bon , votre weblog modèle est véritablement nice , Je suis recherche tout nouveau thème pour mon moncler doudoune individuels site Web , j’aime vôtre, maintenant Je vais aller recherche le identiques thème !…

feicipet> no doubt bloggers are biased (and opinionated !), there is nothing wrong with this. however even if one is predisposed towards a perception, being balanced is still possible. by balanced, i mean that they should state the facts as it were, and not manufacture facts or to gloss over pertinent points. this notion gets a little more morally incomprehensible when the blog post in question was ‘paid for’ in some form or another.

when it comes to reviews, an honest review should be given. there are many examples of mainstream publications who have made their mark on doing reviews, honest and calling it as they see it without fear or favour. that has actually made them more influential among their readership, and at the same time among manufacturers/developers because its a truly honest review. a review for the sake of getting something positive into a google search is neither here nor there.

in any case, thanx for the comment, mate.

That’s a bit too much to expect, ain’t it? Bloggers used to be, by definition, a person with a website and an opinion. They may gain authority in certain areas based on the consistency of what they write about, but they’re also allowed to be biased. I’m an Android and Linux enthusiast and I write about it on my blog. But I’m not going to write about iPhones or Windows or even attempt to learn more about them in the name of equality or balanced opinion. I’m not required to, unless I state upfront that’s my aim.

Some quarters, though, seem to hold the view that this is not acceptable. Mary Jo Foley, a ZDNet writer focusing on Microsoft, recently bought an iPad and blogged about it. For some reason, it was met with derision by some Apple communities, with snide remarks amounting to how she does not qualify to even make a comparison due to her lack of knowledge of Apple products.

The blogger-for-hire phenomenon is something that affects the other 2 key words in the phrase I lifted above: “Credibility” and “integrity”. Yes, those remain important whatever your blogging interest is.

Marketers and PR agencies will of course try to do whatever they can to ensure that their product gets the appropriate amount of coverage. I think it’s fine that bloggers get press releases and product samples to write about. The positive side of blogging is that the power of numbers can show up disparities in opinions really quick.

If a product is flawed in some way, there will be probably hundreds of blogs covering this issue. 10 bloggers who may be given an incentive to not touch on these issues aren’t gonna make much of a difference. If anything, their bias will be known and it will affect their reputation eventually.

No, I’m not implying that the Maxis10 campaign was an out and out bribe when they decided to let the reviewers keep the review units after they were done. The 2 phone models reviewed so far were fairly able to stand on their own strengths and the reviews were pretty balanced, if lacking a bit in depth. However, I would comment that it may have been better for Maxis to state upfront whether or not the reviewers could keep the review units and under what conditions.

Yes, things can be improved, but as far as the blogs I actually read are concerned, I would say right now it’s more imperative that they learn more about what they’re blogging about than to worry about whether they’re on the take.

Your observations are astute regarding the social media scene. I almost wish we have a ruling similar to the USA’s FTC that makes it compulsory to disclose financial / promotional relationships that a person has with companies they talk about. Unfortunately it will be a while before regulators and marketers wise up.

In the meantime, it’s up to us to help educate our less savvy friends on what they should or shouldn’t believe. Thanks for bringing this into the conversation