Continue reading Rupert Murdoch: The newspaper old guard is arrogant - and obsolete

Rupert Murdoch: The newspaper old guard is arrogant - and obsolete originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Tue, 18 Nov 2008 15:45:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

I often spend a little time over at Blogmaverick.com, where Mark Cuban recently sought to give the world of blogging a little of his insightful perspective. It seems that Mr. Cuban finds little to respect in the world of blogging, or at least in the world of slipshod ,cookie-cutter blogging. Though I found Mark's blog entry a trifle difficult to read, which is quite unusual coming from him, I nonetheless agree with most of the body of his post. I especially agree with his assertion that just because a blog is backed by the name of a well-known media organization does not in itself render that blog worthy of special notice.

Mark Cuban wrote, "...newspapers having 'bloggers' is easily one of the many bad decisions that newspapers have made over the past 10 years." If newspapers are going in a wrong direction by producing blogs, perhaps they need to reinstall the title reporter and drop the title blogger to give a different perspective to the reader. If newspapers are using the term blog simply as a culture hook, then they have it all wrong and they're just selling their reporters short. I believe that I'm in agreement with Mark Cuban when I say that true reporters should be releasing content within some format other than blogs. Blogging is what I do, and I'll be the first to tell you that I'm no reporter. The titles are absolutely not interchangeable, though they may sometimes be used correctly in tandem.

Continue reading Billionaire Mark Cuban offers opinions on blogging

Billionaire Mark Cuban offers opinions on blogging originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Sat, 15 Mar 2008 17:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Yesterday's big lead story in the New York Times (NYSE: NYT) questioning Republican presidential hopeful John McCain's ethics surrounding his relationship with a female lobbyist, was nothing more than a political hit job and not only did it backfire as McCain is raising money off this story but also sent shares of the Times' stock slipping more than 6%.

The Times stopped long ago being the paper that coined the phrase "all the news that's fit to print." The paper has turned into a mouthpiece of the far left wing in not just domestic but also foreign politics. Yesterday's article was a rehashed story from years ago that has been denied by everyone involved. How the editors of this story could have even published it is shocking.

Continue reading New York Times hit-job on McCain hits stock more than McCain

New York Times hit-job on McCain hits stock more than McCain originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Fri, 22 Feb 2008 10:01:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

What's the price of a blogger's soul? In some cases, it's as little as dinner with a guest at a nice restaurant.

According to The Wall Street Journal, "As online food sites become increasingly influential in the restaurant business, chefs and owners are plying bloggers with free meals to get good write-ups. Some are also posting favorable reviews about themselves on popular Web sites or becoming Internet scribes."

This is as clear a violation of journalistic ethics as you will find. Real food critics dine anonymously and pay their own bills -- a known critic is likely to receive special treatment, which of course could make their experience less than indicative of what their readers can expect.

And then there's another problem: Is it really possible to be objective in a review when you aren't feeling the sting of having paid for it?

Blogs are certainly giving the traditional media a run for their money. But in order for the coup to be successful, they will have to adopt some of the ethical standards of the traditional media. For what it's worth, this is the policy for all blogs in the Weblogs Inc. (owned by AOL; includes BloggingStocks) network:

• Bloggers do not receive free products or services from the companies they write about.
• Bloggers do accept review units (e.g., a new cell phone at Engadget, a video game at Joystiq, or a week-long car loan at Autoblog); however, when they're finished reviewing products, they return these items to the manufacturers. If the manufacturers do not take the items back, we give them to our readers. This is the same editorial policy as the New York Times or Wall Street Journal.

Bloggers sell their souls for free food originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Sun, 07 Oct 2007 11:10:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Friday's Wall Street Journal talked about the efforts Democratic Presidential candidates are making to gain favor with some of the blogosphere's most prominent Democrats. Yes, ladies and gentlemen, blogs really are that influential nowadays. Senator Hillary Clinton has even sent her communications director on television to support Daily Kos, a liberal blog that has been highly critical of her campaign.

This got me to thinking: How much longer before lowly business bloggers like me can make an impact on corporate America? I've always wanted to launch a campaign against incompetent management at a company, and use the power of blogging to effect change. I've made several attempts at this here at BloggingStocks, but didn't generate much interest.

I believe that the internet, social networking, and blogging could be the catalysts for tremendous positive change in corporate governance -- something that I would argue is severely lacking at the majority of America's publicly-traded companies. I know of several small, grass-roots efforts that have generated some waves, but nothing major ... yet.

I believe that our day is coming though. Does anyone else here think bloggers are perfectly positioned to take on greedy and lackluster management?

Democrats court bloggers -- Can we gain similar influence in business? originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Sat, 04 Aug 2007 17:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Several sources have confirmed that Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG) is in the closing stages of buying RSS management company FeedBurner. The start-up's traffic has increased over 200% in the past year, according to Hitwise. The company describes its business as Web-based tools to help bloggers, podcasters, and commercial publishers promote, deliver, and profit from their content on the Web.

Websites and blogs use FeedBurner to track RSS feeds and traffic to their sites. Google will pay about $100 million for the company.

The RSS feed business is one that has yet to be monetized, but FeedBurner does have a nascent advertising program. With the use of Google's Adsense program, this revenue could almost certainly be pushed up sharply.

Because FeedBurner is an important source of traffic and data for blogs, it also fits well into the Google Blogger platform, which is used to create millions of blogs. Many of these blogs use Adsense to get their revenue. With Feedburner, Google will have "one-stop shopping" that will offer RSS feeds, audience data, and advertising.

Yahoo! Inc. (NASDAQ: YHOO) and Microsoft Corp. (NASDAQ: MSFT) could have used FeedBurner to enhance their relationship with the blog and RSS communities, but that's another story.

Douglas A. McIntyre is a partner at 24/7 Wall St.

Google's planned purchase of Feedburner could add new revenue originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Thu, 24 May 2007 08:40:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

Bloggers: Get it first, get it fast. Beating old media at its own game originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Fri, 12 Jan 2007 15:00:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

• Apple Computer (AAPL)
• eBay Inc (EBAY)
• Genl Electric (GE)
• Google, Inc (GOOG)
• Microsoft Corp (MSFT)
• Time Warner (TWX)
• Wal-Mart Stores (WMT)
• Yahoo Inc (YHOO)

Continue reading Got perspective, passion and smarts? Bloggers wanted.

Got perspective, passion and smarts? Bloggers wanted. originally appeared on BloggingStocks on Mon, 22 May 2006 18:44:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.