]

Citoyen ! Le vénérable Michael Arrington, celui à qui un avocat en colère balance son café crème brûlant (ici on dit un Latte) à la gueule a annoncé le rachat du magazine pour teenagers Tiger Beat (créé en 1965). Au programme, gossips, musique, sorties, bons plans etc…Mais plus de papier, seulement un webzine. Alors, un risque de conflits d’intérêts entre journalistes et “blogueurs” ? Je cite Wired :

Some TechCrunch readers, like Reid Hoffman, founder and former CEO of Linkedin, believe that Arrington may need to decide whether he wants his new blogs to be stocked with journalists working from the outside or players working from the inside. When you combine the two roles, Hoffman says, no one knows how to behave around you: Are you a journalist or a power broker? Arrington says it’s a false dilemma. He and his new bloggers can straddle this line forever, he says, as long as they disclose their conflicts. “I strive to be fair and say only what I believe the truth to be. But that’s where it ends,” he wrote last year in an 800-word post on his companion blog, CrunchNotes. “Human interaction is simply too complex to pretend that we are all objective.” Like the capitalist he is, Arrington trusts the market to reward or punish him as it sees fit. If readers and advertisers keep coming back — so far, so good — what’s the problem?

Donc le marché disant “YES”, Arrington répond “YES”. Attention cependant aux risques d’hystèrese : le marché peut être abusé un temps en surévaluant une entreprise ou un projet, mais se venge automatiquement après (voir à ce sujet tous les articles traitant de Price Earning Ratio…).

Moins éthique, et donc plus polémique est la déclaration qu’il a faite :

Arrington said in a blog post announcing the deal. “I’ve always thought Big Tobacco had it right: Get ‘em while they’re young. But instead of polluting their lungs, we’re just going to pollute their minds. And really, at some point, like when they’re 14 or so, they’ll get tired of discussing teen news and focus on what I can bring to the table: deep discussions about late-round financing of important new Web 2.0 sites, new services, and TechCrunch’s dream of a $1 billion payday.”

Comparer les blogueurs à l’industrie du tabac risque de ne pas plaire à tout le monde; le risque est grand que ce ne soit pas le marché mais les “suiveurs” d’Arrington qui prennent la mouche. Et là, on ne pourra pas dire que “c’est le poumon“.

Tuesday, April 1st, 2008, 14:15   |   Thought-o-graphy  |  RSS feed |  Respond  |  Trackback