It’s that little “Blog Honour” badge, bottom right of my blog. I put it there after reading Stowe Boyd’s comments about Pay Per Post, and finding that honor badge on his blog. I actually couldn’t care less about my pagerank, it’s the principle of the thing, I’m metaphorically tilting at windmills just like all the other bloggers who wish people would quit making a mess of the web as they try to monetize it.
To get an idea of how roiled up the blogosphere got about this PayPerPost “Payola” scheme, count the trackbacks to the original Techcrunch post. Mike has blogged about it about it serveral times since, and it’s a controversy that PPP definitely encourages (even to the point of paying payola for people to post their point of view), because as they know, it’s all about the PageRank.
This is a from from a comment I recently made on TechCrunch, in which I indulged in an awful lot of alliteration:
For those of you who simply think Arrington has an Agenda related to his Advertising, I think you’re wrong.
People, PPP = Paid Pagerank Pollution. That’s really what it’s all about so far as I can see. I’m stunned nobody has used the “P” word in this thread so far. I mean, that’s the Point of all this, isn’t it?
The Pagerank algorithm doesn’t care if the reviewer said something sucked or not. All links are good links, more or less, in the same way that all publicity is good publicity, more or less. So it makes perfect sense to allow bloggers to pan the product they’re linking too - just so long as they link to it.
I’m presuming that most of the PPP customers are being advised by their SEO people (or are in fact SEO people themselves) because PPP links seem like a perfect way to drum up pagerank in a way that must be very difficult for Google to defeat. Of course over time they will figure out some algorithm for detecting PPP shills, er, agents, er, whatever they’re called, and will mark down their pagerank accordingly, but there will always be more willing to play the game. (For those of you new to this game, your site’s pagerank depends strongly on incoming links, and it is the #1 traffic driver on the net)
Now, if everyone declared on their posts that they were PPP agents in a distinctive and clear way, then Google could automatically discount those links as meaningless for the purposes of pagerank calculation, which would mean that the smart SEO people would stop recommending PPP, and eventually advertisers would pay a lot less per post.
So, I don’t think PPP will do that.
But Google has so much data they could just work it out algorithmically. Ie if PPP got *too* popular Google might just start watching for where known PPP shills link to, and detect new shills based on noting which other blogs link to the same place at the same time. All known shills could them have their pagerank docked from then on (pagerank is transferable via links, so if a source is “tainted” the easiest way to tweak the results is probably to decrease the PR of the source). However I suspect it would have to be making a genuinely large distortion in the search results before Google would care, and in reality Google no longer cares so much about search quality since they probably sell more adword clicks against bad natural results, and they’re so far ahead of the others on search quality at the moment it’s not really to their advantage to “try harder” in this regard.
So if Google doesn’t really care, what’s The Problem?
The problem is the collateral damage. I consider a business to be morally wrong if it destroys more value than it creates. And paying others to do the destruction for you is even worse. Currently PPP is slowly dragging down the average value and pagerank of all blog content - blogs are becoming just that little bit less trusted as sources of unbiased information, which is what everyone is looking for. However, balanced against that are the PPP agents who actually put a bit of thought into their post, are honest about the fact that they are being paid (and being honest means saying so within the post, or right next to it - posting a policy somewhere no one looks does not cound), and create little nuggets of value.
My strong hunch is that at the moment PPP does more harm than good. If they forced their agents to be transparent then it would swing back the other way and on average they would be creating value, but then they would probably make less money. So let’s watch and see what they do.
But giving it some more thought, I’m going to be more condemnatory. Mr Arrington gets it exactly right when he says that “their disclosure policy is like the Tobacco Industry sponsoring tobacco research“. Essentially, they’re damning themselves with this dangerous “disclosure” duplicity.
5 comments ↓
Nail on the head, IMO.
Seth, Your closing swipe at disclosure policies doesn’t make sense to me (a PPP investor and Disclosure Policy advocate). Take issure with PPP if you like (or more appropriately, bloggers who use PPP in a manner you disagree with), but a disclosure policy framework is the critical step towards a long-term CGM transparency solution.
Starting with the assumption that most people want to be honest (you may debate that), the root of the transparency problem is mismatched audience and blogger expectations. If all audiences had the opportunity to read the Disclosure Policy of the sites they find/frequent and then hold bloggers accountable to what they promise then we’re getting somewhere. Until then, bloggers can claim they make no such promises and/or claim different disclosure promises as the mood/issue hits them (as TC and other A-listers do regularly).
The honor pledge you embrace is a crock of static, fuzzy language that was created by an affiliate link pusher. Given that affiliate links actually provide an incentive to deceive (blogger only gets paid if they convince audience to click/buy) but sponsored posts provide no payment for specific clicks, I think you’re confusing your PPP/disclosure arguments.
A Disclosure Policy framework is key to matching blogger/audience expectations and moving towards a more transparent world of consumer generated media. DisclosurePolicy.org provides a central place to share best practices and create a DP. There is even a tool to kickstart a DP that should be customized to match blogger practices and voice. It’s a beta version and improvement feedback is encouraged. New bloggers can learn from your transparency experience/input. Heck, adopt one yourself and link to it alongside your honor pledge.
I can see why you’re concerned about PPP — there are plenty of arguments for all sides. I’d suggest that not blind you to the potential of a ubiquitous Disclosure Policy framework.
Keep the ideas flowing…
Dan, most people want to make a living, and they’re willing to do most things if there’s a general impression that it’s ok. I don’t really have a big problem with them, not everyone is a moral sophisticate, but everyone needs to put dinner on the table.
I do have a problem with your Disclosure Policy, because it fails to distinguish between accepting advertising and paid splogging. Specificly, under step 2 “compensation”, you use this phrasing
“This blog accepts forms of cash advertising, sponsorship, paid insertions or other forms of compensation.”
So essentially you’re trying to say that the practice of splogging requires *exactly the same* disclosure statement as having clearly deliniated advertising content.
And that’s just wrong.
I strongly perfer the wording in the Blog Honor pledge, even if it is a bit heavy handed.
—–
I promise to attempt to disclose or clearly mark any content or advertisements or other monetization attempts that help me keep my blog operating
I pledge to never write “fake” blog content solely for the purpose of trying to generate revenue without complete and clear disclosure. With exception, my blog may exist for business purposes, therefore I use it to talk about products & services that relate to my business, thus assisting me in generating leads & sales for me indirectly
—–
It *had* occured to me that I’d better check into the agenda of the the people who wrote that pledge, so that I could be sure I was giving pagerank to the right people - now that you’ve pointed out they’re not necessarily squeaky cleam themselves, I’ll check them out and probably just write my own pledge.
It looks to me like the Blog Honor pledge is mainly a reaction against PPP and although not far from how I feel I think it’s got the wrong focus. I’m a bit busy right now but I’ll ping you once I’ve had a chance to work on my own version.
Hey Seth,
Actually, all I’m suggesting is we move towards a Disclosure Policy framework. I think your wording suggestions are great — just call it a Disclosure Policy. The DP Generator is only supposed to move people in the right direction, but the result is supposed to be edited to match a blogger’s actual practices, affiliations and voice — as you are doing. Tools, however rudimentary, are often helpful to drive change.
In your blog’s case, I don’t even see any commercial content, but the concept of a Disclosure Policy still holds true. If readers can always look for a “Disclosure Policy” link they know where to start matching expectations. It also gives you a common place to signal if you ever start taking commercial content, affiliate links, non-cash comp (free product, free passes etc.).
Just like Privacy Policies, there could be a day when the mere absence of a Disclosure Policy could signal “reader beware”. Even that communication is progress from mismatched expectations today. Until then, I am advocating we move in the right direction of customized Disclosure Policies…thanks for taking the time to consider DisclosurePolicy.org and I’d love to see what you draft and link from your site.
I find this whole PayPerPost thing fascinating. I had never heard of it until today. I love blogging and the thing I love about it is that it is so real. It would be a sad day if blogs ever descended to the level that so many other forms of communication have descended.
I decided to come to your blog because I really enjoyed what you had to say over at TechCrunch.You have a good blog here. Keep up the good work.
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