In one of my Communication classes last week, the professor brought up something that caught my interest. Apparently, a lot of bloggers get paid to write positive (or negative) opinions about certain products or political candidates.

For example, Coca-Cola paid college students to blog from the Winter Olympic Games in Torino. The six students didn’t have to pay a dime for their plane tickets or hotel stays. However, each of the bloggers had to agree to keep their posts “positive.” Whatever that means.

Why am I not paid to blog? Am I to write about denim leggings and Verizon’s evil monster only for the public good? AT&T should send me a thank you note. Or check.

My work is read mostly by upper-middle-class alumni, parents and students — all within the range of the 18-49 golden demographic. Advertisers should be practically knocking down my door to get a piece of my precious bandwidth.

Besides the fact that being paid to blog on The Spin about a certain product or political candidate would be against the principles of journalism, and choosing to do so would probably result in the loss of a friend (my editor…), the income it would generate would help to pay for a couple outfits from Urban.

However, when I get past all the obvious perks, the idea of getting paid off to blog actually offends me.

Blogging is supposed to be a function of the Web 2.0 phenomenon, not an abuse of it. And as a form of journalism, blogging is most informative, effective and (obviously) genuine when it is unbiased.

My professor, Executive Director of the Center for Digital Democracy Jeff Chester, notes that there is a “fine line between journalists doing work and making a living.” Journalists should be paid for doing their job, but not to advance another organization’s agenda.

In addition to being unethical, paying off bloggers is also a sneaky, manipulative practice. “Not only does the use of digital media by public relations companies and advertisers include social networks, bloggers, YouTube videos completely under the radar — there is a stealth industry of digital influence”, Chester explains.

So, although I’d love to have this hanging in my closet, I will not have anything to do with advancing the agendas of big-time advertisers. Unless doing so would allow me to move up to buying dresses from Net-a-Porter.

Just kidding.

This entry was posted on Wednesday, September 17th, 2008 at 2:53 pm and is filed under Penn. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.