PressEthic

Josh Quittner, Editor of Business 2.0 magazine, is now requiring the journalists at his magazine to maintain daily blogs. To compensate his employees for the extra work -- researching and writing 1 to 2 posts per day -- Quittner has created a payment system in which the Business 2.0 reporters/bloggers will receive additional pay based upon the blog traffic they generate.

In addition to creating new opportunities to sell ads across multiple sites, Quittner said he hopes the new blogs will keep his journalists more engaged and better connected with daily business developments:

"What I'm trying to do here with my folks, who put out a monthly magazine, is allow them to play in both worlds. It allows them to think entrepreneurially. It allows them to mix it up on a daily, hour-to-hour basis with their sources and live in a world of commentary and instant analysis, while, at the same time, becoming better at what they do and bringing those ideas back to the magazine, where they will practice the age-old profession of journalism and go out and report and polish and produce something that becomes the text."

But in a 3 November 2006 appearance on NPR's On The Media, Quittner had to defend the new blogging project when Host Bob Garfield asked if offering Business 2.0 reporters a financial incentive to attract more blog visitors wasn't perhaps inviting trouble.

"Will there not be a temptation for your bloggers to just go for the sort of lowest common denominator and to hit on subjects that are pandering to the readers' baser interests, more down-market, even more sensational?" Garfield asked.

Quittner assured Garfield that he will review the content posted to the blogs to ensure that his reporters are writing about relevant and appropriate business topics.

Unsatisfied, Garfield pressed Quittner about the possibility of reporters relying upon underhanded tricks to increase traffic -- incorporating trigger words to attract higher search engine ratings or establishing linking agreements with other bloggers -- rather than focusing on substantive reporting:

"If there is a financial incentive just to generate traffic, what's to keep your journalists from rigging the game to get more hits as opposed to finding a, you know, more important story?"

Quittner countered that the massive size of the blogosphere prevents rigging schemes from succeeding:

"There's something like 75,000 new blogs being created every day...you're competing for people's attention. It's not easy to rig that."

I, for one, think Garfield's concerns are well-founded. Ethical journalism is founded on a commitment to uncovering and reporting information and news. For individual reporters, this is not an entrepreneurial endeavor, driven by a personal profit motive. Rather, the journalistic mission is more public service-oriented.

Luckily for the information-driven public -- some of us actually derive satisfaction from the continual learning process and creative writing challenges that are part and parcel of journalism. As a result, reporters continue to deliver information for public consumption, and the rest of the world continues to enjoy access to news.

But I would wager that very few journalists joined their profession for the financial rewards. Public glory -- perhaps. Economic benefit -- good luck.

In changing the rules of the game -- and tying individual compensation to blog readership, Quittner is introducing an unpredictable new variable to the journalism equation. Perhaps, as he hopes, daily blogging will make his Business 2.0 reporters agile and better informed -- qualities that will enhance their work within the traditional realm of print journalism.

However, if Quittner's blogging project backfires along the lines Garfield envisions, Business 2.0's reputation -- and that of journalists and bloggers in general -- could be irreparably damaged.