Following up on AK DougJ’s post about the noble search for readers at Politico, I thought John Gruber at Daring Fireball got it about right:
[…] Pageviews, as a metric used for directly billing advertisers, are a scam. Publishers game it with sensational link-bait articles and bullshit tricks like breaking articles into multiple “pages”. Advertisers get stuck paying for valueless impressions. Readers get stuck with the sensational bullshit articles, the tricks (like breaking single articles into multiple “pages”), and suffer through too many annoying ads surrounding actual content.It is, as Jim Coudal and I argued at SXSW, a race to the bottom. Be careful of the “everyones” who say pageviews are imperfect but the best we can do. They’re the ones who are happy with the web as a market for bullshit.
Politico, of course, splits their stories. As for sensational bullshit articles, it’s been known to happen.
WereBear
Wherever there are systems, there are people gaming it. It’s in the DNA.
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
All I have to say to this:
is ‘Say it isn’t so Joe!’ ;)
These practices are all a part of being in the glorious free capitalist market. If there is a way to screw with something and make a buck by screwing someone else then it must be a good thing.
Freedumb bitchez!
ornery curmudgeon
Oh! Oh!
Would posting inflammatory accusations without even minimal due-diligence against a fellow Progressive organization be an example?
It’s been known to happen.
Maybe I missed the apology, and if so, I’m sorry too.
ploeg
If you’re putting out pure linkbait, people aren’t going to click to page 2, and soon they’re going to look at where the link is going and they aren’t going to click to page 1. It’s everywhere and always an exceedingly stupid idea to debase the currency, and then do things so that you have less of that currency coming in as time goes on.
DougL (frmrly: Conservatively Liberal)
@ornery curmudgeon:
Yes, I would think that FDL and Salon count.
someguy
There’s nothing worse than sensationalism to drive up hits, whether it’s lurid headlines, or needlessly starting inane flame wars by aiming inflammatory and arguably inaccurate posts at people who are allegedly on the same side, like Politico has done with Frum and Frum has done with Tunku etc. Sure, it drives traffic, but it’s really exploitative of the readership, and bloggers are supposed to be so over that kind of old media exploitation bullshit…
Oh wait a minute…
rootless-e
The personality issues aside, Glenn Greenwald and others in a certain group of critics of the Obama administration have a political theory that is “surface civil-libertarian”. The basis of many of their critiques of Obama is that he has failed to “restore” a mythical “rule-of-law” in which procedures are followed in a satisfactory way. For labor-left Democrats, this critique is ridiculous since we know that “rule of law” is a function of power, not process and that it is routine for poor people in America to get a boot in the face from our “system of justice”.
TR
I can’t believe you passed on the chance to end this post with “More after the break.”
bkny
add tpm to the list.
pope_grope
um, the splitting pageviews complaint I can understand. But the charge of sensationalism? Every newspaper, magazine, broadsheet, and print publication going back to the Hearst and Pulitzer days has been accused of that.
as the Daily Show’s “America the Book” says: “the term ‘Yellow Journalism,’ was soon shortened to ‘journalism'”
mistermix
@TR: Yeah, that would have been the cherry on top.
Comrade javafascist
Love that Gruber is getting some love from Balloon Juice. Course he’s a Yankees and Cowboys fan so he’s an ass but his take on technology is usually pretty astute.
As for the other stuff, wake me when the circular firing squad is done. I liked it better when it was LGF versus the Insane Clown Poseurs.
LarsThorwald
This goes directly to my comment yesterday that the blogosphere is growing up to fit into the modern American business model. Bloggers battle with each other over issues of money, and blogs are becoming traditional media sites.
Even MTV couldn’t stay MTV forever.
fourmorewars
Re this subject, I have to mention yahoo and their informative homepage thumbnail headline teases, like ‘Hockey player does unusual thing.’
Arkon DougJ
@rootless-e:
I like the terminology “labor-left” Democrats. That’s where I am.
ricky
There is advertising on the internet? Who knew?