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Thursday, January 13, 2005Oh no! It's blogger ethics!The TurkeyBlog, sadly, mystifyingly, has yet to even be offered an ice cream to flak for anyone, but here's my two cents worth on bloggers being paid by people with an interest in what appears on their blog:1) Disclosure is desirable. 2) That doesn't mean it's necessary. Instapundit has this quote from Zephyr Teachout: My interest--and where our focus needs to be, whether you're a little green football or a kossack -- is in collectively building a culture online where we figure out norms for people who both consult and write online so that readers can have the tools to be skeptical, active participants.Collectively building a culture? Um, that's what we've been doing, like, since this whole bloggy thing took off. But amazingly enough, we haven't really needed a meta-debate. It doesn't matter whether you're in the tank for Bush because you're getting big bucks, have a thoroughly constrained worldview or are responding to the radio messages in your fillings. If you shill, people come for amusement, not information, if at all, because the tenor of your site reveals a person who is not, for whatever reason, to be taken seriously. Were your writing about Kerry's Vietnam heroics at the heart of the Swift Boat controversy and supporting him? I don't care if you're on the take or nuts, I'm not going to look to you for a realistic assessment of electoral battles. We don't worry about Instapundit being on the take because if he started in with mindless boosterism, it wouldn't sound like him and he'd lose readers, or at least their respect. Bottom line: Spare me all the worrying. If a site is bought and paid for, it will probably lose its edge, then its readers, then its value to the "briber". If you've got someone with an agenda funding you, don't disclose it because you're worried about readers not knowing to be skeptical. The smart ones are skeptical about what counts - the arguments - and the others don't care. Rather, disclose so you don't get clobbered when word gets out and everyone chuckles at what they'd already guessed. Being bought and paid for is fine, as long as you produce good, reasoned stuff that you're not ashamed to see under your own byline. But being boring, chirpy and predictable in the service of a patron is unpardonable whether your rewards are monetary, psychic or whatever. 
posted by gbarto at 9:05 PM |
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Day By Day© by Chris Muir.Old TurkeyBlog here.
