In GNC #316 Todd asks our opinions of Mark Hopkin’s post on Mashable that questions whether IZEA is evil or not ,and I wanted to share my opinion with you.
PayPerPost is a shortcut that damages the future potential of Blogging. Bloggers that participate in this type of marketing get extra money now, but limit the money they could get in the future, and the money available to everyone else. In essence it is a selfish act and “Advanced Monetization” is an euphemism in the class of “friendly fire”. Let me expand.
I do not mean this as a criticism of Mr Hopkin’s views, this is not a simple topic with an obviously correct answer. In these cases different people will put different weights on different facts which will alter their own personal conclusion. Unfortunately human nature often drives us to subconsciously select the parts of the story that support a position that benefits ourselves. Some of Mark’s points are valid to a degree.
- It is a worthwhile pursuit to improve search algorithms, but I question the altruism of someone that claims this is their goal while making money out of gaming the system.
- The extra money can help Bloggers to build their site and content level, but I will explain why this is bad.
However three of his points are misguided
- Claiming that the size difference between startup Bloggers and the established sites like Engadget is somehow a social injustice
“Begrudging small-time bloggers a chance to make money like your highly trafficked blog because you don’t think other methods of generating revenue are ethical is greedy and arrogant”
is at best trite and at worst sophistry.
- To state that not doing this is detrimental to the Blogging community
“Disparaging organizations that allow small time bloggers to make significant money doing what they like is myopic and detrimental to the community at large”
is the opposite of reality. Undisclosed ads in blogs will give a temporary gain to some at the expense of long term gains to all.
- And to rely on a free market to decide this
“In essence, we should be quiet and let the market decide.”
is to court disaster. Free markets only work when there is free and complete information. We regulate markets simply because they are imperfect.
Not only is there not enough information for “the market” to make an educated choice, to promote products without disclosure actually subverts the possibility of a free market to create the correct balance. The whole PayPerPost paradigm offers incentives to game the system for quick personal gain without consideration of effect it has on others.
This matters because of the foundation that Blogging (and following that PodCasting and video) is based on. It is a raw and honest expression form closer to a diary entry than a magazine article. Because people have shown their vulnerability, been willing to make public mistakes, been honest in their opinions a level of trust has built for the medium. The opportunity is there for this to continue, and to build, and to be the major cornerstone of media. This is the potential prize if we maintain our integrity, but it will not yield explosive growth. It may grow in explosive spurts, but will take time.
The path of the hidden ad would bring the blog back to the level of the TV advertorial and is old media thinking. I have posted before on the difference between good and bad marketing, and almost by definition a company that needs to make their ads seem like real news or opinion are trying to fool their audience. If you play this game you are complicit in the lie.
This is not Chicken Little, the sky is not going to fall in if a few small blogs do this. There are more than enough dodgy blogs out there already and this has not killed anything. The problem comes if this gets large enough to be considered normal, or if well known sites that have built trust with their audience start accepting covert endorsements. If the audience feels they are being lied to they will cease to consume. This will reduce the audience, reduce the marketing clout and the blogger will be ultimately worse off. If you want to understand how this can happen read and understand this.
No matter what justification you give, posting an advertisement or PR release without disclosure would be considered (correctly) by your audience as a lie. People don’t like to be lied to, and are better than you think at detecting it. You will gain in the short term but it will harm you more when you are eventually discovered. If enough bloggers engage in deceptive advertising practices it will negatively effect all bloggers.