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| GeoCommunity Mailing List |
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| Mailing List Archives |
| Subject: | RE: [gislist] Just one GIS publication? |
| Date: |
01/08/2004 12:35:01 PM |
| From: |
Dimitri Rotow |
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>
> Dimitri,
>
> If you find the SpatialNews and other on-line publications who charge for
> services annoying, simply do not subscribe. There is nothing dishonest
> about how we operate our newsfeed.
>
I have no idea how SpatialNews operates these days, which is why I did not
mention it. In the past, SpatialNews did not tell its subscribers that the
so-called "newsfeed" was not an impartial report of GIS industry news but
was, in fact, a 100% paid advertising service. If that is still the case
(one assumes it is, given your touchy response), I think it is dishonest to
send people paid advertising when they think they signed up for a bona fide
journalistic service.
Since you chose to conclude your email to me with a threat (see below), let
me reply at length so you understand why I feel it is dishonest to send spam
or paid advertising masquerading as journalism.
I don't think there is anything wrong with charging for services (such as
subscriptions, advertising, etc) - it just so happens that both ethics and
the law require you to be truthful about what product is being delivered.
If you are providing what you claim to be "news" you have an ethical and
legal obligation to disclose when it is not news and instead paid
advertising. Otherwise, you should not call it "news." Better call it a
"spamfeed" or "today's advertorial" or "a special promotional bulletin." If
you want to hang your hat on the "hey, if you don't like it don't subscribe"
argument, you still have an ethical and legal duty to inform people when
they are subscribing that they will be getting paid advertising and not
news. It is deceptive to accumulate subscriptions by telling people they
are subscribing to "news" and then send them only paid advertising. For
example, when I first subscribed to SpatialNews I had no idea I was
subscribing not to an impartial news service but instead had been fooled
into signed up for a daily dose of paid advertising. I'd bet many of your
subscribers have no idea that your "newsfeed" is exclusively paid
advertising. I bet a fair number of your subscribers would cancel their
subscription if you disclosed to them that the selection of items was 100%
paid advertising.
>From a business perspective, people don't like getting paid advertising
that's misrepresented as impartial reporting. That's one of the main
reasons why Google has supplanted other search engines: Google never pushes
pages ahead in its results because of payments, while Alta Vista and the
others will show you page ranks based upon advertising payments. When people
found out that Alta Vista and others had their page rankings for sale, they
moved to Google. So, don't be so glib about "if you don't like it, leave"
if you are not willing to tell your subscribers the truth about the material
you send.
As a matter of ethics, the delivery of paid advertising masquerading as
journalism is denounced as a dishonest practise by all journalistic
organizations.
As a matter of law, note that recent FTC decisions and various state
regulatory bodies have also chimed in on this, in some cases labelling it an
"unfair and deceptive" business practise. The new anti-spam laws now
operating at the federal level and within many states may also have an
impact, in that it is generally illegal to get people to "opt in" to email
advertising based on false representations, such as that they are signing up
for "news" and not paid advertising.
> The funds we receive from the SpatialNews enable and support free services
> to the GIS community such as the GISList. As such, I really don't
> appreciate
> your indirect slam of our on-line publication. If such postings continue,
> I'll consider blocking or moderating your postings from the list.
>
> T.C. Herman
> Executive Vice President/Managing Editor
> ThinkBurst Media, Inc.
> 4588 Highway 20 East, Suite A
> Niceville, Florida 32578
> 850-897-6778 (P)
> 850-897-1001 (F)
> therman@thinkburst.com
> www.geocomm.com
> www.wirelessdevnet.com
>
GISList is hardly "free" or altruistic. It is an advertising medium for
your enterprises by virtue of the promotional messages you attach to every
posting. Your strategy is to co-opt the discussion and contributions of
people participating in the list to generate advertising impressions for
your business. The cost for all of us, a very small one, is that we see a
bit of advertising for you at the end of every posting. I don't have a
problem with that, but given that you have been paid with advertising for
your service in hosting the list, let's not have any righteous cant about
how you are running GISList for free.
I refrained from mentioning your SpatialNews product
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