UPDATE: PPP is getting the great press they were looking for. Other than Jim Kukral, who is paying people NOT to blog about PPP, every other trackback at this point on the TechCrunch post, is a PPP love fest. It’s a shame, because it looks to be comment on TechCrunch and Arrington, and that smaller bloggers tend to think he’s lost touch with where they are, more than a real discussion about paying for positive reviews.
In one of the odder stories I’ve seen, PayPerPost is paying bloggers to post on TechCrunch’s latest PayPerPost article.
From one author:
Actually, until 5 mins ago I didn’t even realise there was a war going on. Anyway, PayPerPost are offering bloggers like myself cold hard cash to voice their opinions about a TechCrunch story posted by a dude called Mike.
I can’t wait to see how people respond to this, but early this morning when I read it, it gave me a hearty chuckle. These guys must have some steady money coming in, because I’d think alot of bloggers would jump on this one.
My first reaction to the story is that 1-this fellow doesn’t know who Arrington is. He’s been blogging since July, so it’s not like he’s a ‘just started this month’ kinda guy, though in fairness that is still rather new. Being that he’s a tech blogger I find it highly unlikely that he’s not stumbled upon TechCrunch before. More likely it just didn’t impress upon him the A-list status of Mike and the bunch to the point that he’d remember it. This reminds me that while we put a great deal of stock into A-list and status, the large majority of the blogsphere do not care where we rank.
Of course, I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention that it’s odd that Ted is paying people for a post that he’s not directly getting paid for, and it tells me just how much money he’s raking in to be able to afford to pay bloggers for this fluff piece. However, when you look strictly at the marketing of this, it’s quite smart.
I wonder how many bloggers will sign up today to write this piece. Clever Ted, clever… Oh, and I’m NOT getting paid to write this post, by the way.
This is great advertising for PPP.
They’re taking a note from reviewme.com’s self-hype.
[...] I did get a nice little write up on the Practical Blogging website. Indeed, I was quite honoured that my story was one of the “odder” stories the author had seen. [...]
engtech, I know what you mean. However, they get no link love from me. I refuse to link to them.
On one hand, I’m glad bloggers are getting a buck. On the other, it seems so phony.
PPP could clean up their act, but they won’t. These are the same people who sold their Digg account (top 100) to the highest bidder. Mindcomet is their parent company.
My first time here,nice work.
Paying for Bloggin doesn’t fly. Too many self-directed interests. Paying undermines trust, authenticity can be questioned, once this happens the value of the content is comprimised, once the content is comprimesed well you get the point. There is no need to inject secondary motivators (ex: money from 3rd parties) It’s like schills in buzz marketing. Paying people to act as if they own the product or like the product. People don’t want to “feel” they are being duped.
I say keep the motives be pure.
Antman, that’s the thing, the reason the blogosphere has real power is that bloggers are, by and large, not corrupted by marketing messages. I’m sure in a few years we’ll be no different from the MSM, worrying about what we write so we won’t offend advertisers, but I hope it takes a long time.