best and would be able - in theory - to make well-informed investment decisions. There is no way I want my thinking to be influenced by how my extremely modest investment portfolio could be affected. So what does it mean for bloggers? For one, they are going to have to be far more transparent on whether they have any kind of a relationship - paid or non-paid - with the companies they write about. If Michael Arrington, for example, is offering consulting services to a cool Web 2.0 company, his posts should include a disclaimer on the top or bottom of his posts so everyone has an idea about where he's coming from. You'll see this disclaimer at bottom of stories written by many business columnists. Maybe the WSJ story in a tempest in a teapot but the sooner this issue is addressed, the sooner it will become a non-issue.
As an aside, who are FON's PR advisors? How could it come out of the gate with guns ablazing but stumble so badly by announcing an agreement that doesn't exist with a Seattle-based ISP, and now this conflict-of-interest issue? You have to wonder how the VCs, who pumped $21-million in FON, are thinking about how well they did their due diligence.
For more views, check out Paul Kedrosky and Mathew Ingram, who's covers technology for the Globe & Mail newspaper,

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Re: Biased Bloggers?

by bigfish on Thu 09 Feb 2006 01:29 PM EST | Profile | Permanent Link

In the dating industry there are self appointed "neutral" industry experts that are actually nothing but paid consultants pushing the companies they work for's agendas. A lot of people have gotten really pissed as some of the agendas being pushed involve legislation that would put many companies out of business.

Some of the sports gaming companies have taken it to the extreme. I know of one that has hired 40 bloggers and set them up to be "indepent experts". To me blogging is just becoming another pay for play marketing channel.

Re: Biased Bloggers?

by Mark Evans on Thu 09 Feb 2006 03:02 PM EST | Profile | Permanent Link

this suggests an issue that will eventually have to be tackled within the blogosphere is who do you trust. if people lose faith in bloggers and their motivations, the big brands will just capitalize on it to take over the blogosphere.

Re: Biased Bloggers?

by Vaibhav Domkundwar - iNods.com on Thu 09 Feb 2006 06:46 PM EST | Profile | Permanent Link

Mark:

This is indeed well written. I just posted about it on my blog as well - The rise of FON ... in one evening

The fact they announced incorrect information about Speakeasy, the fact that they got way too much coverage just one fine evening (that too on a weekend ... just before Monday morning) and almost every post hyping the idea, all made it totally suspicious.

I am really surprised that no one really questioned the idea in the first place. It is a tough one to make work and I don't believe ISPs are going to allow it. Definitely not the ones in the developing nations where the service might be useful. In US and other developed nations it will be useless with EVDO cards and other mobile connectivity solutions.

Re: Biased Bloggers?

by bigfish on Thu 09 Feb 2006 10:27 PM EST | Profile | Permanent Link

The blogosphere is a long tail application so i doubt it will be able to self police.

The top 200 topics may have 100+ bloggers who can police themselves and their topics. What happens when you get down into the millions of topics that only have 1 -5 bloggers with all of them being consultants selling something, or setting themselves up as media experts.

Re: Biased Bloggers?

by Andy Abramson on Sun 12 Feb 2006 03:49 PM EST | Profile | Permanent Link

Boy, I'm sure glad I post using the word "client" whenever I mention one of the companies I'm under contract with.

Re: Re: Biased Bloggers?

by Mark Evans on Sun 12 Feb 2006 03:55 PM EST | Profile | Permanent Link

that's the thing - it's not an issue to promote a company if as long as everyone knows where you stand. it's all about transparency.

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