It’s staggering just how ignorant right wing bloggers are about how the business of media works, or business in general. Which wouldn’t be so ironic if they didn’t run around thumping their chests about the virtues of "free markets" and capitalism all the time. They only understand it through their own lens of blasting propaganda, and in characteristic wingnut fashion, are shrieking j’accuse! most loudly about the things they themselves are guilty of.
As someone who actually has a business degree and has made a career of running media businesses, I wrote this in a comment over at Talk Left:
A traditional marketing campaign has two components — paid media and earned media. Paid media (advertising) is purchased, and earned media would be in the form of reviews, articles and other "free" content that a PR department pushes.
AARP, for example, had the "Divided We Fail" campaign. They put millions into buying ads in newspapers and networks, but sent the blogs a press release. Which means that the New York Times fell into the "paid" media category because of an ad buy, but was also counted on to be "earned" media in the form of news. Blogs were simply consigned to the latter.
The reason the New York Times is around to do "earned" media is because they make revenues off of "paid" media. Everyone understands that, it’s just how business works in a capitalist system. And if you look at an advertising campaign for Toyota or Dove or Marlboro, they devote an increasing percentage of each campaign to online advertising. So it’s not like we’re asking anyone to participate in a system that has no benefit to them as advertisers.
The problem is that groups who send us their press releases expecting "earned media" just as they do the New York Times get the same "earned media" from us that they do from the New York Times. The difference is that they aren’t factoring us into their "paid" media budgets, and like the New York Times, without that, we don’t have a sustainable business model to keep offering "earned" media. As groups increasingly depend upon us as the only news outlets covering their issues (which we do without consideration as to whether they advertise with us or not), participating in a sustainable structure is something they need to be thinking about.
Right wing bloggers at the top of the food chain don’t have to worry about this dynamic, because they’re well compensated through a variety of means — and also conspicuously silent on the subject. It’s the toadies on the bottom who churn right wing propaganda for free who are whining, and they clearly don’t understand the financial structure that both traditional media outlets and liberal blogs are operating within.
The allegation that liberal blogs are asking to be paid for content is absurd — letting people know that this is a business does not equal "pay for play." As Aravosis notes, we’ve forged successful relationships in the past with many organizations that encompass both paid and earned media, with no conflict of interest that anyone can point to. We’re capable of covering a subject without being drones programmed by those who have an interest in promoting a point of view about it.
Unlike some.
Related posts:
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- Obama: If Private Insurers are Such Crack Businesses, How Can “Incompetent” Government Put Them Out of Business?
- When Pro-Business Ideology Goes Bad
- Right-Wingers Trash Ted Kennedy While His Body is Still Warm
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ZED!
Right wingers just don’t understand _______________.
Does this mean I have to give back the pony George Soros bought me?
Hey Pups be sure and DIGG Jane’s Post!!
Good morning Jane or for you Jane good afternoon!
The lower rung WingNuts don’t understand much except maybe to oppose anything that the Left is trying to do, never mind basic business 101!
Excellent post, Jane.
More bizness stuff????? Borrrrring. Where’s my daily dose of Michelle Bachman?
Ah this is what we expect of nutwing apparatchniks.
But seriously…………… This is good stuff, jane.
Query: Where to you pigeonhole your appearances on msnbc; c-span? is that even “media”?? free media?
Yeah, wingers — ensuring that potential paid-media outlets are actually also available for earned media by advertising in them is payola. What a crock of losers. Talk about unclear on the concept.
And when has the Weekly Standard ever turned a profit? Human Events? Commentary? They are all wingnut welfare, right? Just the old-fashioned bricks-not-clicks kind.
That’s us sharing our wise and funny founder with the wider world.
I’ve observed over a period of many years that those individuals who trumpet their business acumen the loudest (”free markets, low taxes, less regulation, blah, blah, blah) are the the same ones who tend to make the stupidest, most breathtakingly incompetent business decisions. Nor, generally speaking, do their egos permit them to listen to more informed voices when there is still sufficient time to correct their blunders. I’m certain the same dynamics are at play in the cases you are describing here. Never mind the facts. Yes, it can be quite exasperating, lemme tell ya…
Well written Jane.
Thank you. We are working on gathering a donation to send your way.
Are you addicted? There are cures for that you know. The new stop-listening-to-Bachman patch can be applied anywhere (the butt is recommended) and causes you even greater nausea than would normally experience listening to her.
LOL. In a way I am. I used to think “Jeez, she can’t get any loonier.” And she always did. Now I’ve come to expect it and am disappointed when I don’t get it.
Oh. It’s good to share.
It occurs to me that jane’s pissed about this maybe.
I just sent some $’s to support this Capitalistic blog!
Do you think she is really a clone of Kathrine Harris?
It’s the model of the Republic Party. As the Party of the Wealthy, Republic leaders long ago figured out that there are not enough wealthy people to win elections. They need those wingnuts, so they keep churning the same social issues, year after year. The wingnuts never notice that Republic leaders don’t intend to really address those issues. Republic leaders can’t afford to lose the issues and thus lose their ability to manipulate wingnuts.
Maybe they were Siamese twins separated at birth?
Murdoch loves him some uberreichwingnut propaganda. That’s why he’s willing to lose $1M (read pump into) per annum on The Weekly Neocon. Wouldn’t be so bad if any of its contributors could actually, like, write. Reworking or reprinting Heritage/AEI papers doesn’t count as writing in my book.
A business degree??? Jeeze, Jane, you never cease to amaze me! I’m now even MORE in awe of your talents!!
So, slightly OT: I’m a faithful reader of FDL. [Hell, I live on Maui, where the local “newspaper” is worse than my son’s high school rag.] I’m a former [long former] securities lawyer. I read Ian Welsh and others here. But at least I have never seen, or seen a link to, a good “Derivatives for Dummies” piece.
Is there one? Are there a series of them? I can patch together some elements from my prior work, but I refuse to believe that “it’s all just too complicated for you Little People” like the Big Boys say.
I’d really like something that will help us refute the “Give Us ALL the Money or Your World Will Collapse” tripe from Geithner et al. Why?
Thank you in advance for your help.
I can point to my wingnut boss as a concrete example of the clueless businessman. If the business didn’t run itself (read by the agents and bookkeepers) he’d have been in deep shit many moons ago. This is a guy who leveraged over $100K in WorldComm, or Global Crossing, I forget which, after the stock bubble had already started to collapse. Lost his shirt and damn near lost his house.
They both have that clinched look. You know, the look of being “off meds”.
Couldn’t say. Their… should we say… attributes… are certainly disimilar.
Have you read Matt Taibbi’s Rolling Stone’s article. It is a great overview of the entire mess.
Richard Wolff was featured on Alternative Radio this morning. Casino Capitalism. Very interesting talk.
Bachmann is adopted…so it raises all sorts of possibilities.
That was my first thought. I sent that piece to many people who are not bidnis types.
I know the type.
How many times have tyou run into a successful person, talking shit about… fill in the blank…. gays, blacks, women, immigrants, unamerican liberals, weak-on-defense liberals… and almost uinoversally, they giot their money from daddy. never had to do shit themselves. all this stuff jane is talking about, for me, can be distilled to 2 words.. George Bush. (W).
Thank you!
Re: Social Issues. Here’s wingnut biblical marriage between one man and two women:
If a man have two wives, one beloved and the other hated, and they each have born him childen, and if the firstborn son be hers that was hated, he must acknowlege the son of the hated as the firstborn by giving him a double portion of all that he hath for he is the beginning of his strength; the right of the firstborn is his. Deuteronomy 21:15 – 17.
Looks like the online version of the story has been reduced to a 2-page excerpt. Before the issue came out the whole thing was online. Sure am glad I printed it out.
My pleasure!
My right-wing fundamentalist record-store boss was for years stealing product from the store he managed (for other right wing, though not so fundamentalist, bosses), trading them at firesale prices for his mountain and racing bike hobby (as well as other items). We (or at least I) always wondered how he could afford his gigantic house…apparently he had no other expenses. He would come in after hours, take a few records and CD’s, and store them at home.
Even more amazing was that most of the other businesses in town (run by many people in his church) knew that he was doing this. He had “exchange credit”. I always wondered why we had such high “loss” in certain musical genres (New Age, Christian, Country) but he kept encouraging we order more. It was because that was what people were getting as “gifts”…and cutting into our sales column. The store eventually went under.
Can’t remember exactly how this question came up but………….
Who the spit pays for the running of that piece of trash named politico?
The Taibbi Rolling Stone article is the best piece I’ve read on the topic of the Bush era engineered economic meltdown and its continuance under Geithner, et al.
I have passed it along to my atty who is a friend of freshman FL Congresswoman, Suzanne Kosmas. I think he will be inspired to share it with her.
No doubt he asked for forgiveness from Jesus and is still saved.
what about the conservatives who focus strictly on fiscal conservatism, that sacrificed in life in order to get ahead and employ others and do go for themselves, yes, but also charities, their workers and suppliers not to mention communities as a whole. I find it upsetting that people will classify all conservatives in a certain negative light when these same people will scream discrimination or or other unjustice when talking that all muslims are terrorists, or all people on welfare are sucking off the system. Individuals from all beliefs and background make errors. Blame individuals not sectors of people.
Right-wing fundamentalist do love the Christian escape clause.
Both Parties are full of GREED and should get a good lashing…!!
thanks for the heads up. here’s a link for you (although you may have it, i just came across it – it was recommended in a thread of an australian economist’s blog)
http://anarchism.pageabode.com/afaq/index.html
epu’ed but thought i’d throw the links out there.
Ultimately, I think that it’s more disturbing than that. The most ferociously ‘free market’ right wingers that I know protect their interests by paying TAX DEDUCTIBLE campaign contributions to an assortment of PACs as ‘business expenses’.
So in addition to howling about ‘free markets’ and their benevolent, magical powers, they refuse to admit that those markets are regulated — or not! — by the people whose elections they fund, while writing off those very same contributions as ‘business expenses’.
That’s what we’re all up against.
Corrupt to the core, and in need of sunlight.
Limbaugh, Hannity, Coulter et al describe themselves as conservatives, nay, as the only true conservatives. If they’re shining examples of conservatism they deserve all the contempt the American people can heap upon them. Are you equating fiscal conservatism with fiscal responsibility? If so, I suggest you inform those in Congress over the last 10 or so years who have called themselves fiscal conservatives. Conservatives, by definition, want either to maintain the status quo or return to what they consider better times, like the Gilded Age of the robber barons. That’s why they’re referred to as reactionaries. Me, I’d rather be a revolutionary.
Now that I’ve fed it, I’m going back to work.
BTW: Is there any super-simple way to upgrade my monthly donation? Or do I have to basically start from ’square 1′ again as if it were a brand new contribution…?
I’ve been in there several times but don’t see how to easily change the monthly amount… Best to cancel the existing and then start over?
What’s simplest?
I’d give but I haven’t worked in over a year and half now. Sorry. I also had lung cancer 6 years ago. I’m sorry for that too. I also spoke the truth to blogs. I’m sorry for that too. Please have mercy on me. Don’t ban me like Americablog and DailyKos.
Yes greed and corruption are all over but again these are individuals that betrayed what they said they supported (i.e. fiscal conservatism) They do deserve all the crap they get and it is coming from the right as well. There is a push to return to the good times and yes there are many mindless drones who go along with anything because it was said by a republican and against anything said by a democrat. I look at personal finance and equate that to the government and many businesses and government are looking for next quarter results instead of taking smaller pain now in order to get larger rewards later. If the American people as a whole were better at understanding their own money then maybe those who get elected might also have this ability when they are given the power to control the nations money.
That would be the only way I know of — sorry it’s creaky, but do appreciate the support.
Jane, I’m sorry for criticizing this pitch for money, but it just seems so much like church where the preacher says he rarely preaches about tithing, then proceeds to do so. I’m sorry you have fallen on such hard times at Firedoglake. I too have had it kind of rough since I got lung cancer in 2002. I haven’t worked in over a year now so I can sympathize with you. I’m sorry if you think I don’t care.
Peace!
Excuse me. I’m not a troll here (though I do comment infrequently), but you’re absolutely wrong. How the hell is saying:
Not corrupt?
Look, I have no problem with promoting fundraising for a political candidate or an interest group. The problem comes when you are tying your coverage of a candidate or an interest group with that candidate or interest group paying you, instead of your actual feelings toward a candidate or interest group. That’s completely intellectually dishonest, and that is exactly — explicitly — what you were doing. Real news organizations don’t GET to push advertisers around in such a thuggish and corrupt way. This is a liberal outlet which criticizes Larry Summers (rightly) for having the appearance of doing favors for Wall Street in exchange for the money he’s made from them through public speaking — but people cannot criticize you for expecting advertising dollars in exchange for all the favorable coverage you’ve provided over the years? What?
Please, tell me where I’m horribly wrong and a right-wing troll. All I am is incredibly disappointed in your integrity. And, from my perspective, rightfully so.
Oh, is this supposed to be a satire about that guy from AIG that posted his resignation in the New York Times? If not, can’t you see poverty is all relative? Please be kind.
Peace!
I could not agree more. We have met the enemy and he is us!
Isn’t this what we accused the Bush administration of doing? Fixing the intelligence around the facts? I thought we were better than that. I thought there was a purpose to these progressive blogs. I thought it was about FREEDOM!!! No, it’s about lack of support from the powers that be because we put them in power. Lobby much?
I’m sorry for writing so much, but this just makes me sick. I thought there was a noble purpose to these blogs. I didn’t know it was about the money. Rush says he’s moving his studio from NY to Texas so he doesn’t have to pay so much taxes. Perhaps you and Avarosis should seek advice from his accountants.
I hope that, sooner rather than later, Jane Hamsher and the other bloggers quoted in that blog post apologize for and reject their previous statements. Otherwise, they will have ceased to be legitimate journalists — really.
The people here who find these clearly out-of-line comments perfectly acceptable are no better or less guilty of Dear Leaderism then those who find it impossible to criticize President Obama.
I agree. I’m crushed. I’ve been banned from Americablog for objecting to this pandering. I’ve been banned from KOS for pointing out the hypocrisy. It’s sickening. I know we all have to earn a living. I know these are “private” sites. The only problem with these “private” sites are they are on my internet! If they want to be truly private, start a newspaper. Oh, wait, newspapers are going out of business because of the internet. I wonder if that was the plan all along?
You are completely misunderstanding the difference between the “ask for help” and the “buy an ad.” It’s not a quid pro quo for the message, but a reality of “if you expect someone to be around to help with the message down the road, you’d be better off spending ad money with them.”
If, as Jane already explained, you have a group which is spending a buttload of money on television ad buys for a progressive cause, but spends nothing on progressive blogs for ad buys, why would you expect us not to see that as stupid planning? Especially when that selfsame group might hit up Jane, me, Marcy, and several others here for some ad posting — “please help us spread the word, fundraise for our efforts, and be a good progressive soldier by helping us out!” — except that “help us out” is never a two-way street.
And that’s incredibly short-sighted. Not just for us, but for progressive blogs as a whole — which is the point. Local blogs, especially, are really suffering right now. And with newspapers cutting reporting on the local level on politics, some local blogs are doing better muckraking on corruption than local papers ever have. We don’t have the luxury of that disappearing for all our sakes and yet? If they take ad revenue from people who ought to see the value in that, they somehow fail a purity test? That’s just nuts, I’m sorry, but it is.
There is no effort at sustainable progressive infrastructure. None. Where there is an offer of funding, it’s often made with big strings attached to it — and we simply do not do that, thank you very much. (I mean hell, when the telecom immunity fight was going on and the people who wanted to squash it bought ads on the blog, we spent time mocking them every damned day. Yeah, so bought and paid for…)
Why is it insulting to say “if you are going to throw money around, be smarter about where you throw it and stop shooting yourself in the foot.” Or would you rather progressive blogs disappeared altogether and we all walked around in lock-step getting our message from the Rahm-approved machinery? No thank yew.
Why should Jane or any of the others apologize for stating the truth? It costs money to run a blog and do it well. Contrary to the fantasies of BillO and others, George Soros does not give all the bloggers on the left a stipend. Jane and others don’t get the daily talking points faxed to them from Rahm Emanuel or Paul Begala or such.
FDL is a business. It makes money on advertising. So Jane and others decide to remind folks of that fact and that makes those of us who understand the process guilty of “me-tooism?”
What you would have everyone do? Live in glorious poverty in total isolation because no money was available to allow for the message that Jane and the others present to get out?
And, FWIW, so there is no question whatsoever on this: no one has ever paid me to write about a particular topic for them; no one has ever offered to do so; no one has ever fed me content that they expected me to print verbatim (in fact, the few people who have sent me talking points information have found that I’m relentlessly annoying about asking them to back it up with supporting factual material, so people don’t even bother any more); no one has ever stipulated that I write a particular opinion on anything — and Jane has never, ever asked me to back up an advertiser here or elsewhere or asked that I pull a punch on any advertiser. Ever.
Making a mountain out of a nonexistent molehill doesn’t make it so. And it also doesn’t pay our server bills.
Well why have a blog for progressive causes? I thought it was the cause, not the money? I’m not missing anything. You have posed yourselves as knights of the round table fighting for a noble cause. Now you want paid or what? You’re not going to support noble causes or what is “right”? One thing I can say for Firedoglake, at least I’m not banned, yet.
I didn’t realize how much they relied on real reporting that the people writing on blogs create. The owners of “teevee” nooz are deathly afraid of the blogs because they are outclassed even by some of the worst blogs in reportage. I never thought about how much traffic you all get from the poor folks stuck at a paper that has no budget, no investigative staff, no conscience. It is also a testimonial to the great blogs by seeing how fast the MSM picks up on what you have said, and then attacks it.
The end of the NYT and the WP may precipitate a more general ignorance in this country. If the net goes down, there will be no truth except in Pravda.
It’s just so icky.
Look, I understand that blogs have to make money. I know it “costs money to run a blog and do it well,” as the poster below you said so informatively. I understand you need money. But seriously, just take a look at this phrase that you say represents the reality of the business: “if you expect someone to be around to help with the message down the road, you’d be better off spending ad money with them.” Um. There is a difference between asking for advertising and explicitly tying that advertising to coverage, which these bloggers have been doing repeatedly.
I work for a newspaper. I would never make a comment like “if you expect us to help with your message down the road, you’d be better off spending ad money with us” — even if I agreed with the message the advertiser was promoting. Good for you for not taking the money of the telecom companies. That hardly makes you pure here.
It’s because you may not understand that some people want everyone to benefit because it helps all of us in kind. Please realize that freedom of speech is an issue that we revere. I hope that helps you understand. I am not however, speaking for FDL or anyone but myself.
Can’t it be a caring about the cause that allows folks to also earn money to pay bills? Why should this be mutually exclusive?
Or do you think that in order to be credible, everyone who purports to believe in a progressive environment should all take vows of poverty and be pure and untainted by any thoughts of money and profit?
If the net goes down, there will be no truth except in Pravda.
Who do you think owns the “net”? This asking for “donations” for doing what they say they is their “cause” has got me now thinking all kinds of conspiracy theories.
Is there a plan to keep us divided so there is always turmoil? What will it take for us all to really join together? A donation or ad from the Democratic party?
What in the hell is happening? We’re eating our own!!!
That’s because a newspaper isn’t in the business of working on political causes, are they? But we are. We do activism for the issues that are important to us. If you haven’t noticed that about us, then you haven’t been reading here very long.
Hell, I had people calling Congress this morning because the Senate is pissing me off on legal nominations and we’re about to have a live chat about that in a couple of minutes. Why am I doing it? Because it’s the right thing to do and it’s an issue I believe in passionately. Does it help progressives to have better legal minds in place to do work we think is important? You bet.
Does that make a difference for progressive organizations? Yes, it does. That’s reality. Is anyone else pushing calls on this right now? No. Why? Hell if I know, but they should be — which is why I started doing it.
Can I keep doing it if we can’t afford server costs? No.
We do original reporting here, we also do political activism. It’s a bit of a hybrid. And if progressive groups want places like FDL, Dkos, and others — especially local blogs — to continue doing what they do? Does it make sense to support them or not? You tell me.
The net is smaller than imagined. I’m now banned from Americablog, Crooks and Liars, and Dkos. Let’s see, my shortcuts are alphabetical, that means Eschaton is next. Then FDL. I am truly a hideous monster. As Patrick Henry once said, “Give me liberty, or place an ad!”
Peace!
You’re right, I haven’t been reading FDL for very long. I thought you were journalists — not lobbyists. Perhaps I was seeing you in the wrong light.
Really, I agree with you that it makes sense for progressive organizations to advertise with you. Stop knocking down straw men. What doesn’t make sense — what’s unethical — is for you to tie your coverage to the promise of that advertising. Which Jane Hamsher clearly did.
I think Jane is right about the double standard between print and new media. However, there are other groups that buy ads. There must be something Firedoglake readers buy more of than a similar size random group of people. There are probably some stereotypical things, but there are probably some surprising things like annuities or something like that.
I must however give a donation to FDL for allowing me to post. I wonder how many other posts critical of this call for funds have been deleted from the sites that have banned me? Honest, that’s all I’m posting about is this astonishing loss of innocence. No vulgarity, just pointing out the hypocrisy and how it must seem to us idealists. This is what it takes to get banned? I feel like I’ve been hit with a MAC truck.
Peace!
No, she didn’t. Which she explained above — what she said was, if they are going to send us all this crap and constantly ask for help on issues, then they have to also understand a need to support the site revenue when they do an ad buy.
She never said anything — nothing — about a quid pro quo. You are reading that in yourself.
You yourself said “if you expect someone to be around to help with the message down the road, you’d be better off spending ad money with them.” That is an implied quid pro quo, wouldn’t you say?
No — it’s reality. Without revenue, how in the hell do you think the servers keep on humming along? Prayers and faeries?
If they expect blogs to be here to do any messaging on anything, then some of that ad revenue had better be spent on blogs. It doesn’t have to be FDL — there are a whole host of blogs, large and small, who are barely making a go of it right now. And a lot of these groups buy ads with the NYTimes that cost $50K for a full page ad. Imagine for a moment how far an ad buy of a tiny fraction of that size could go toward server expenses for a blog.
Then tell me that it doesn’t matter that they think about infrastructure concerns. It’s apples and oranges. And you just keep reading in something rotten when it simply isn’t there.
Let me type this slowly: THERE IS NO QUID PRO QUO.
Blago, cough, cough.
Hey, I’m an out of work IT technician. I have been out of work for over a year now. Whatever you are paying your IT people, I will keep your servers up and running for $10,000 less a year because I believe in your cause. So, when do I start?
Stop pretending that the only source of your advertising has to come from non-profit organizations in return for “helping with the message down the road.” First of all. Let me say once again: I have no problem with the site making money.
Secondly. Read this sentence: “If they expect blogs to be here to do any messaging on anything, then some of that ad revenue had better be spent on blogs.”
Yes, “if they expect blogs to be here to do any messaging” — i.e. if they expect the blog to continue to be able to exist, as in keep functioning, as in be able to keep the servers going and help to build better infrastructure in the progressive movement overall by helping that sustain — then some of that ad revenue had better be spent on blogs — i.e., see above.
How is that hard to understand.
Unless you are reading some sort of threat, implied or otherwise in there, which I didn’t intend. That’s the only possible way I can see your misunderstanding have any sentient logic. I’ll keep working on these issues as long as I can because I believe in them. But where there is a finite revenue pool — and believe me, we have been working our asses off to get any of it, corporate, progressive, ad bloc remnants, google, you name it — why would we not want to push progressive groups with the money to buy ads to buy ads from progressive blogs?
Why is that so hard to understand? Seriously?!? I’m missing whatever it is that has a bee in your bonnet, because there is no quid pro quo. Not for me, not for Jane nor anyone else who writes here. I can’t speak for the entire progressive blogosphere, but there sure as hell is no quid pro quo here.
If anything, I get occasional screaming hate mail from several leadership folks for pushing things too much.
Isn’t this kind of the “best and brightest” bullshit wall street is feeding us? What’s next, Christy Hardin Smith is going to write a resignation and quit being a blogger so she can be an attorney full time?
Let’s see, a blogger’s income versus an attorney’s income. I definitely see why you’d chose to be a blogger.
I’m sorry for being so snarky, but you really must read what you’ve been writing. It’s like AIG, only bigger. At least we knew AIG was looking to get rich.
Maybe we should audit the FDL books?
Blago!
You haven’t been around here long, have you? I have lupus and can no longer practice full time. Any other wounds you’d like to rub salt in or are you done being a flaming asshole for the day now?
PJ70: I hope the [edited by mod] don’t hear about your whizbang theory about how this place works.
No I haven’t been around here long, maybe only a couple years. I had lung cancer in 2002 and was fired from my job where I was “Quality Employee of the Month” six months before my diagnosis and fired three months after returning from my operation to remove the upper lobe of my right lung. I have since 2002 been unable to find suitable employment because no one wants to hire a 56 year old man with half a lung missing. Any other wounds you’d like to rub salt in or are you done feeling sorry for yourself like ME?
I’d encourage you to re-read the beginning of the blog, because it is true in my experience that right-wing Think Tanks, right-wing judicial candidates, right-wing property rights candidates, right-wing ‘repeal regulations’ advocates are able to find funding through corporate interests. I’d add that those corporate interests, in my observation and experience, get TAX WRITE OFFS for supporting those blatantly political entities. They ‘buy’ speech online, in symposiums, yadda, yadda.
What has happened to newspapers is an absolute tragedy, and IMVHO there are outstanding news reporters all over the country who are being asked to carry the weight of what are — in retrospect — huge amounts of debt incurred by owners. (FWIW, that also occurred in the retail business back in the 1980s.) In the 1980s, newspapers were regarded as ‘cash cows’ and they were bought up by people who viewed them as ‘businesses’ and put the bean counters in charge. (At least, that’s what I hear second-hand from friends.)
I do not receive any tax breaks for my newspaper subscriptions.
I also do not receive any tax breaks for the meagre pennies that I occasionally toss toward FDL.
Meanwhile, every single day in this nation, people with extremely conservative views, who offshore money to avoid paying the taxes that support military, education, research, food safety, courts, yadda, yadda, use tax breaks to fund right wing media and blogs.
THAT’s what Jane was pointing out.
I honestly think that she was posing a question: why is it that the people on the right wing have the luxury of not having to support themselves? How does that affect what they write about, and what they say?
I don’t believe that we’d see anywhere near the number of right-wing blogs if they were required to be self-supporting. They’re not self-supporting.
As for ad revenue: the Internet, because you can identify click volumes and patterns, in many respects provides advertisers far better information about target audiences, about how well their ads are working, and about what people respond to than the inert teevee box.
You might find this a good starting spot for more about web metrics: http://oreilly.com/catalog/9780596515089/
If you don’t do web metrics at your paper, someone is — and you might find it an interesting topic.
There’s a solid case to be made that smart advertisers use the Toobz, both at newspaper sites and blog sites. At least, if they’re smart and know their business, they do.
Moderator: I used that particular example to illustrate the
absurdity of PJ70’s assertion that an entity placing an
advertisement here would impact the content of the site.
You’re just lucky it’s not up to a vote of the “regulars.”
And, with your repeating the Honor Roll of where you’ve been banned, it seems like you’re just begging for it here.
We get it; you don’t get it. Don’t expect us — particularly those of us who’ve been around for a fair amount of time –to come around to your “point of view.”
And, did you ever pause to query why you’ve been banned?
I don’t mind Google text ads as much as other kinds of ads. Just don’t “go out of business”. I like having FDL around.
No I get all too well. It’s all about the “regulars”. The regulars. What do you call the regulars on the “other” side? That’s right, you say it’s all about the villagers to them, don’t you?
See, I get it. The “regulars” don’t get it. You are becoming what they are. That happens with power. That happens when every one is hanging on edge to see who the next blogger is that going to get to be on national tv. You’ve become successful and now you want more.
Where will the new truth tellers come from now that the Netroots have advanced to the next level? I guess that’s what they mean by evolution. Even the best of intentions become corrupted. Say no more, say no more.
Peace!
Right wing bloggers are still honoring their parents stories of the great republican deppresion. Got to keep working 24-7, never mind what that FDR and those Teamster Unions get. You’ll never go hungry working at the old sweat shop, and you can have a crust of bread and such! Grandpa Walton will buy another politician, and invade a new country every month with multi-national, TLC ( tri-lateral commision ), Henry the K. sponsored, New World Order, capatalist leverage. Never mind the well being of the revolutionary middle-class nation state it sprang from; or the mercantile chains it boasts’ of breaking with Britain, and the tobaco standard. We’re going GLOBAL, its unpatriotic not to finance, write off, and drive a SUV. Just think of that global pension stock fund money getting ripe!