A bunch of blogs lately are using paid posting services. several of them are causing a bit of backlash on the net saying that bloggers are deceiving their readers to make a quick buck.

I personally listen to a lot of talk radio at work and have noticed the commentator reciting the advertisements for flowers to motorcycles to computers. Is that unethical also?

What say you on the matter?

I say "DOWN WITH CAPITALISM!" hehe

I don't find it unethical as long as the bloggers are not deceived into doing something they don't want. Same with online banner advertisements with popups. As long as the popups don't have a fake cancel button where if you click it it runs code or anything, then it should be ok (we will just block them with blockers). We all know that if the commercialism gets too much people with turn off the radio station, they will never visit a certain website and if a channel on tv does it, we turn to a different one. (I do this with some of the game shows that need to have commercials every 2 seconds to pay for their contestants winning too much money... aka Deal or No Deal and Are you smarter than a 5th grader).

Half the time it is necessary to have some advertising to pay for the service, especially if it is free to the public. Things do cost money to run. But hey, if a popular blogger can keep them reading while still advertising a bunch, more power to him. If he has too much, his readers will leave and he will be the one that suffer.

Winners in all this? Advertisers. They suck the popularity out of popular things and then move onto the next fad.

You are the god of thunder, can't you just crush them with a hammer or something?

This post has been edited by Martyr2: 2 Nov, 2007 - 02:43 PM

I post here while I am at work, so technically, I'm getting paid for that.

Or if I work on a project at work & the code can be useful to readers here, I'm getting paid for that.

I know it's not what your asking, but just one way of looking at things.

I say, anyone who reads something off the internet & doesn't do the footwork for themselves is to blame.

I don't think its unethical at all.

In fact, I do a lot of paid blog posts through PayPerPost and they require full disclosure with an easily accessible disclosure policy link on the blog. Here's mine - http://www.marklangenfeld.com/2005/04/20/m...ent-disclosure/

There are unethical ways to do paid posts however, I stopped myself from doing a paid opportunity for a flooring company the other day because it had nothing to do with anything I normally blog about. So for me personally, I'm picky about the paid blogging that I do.

It's probably fattening too.

Ahh phooey. As long as they are honest then it's ok.

My rule of thumb is, if you have to be sneaky then what you are doing is wrong and you know it. If you can't bring it out in the light of day then it's not.

Would your mom approve?

Three things to focus on: full disclosure, relevancy and frequency.

As MarkoDaGeek mentioned, your readers should know that it's a paid post (a sentence stating this in the first and/or last parts of the post works good), fulfulling the full disclosure part. The post should be objective, giving any good and bad impressions (double meaning for full disclosure).

He also mentioned that he won't do flooring companies, because it's not relevant to his blog. It'll look out of place anyway. Relevancy helps with search rankings too.

And you don't want to do paid posts too often. Your readers are more important than search traffic (from search engines or social media sites). Again, relevancy helps.

Other than those, I think paid posting is fine. If you get adverse comments from readers, then it might be worth rethinking the whole thing. Why don't you give it a try and see what happens?

If your posting frequency is daily, then one paid post every fortnight or even once a week (stretching a little) should be ok.

If I could be eligible for most paid blogging, I'd totally hop on the band wagon. I don't really blog enough, myself, so I don't have as much oppourtunity as others do. I actually kind of enjoy reading a few of them. DIC's own Firestorm and Markodageek make them very entertaining.

If we are playing by radio rules, look at Paul Harvey. He's one of my favourite radio broadcasters. He has great stories to tell, and at the same time, he makes his advertisements totally listenable.

Excuse me, who stopped you???



I totally agree with OrcaSquall.



I do some paid posting via PayPerPost, I do have a full disclosure, and I blog so much that if you're a normal reader you usually can't tell what's paid for and what's not...

Ok well maybe you had a big part in stopping me from doing the opportunity. But I didn't want to post it, I had to be stopped.

I felt kind of weird when I wrote my first sponsored post, but I have laid down some ground rules for myself which pretty much look like what OrcaSquall posted, and I don't stop myself from sleeping because I made a few bucks for a few words.

She would indeed, but then my mom is a notorious thieving drunk who'd cheerfully stick a swizzle stick in your eye if she thought she could lift your wallet as you waited for medical attention.

I think paid blogging is fine...no forces people to blog for pay, and no one forces people to read those blogs. If people can make money from blogging go for it. I don't do it myself, but there's nothing wrong with it in my view.

I dunno but I once worked for an outsourcing company who made me write blogs that I can never call my own. I'd see them on the internet but I can never claim it's mine.