A recent post by content guru Christina Gleason uncovers the dark underbelly of what Google considers good practices for creating link bait. For any of you who don’t know, link bait is simply the act of spreading content on the web (in this case, just like fertilizer) in the hopes that you’ll get people to link to your site. Matt Cutts, head of Google’s webspam team, is an advocate of creating fresh and interesting content as a way to increase rankings. In a recent video , he seems to contradict himself. In the video Mr. Cutts is suggesting using a service called Amazon Mechanical Turk, which many writers feel is akin to a sweatshop that employs writers. Mechanical Turk is dirt cheap, and in my opinion, exploitative. Getting something for nothing because a new technology allows one to do so is not a new idea. Remember when “desktop publishing” took the world by storm? With the proliferation of computers that could handle graphics-based software, anyone with a Mac or PC was suddenly calling themselves designers, even though they had no formal knowledge of color, typography, design, etc. These self-proclaimed designers also knew nothing about how to price the market and often undercut professional designers, thus turning the design world on it’s ass for a bit. In the short term, it was bad for everyone because these “designers” were churning out terrible logos, websites with animated flames and hard to read content by the bushel load. But as design became more and more of a commodity, clients quickly saw the need to stand out. They realized the adage that “just because it’s cheap doesn’t mean it’s good” and came to their senses, going back to professionals who could tell the difference between a serif, slab and sans-serif typeface and who charged accordingly for their services. I believe we are in the same situation here for the written word. While it may take some time, at least we don’t have to put up with over-animated flames.
Journalism ain’t dead. At least that’s the slant.
Walt Mossberg, personal technology columnist for the Wall Street Journal reports on a new kind of online venture that attempts to blend journalism, advertising, entrepreneurship and social networking all into one big ball of digital wax. The company is called True/Slant and is being helmed by Lewis DVorkin, who previously held the senior VP of programming title at AOL. True slant is home to over 100 contributors, or “Knowledge Experts” who are given a plot of digital real estate where they can plant their best reportings, posts and opinions. But that”™s not all. Each “Knowledge Expert” has the authority to manage and promote their own page and are even expected to interact with and manage their own readers and advertisers alike, hopefully forging bonds with a large crowds of hungry fans which will in turn attract advertisers who are willing to shell out the dough for ad space on the site. These “Knowledge Experts” become in effect mini-publishers who have a real stake in shaping their online property. The contributors get paid to write stories, but also share in ad revenues generated on their page and if they”™re good enough, may even get equity shares. Not a bad business model. But is it a good idea to mix advertising and journalism? Some think it raises ethical questions. I think it pushes the envelope and may give newspapers some ideas on how to actually get paid for what they do. It”™s a fresh and new approach to journalism, and what better time to try something that”™s never been done before.