Things are blowing up with Review Me, the site I mentioned in a previous post. It seems that there was some sort of loophole (if you can believe the Review Me spokesperson) that allowed people that didn’t actually own a site to submit said site for whoring out inclusion in Review Me. The full story is on Consumerist; it’s worth checking out. The real deal here is that from an SEO (Search Engine Optimization) point of view, this is a new form of “organic content”. Rather than the traditional approach of contacting bloggers/media and asking if they’d like to review the product, the companies involved are opting to simply buy the attention of the bloggers. The bloggers might claim that the actual outcome of the review isn’t tainted by the money, but stop and think about this for a minute: if the blogger writes an honest and scathing review, what are the odds that he’ll be selected by another company to write a review if his last one was anything less than positive? Someone with money to spend is looking to buy good commentary, period.

Because of this story, I spent a minute looking through nine pages of results for the word “thought” just making sure that none of my Web properties were showing up there. None word. Thoughts Media commentary isn’t for sale.

The problem isn’t that people are getting paid to write reviews, the problem is that they’re not disclosing it properly. Look at one of the sample reviews that they show off: there’s no indication that it’s a paid advertisement until the very end, the last sentence. That’s completely unethical, and if I had read that thinking it was the author’s real opinion and saw that at the end, it would make me doubt the sincerity of what I had just read. It would also make me doubt the integrity of the entire blog. Based on the number of blogs that have signed up for Review Me, it seems there’s more than a few people willing to prostrate themselves at the altar of Review Me.

Is it possible to get paid for something and still be objective? Yes. I don’t consider myself a journalist and do not follow the strict code of ethics that journalists are expected to follow - I routinely get invited to events (Mobius, Featured Communities) where my flight/hotel/whatever is covered. The things I write about those events are my honest, un-biased opinions. But I never assume that everyone is going to believe that, so I’m always clear to state up front that I was invited down to those events, and explain what was paid for - that gives the reader the information they need to filter my comments however they wish. I also reveal what I was given at those events. It’s all about the disclosure. Until Review Me requires that bloggers have a statement of disclosure in the very first part of the “review” (and the blogger doesn’t get paid until that happens), this is nothing more than bloggers whoring themselves out to companies looking for publicity and tricking their readers into thinking their “reviews” are something they are not.

I find myself thinking that I can’t trust the opinions of any Web site or blogger that is partnered with Review Me, and I also would think twice about reviewing a product from any company that was playing bloggers to review it - because people might think that my review was paid for like the other reviews. Companies using the services of Review Me may be shooting themselves in the foot with all legitimate media…

Because the blogging boom continues to grow, and because you have things like Pay Per Post and ReviewMe (this is particularly tricky for instance) popping up, disclosure is becoming a popular topic. I think disclosure is a very, very good thing - but like all things, if it’s not done properly it can be a very, very bad thing. I saw this Web site that helps you to create a disclosure policy similar to that of coming up with a Creative Commons License. The problem with wizard-driven output of course is that it often reads as though it were written by a lawyer. I saw this disclosure policy over at ZuneMax, a site we link to frequently from Zune Thoughts, and after reading their disclosure policy I couldn’t help but be left with a negative impression of the site because it essentially says they get paid for every post - which I highly doubt is the case, yet their disclosure policy left me wondering. I’d encourage any blogger concerned about disclosure to simply write their own statement of disclosure rather than using a template-driven tool that makes things sound worse then they really are.

The other day I complained about the scam situation that is brokerage fees from courier companies, but I didn’t explain what exactly I had shipped. Well, here it is: a custom-made skin from DecalGirl for my Fujitsu P7010D laptop. The skin is a durable vinyl that’s sticky, but not so sticky that it was difficult to work with or pull off and re-apply.

I’m not really a “bling bling” type person, but I thought a DecalGirl skin would look great on my laptop, and I was right! I’ve long wanted to make my laptop more customized. Voodoo PC “tattoos” their laptops, but the process is expensive and they only do it on Voodoo-branded machines - which of course I don’t have. The DecalGirl skin was an inexpensive way of giving my laptop a customized look - I think it ran me $24 USD for the unique size that I required. There are a huge variety of skins to choose from - and they make skins for not only laptops, but iPods, Zunes, and other devices. The install was quick and easy (just peel and stick), and the air bubbles were very easy to push over to the edge and out.

About the only problem I had with the install of the decal was that it was just a smidgen too large - resulting in the edges looking like this:

That was easy to fix by cutting the corner piece in half, then laying the two edges on top of each other. I’m thrilled with how this looks and I’d highly recommend DecalGirl products to anyone - just remember to factor in the nasty shipping and brokerage fees if you live outside the USA.