With the announcement that the Diggnation podcast is going to be sponsored by Zune is a good sign of Microsoft understand the power of advertising on podcast it is also causing some eyebrows to be raised.
This would not normally be an issue, but with the very public disclosure that Microsoft had very restrictive language in the proposed Rocketboom agreement restricting the negative things can be said about them is quite concerning.
To this point podcasters and videocasters sponsorship have had significant levels of transparency in keeping sponsorship separated from editorial content. That separation has allowed me in the past to address concerns, and make public those concerns and recommendations to my sponsors.
If the Diggnation / Zune podcast sponsorship advertising deal has the same language as the Rocketboom deal, then how can a primarily tech review show give an objective overview of that sponsor when they are not allowed to say anything negative. Or will the Diggnation duo now have to abstain from any Microsoft related news items.
As a leader in the Podcasting Community and a also business owner who is very concerned about transparency in any podcast advertising deal my gut reaction is that we will have to wait and see what happens but needless to say I think that Kevin needs to fully disclose whether or not Microsoft has put this restriction upon them.
I will go on record and say that any sponsorship deals that my companies RawVoice and Podcast Connect do, will never be inked in a way that limits, restricts or alters editorial control of the content producer. We will always fully disclose the relationships we have with sponsors and I will say again we will never restrict the content of a content producer. [mediaright.vox.com] [Diggnation]
You know, it’s great to talk about “transparency” and all, but truth to tell I’m more concerned about the “very public disclosure” of the original deal gone bad. It’s been bugging me since I read about it here. I just can’t think of any other way to say it, but this whole thing just seems so totally unprofessional. If bloggers and podcasters want to be taken seriously they’ll need to at least act professional in their business dealings, which can at times include a little things known as confidentiality. Posting the details of a deal you don’t like in public, for whatever purpose, just seems so childish, and not someone *I* would want to do business with, much less read.
~Mark