With the recent kerfuffle over Microsoft giving laptops to bloggers so that they might try out Vista — and then quickly letting them know that they were NOT gifts after all (but had to be given away, or sent back) has gotten the blogosphere all riled up during this quiet inter-christmas-new year time period. Quite frankly, in spite of all the righteous outrage that got Microsoft to retract their offer (or change it, as it were), I’m not sure where Microsoft was wrong in all of this.
First of all, as much as I agree that blogging should be above sullying, its unrealistic to get upset about it because its already happening. PayPerPost, ReviewMe and Creamaid are not going away as much as it is loathed by some bloggers, because they are loved by others. Some bloggers (I would even argue, most bloggers) are not above getting paid to blog about stuff, and that’s really what the whole Microsoft issue is about.
Secondly, giving gifts to opinion makers is an age-old tradition amongst marketers and PR folk. Whether its right or wrong, It happened before the Internets, and its going to happen after.
And, for the record folks, it is NOT the same as creating fake blogs, or fake personalities. Even though the intent is the same — to try and manipulate opinion for your own ends — giving gifts to opinion makers recognizes and respects the fact there is an existing network of reputations and trust. Creating fake blogs and personalities for the purposes of creating buzz ignores that, and tries to supplant it with something wholly artificial, which, to existing bloggers and people who they are trying to fool, is obviously insulting.
What the whole Microsoft issue brings up, however, is a question that I suspect most bloggers dare not answer, for fear that once they look in the mirror, they might not like the answer they get. The question, of course, is.
“What is my integrity worth?”
And the subsequent questions: How much would I accept before I started about something (a topic) that I wouldn’t have normally? How much would it take to change my opinion? How much before I started writing something I don’t even believe in?
Yes, I think the reason why there has been so much outrage is NOT because Microsoft tried to persuade bloggers. (Heck, Microsoft will do what any soulless corporation needs to do to sell more widgets.)
No, the outrage over this is because I suspect many bloggers are secretly afraid that if they were put in the same position, their integrity would be at odds with temptation. And the incongruence, the dissonance, over that moral dilemma is because many of them, I suspect, would probably be willing to sacrifice it for an awfully pitiful sum of money or gifts.
Why is the blogging economy so damn cheap? Its because for many, blogging is hard work with often little or no return on your efforts.
Irrespective of whether its “right” or “wrong”, there is a lot of noise in the internet and blogosphere. To get noticed, build a following, and create regular traffic requires one to blog regularly, intelligently, and passionately. For a long while. Months perhaps. Before getting “noticed” in any real way. And while this is ongoing there is a real cost to this in terms of energy, time, and sleep.
For every Mike Arrington in the world, there are thousands of bloggers toiling away in anonymity. The “attention” they get paid back in terms of link backs, the trickles of traffic, and the odd Ad-sense buck is a very thin gruel, indeed.
Its easy to stand on your high horse to proclaim that you would never ever compromise your blog’s integrity for the sake of some trinkets. On the other hand, its easy to do once your standing on a pile of steady traffic, a regular readership, and enough income to pay for your hosting fees. But even then, some might argue, the question is even harder as you have even more to lose.
For many others who are struggling to break away, the offer of something better in exchange for your “work” is a tempting one. And for that reason, I suspect many bloggers who have real jobs that pay real dollar amounts so that can pay for their real bills, would have a real difficulty with the dilemma above. Because they know that in the Real World they would never settle for the pittance they are tempted with when they’re online.
So where does that leave things?
I don’t think Microsoft has done anything wrong. Or rather, if you find paying for the possibility of opinion makers and journalists offensive, they’ve done nothing NEW that’s wrong. They’ve done what large companies always try to do. And they haven’t started any fake blogs (that I know of) to promote Vista or whatever else they’re hawking.
The outrage, as I see it, is more telling of bloggers than anything else. They have a choice once they have the gift — and the onus is on them to make that choice. Outrage disguises having to make difficult choices, and to commit where you stand on things than anything else. You can accept it with a statement saying that you got a gift. You can send it back on your own so that your opinion can never be sullied by their overtures. Or you can not tell anyone you got a gift at all. Its up to bloggers to decide what they want to do.
Bullying Microsoft into retracting their offer only allows bloggers a way out, rather than making those decisions.
And for some bloggers, particularly those that are up and coming, those that aren’t getting much of a ‘return’ on their blog (in any sense), it isn’t an easy one to make.
(although, to be honest, less-than-A-list bloggers were never eligible for the laptops anyway, so yes, I’m using this as an example).
December 28th, 2006 at 6:49 pm | Permalink
Tony, glad to see you are one of the bloggers who take the other path.
This whole scandal is just another case of MS bashing IMHO (as I wrote on JOAB). We have been numerous grabbing our $30-$250 for the ReviewMe launch, many have accepted Google gifts over time aso…
But this gift, although a strategy applied for years already by MS in the MVP program, got buried.
December 28th, 2006 at 8:33 pm | Permalink
Where the hell is my free Ferrari lappy!!! if there is anybody who should be writing a review on a free Ferrari Lappy it’s the overseer of The Garage, dontcha think?
Seriously though, bring on the free swag, just don’t expect me to wax poetic about it if your product is crap!!! It’s all about generating some flow and a bit of free swag. I’m a firm believer that you can take the income & freebies and maintain your integrity…if you have any to begin with.
December 29th, 2006 at 12:12 am | Permalink
I don’t see why everyone is fired up about this, seriously. Microsoft and AMD are pulling PR. Plain and simple. So they target the bloggers. If someone writes a dishonest review of the software, then you shouldn’t be reading them anyway.
I used to work for Pepsi, and I have personally delivered refrigerators, grills, stereo systems, and big screen TV’s to store managers. Bloggers are no different. You give incentives to decision makers, and that’s all there is to it.
December 29th, 2006 at 12:13 am | Permalink
Seems you’re saying it all comes down to the economics of blogging, or lack thereof. And I figure you’re right. Most full-time bloggers are unlikely to endure, even those with fairly popular blogs, unless they can find some way to pay the bills.
Advertising isn’t going to do it for most people. Subscriptions might work in some instances. In other cases, blogs might simply be used for marketing a service or product.
I really doubt that payola is going to be a sustainable model though. For one thing, who wants to read advertorials? But, more importantly, you can’t eat laptops.
December 29th, 2006 at 12:48 pm | Permalink
Well, I am not surprised with this pimping act - Can I expect any of those bloggers writing a anti-review of the laptop? NO.
Infact I am surprised that in India, one of MS’s *honored* MVP is a blogger who copies content from Digg/Reddit etc. and gets away with it!!
December 29th, 2006 at 1:15 pm | Permalink
Kumar, being an MVP has nothing to do with were you get your info from. It is all about size, only the following you have build really matters to MS.
And if I have a look at the list of bloggers who received a notebook, there were many known Apple users who got selected.
The MVP program, and other MS community rewards, has always allowed the person/community to be critical about Windows.
And I have lead a community which became CLIP (Germen Community Leading Influence Program from MS) member.
Sure we loved Windows, but dugg into the system as deep as possible. And bad behavior got torn apart. And still we got awarded. And the bigger your community becomes, the sooner you’ll become MVP.
Sysinternals being bought by MS proves MS actually does accept critics. ;-)
December 29th, 2006 at 5:14 pm | Permalink
[…] Rather than immediately jumping into the controversy over the rightness or wrongness of Microsoft’s offer of a free Vista-loaded laptop to dozens of bloggers, I decided to watch from the sidelines for awhile to gather my thoughts. (Disclosure: I’m one of those bloggers who was given a Ferrari laptop by Microsoft. My employer, b5media, plans to give it away as part of a contest). The Vista issue is fascinating on a number of different levels. One, it puts the spotlight on whether bloggers need to be editorially “pure” like journalists so the content they produce is seen as objective. It’s an interesting concept as blogging evolves into a mainstream medium read by people looking for information and insight. As Joel (on Software) Spolsky argues, trust is a key consideration for many bloggers who wants their posts to be seen as credible and authentic. Perhaps what the Vista issue does is continue the fragmentation of the blogosphere. There will be bloggers who will write and behave like journalists - and expect to be treated as such by companies, PR firms, conference organizers, etc. There will be bloggers who have little interest in being treated as a journalist because it’s not a job, and they get paid little or nothing to write their blogs so how’s a freebie here and there really going to matter. Then, there’s the Pay-Per-Post crowd. Truth be told, no one is really, really pure - not even journalists, particularly high-tech reporters who operate in a PR-happy world of product trials, demos and evaluations (and this comes from a decade as a high-tech newspaper reporter). I would hazard to guess, for example, the majority of Microsoft XP CDs sent to journalists in 2001 were never returned to Microsoft even though we’re talking about $350 to $500 product. In general, I would strongly suggest the majority of hardware/software sent to reporters is never returned, and everyone carries on their merry, objective way. And what about when a source takes a reporter out for an expensive lunch, or a PR firm invites a group of journalists to a concert or sports event, or a company takes a reporter(s) on a junket/conference and picks up the flight and accommodation expenses? Where do you draw the line on accepting freebies? It’s a very tricky game. That said, Microsoft’s offer - albeit generous - strikes me as over the top given we’re talking about a $2200 product. It’s awful tempting to keep something so shiny and new but to me it doesn’t seem quite right (maybe this comes from nearly 20 years as a journalist). If I were Microsoft, I would have asked for the laptops back and donated them to charity, or asked the bloggers to donate them to the charity of their choice after three months. For more thoughts, check out Internet News, Deep Jive Interests, ex-Microsoft employee Robert Scoble, who thinks Microsoft is doing something awesome, Web Worker Daily, and BL Ochman, who provides a snapshot of the controversy. […]
January 8th, 2007 at 10:29 am | Permalink
I think this is very sad, as one would never really want to give up a chance to bash Microsoft….
But I agree with the good Doctor here, and would add this: Everyone has to give everyone else a break here. There is no tradition, no standard, no “ethical center” available to use in making judgements about things like funding paradigms or what constitutes professional behavior. I’m not suggesting that there is NO way to identify very smarmy behavior, but I don’t think this is it.
(Disclosure is probably important as a rule of thumb. If a company, or a blogger, find themselves hiding something (for whatever reason) then they should probably go talk to their rabbi or shaman or whomever they normally get their advice from.)