This month there has been a lot of interesting debate about fake stories. More specifically, the traffic they can generate and the potential damage they can do to the authors crediblity. It all started when Money.co.uk posted a story entitled ‘13 Year Old Steals Dad’s Credit Card to Buy Hookers‘. The story reported that a 13 year old ordered a credit card through his fathers existing credit card company and then treated him and his friends to a $30,000 spending spree involving him, his friends, an xbox and of course, the hookers. The story was completely fabricated though it generated a lot of traffic for the site since it was picked up by a lot of mainstream news publications (online and offline). It was also Digged about 2500 times.
The problem with this story was that it wasn’t posted on a satirical site, it was posted on a serious site about financial issues where the reader had no reason to believe that the story was fake. The author of the story was a man named Lyndon of CornWall SEO, who promotes his Linkbaiting and Social Media Optimisation service on his website. He wrote an article on his blog explaining his side of the story but later removed it. Thankfully, WiderFunnel reproduced the story on their blog (it’s worth checking out). I don’t believe the owner of Money.co.uk realised the negative side of using this traffic technique, sure he got a lot of traffic but who is going to believe the articles printed on the site from now on are true.
Are the traffic benefits from fake stories worth losing your crediblity over?
There is a great article which summarizes this whole affair on Jonathan Crossfield’s blog entitled ‘Linkbait at any Cost?‘. He rightly points to the old story of ‘The boy who cried wolf’. How can your readers trust you after you have misled them in order to get some extra traffic?
Some blogs use link bait a lot however not all link bait can be tarred with the same brush. For every good example of link bait, there is an article which generated traffic using questionable tactics. Is writing fake stories for your blog wrong, unethical or even just plain stupid? This is something where opinions can be divided but personally I wouldn’t risk losing my credibility just to get extra traffic. James Mowery from Tech in Demand feels the same way. Today he wrote an excellent article on Performancing entitled ‘A Warning to the Blogosphere About the Potential Increase of Fake Content‘. In the post he explains why he has lost faith in the blogosphere with regards to credibility. Unfortunately, I have felt the same way the last few months. I have unsubscribed from a number of blogs because I have lost faith in their integrity, whether it was because of a fake story or whether the author was completely raving about a product just to make some commissions.
An example of a fake story backfiring
Around the start of April, Jim Kukral, Sam Harrelson and Shawn Collins decided to create a fake spat between them all. They all openly threw mud at each other on each others blog and critized Jim’s new site TwitterMeThis. If you want to how it developed then please read the post I wrote about it all in April.
So what happened? Well, they later let everyone know that the whole thing was staged. Some commenters suggested that it was probably fake at the time but others did believe it and unsubscribed from the authors blogs because they were disappointed with them. I have to hold my hands up and say that even though I read others saying it was probably fake I did actually think the spat was true because after subscribing to Jim and Shawns blog for a few months I didn’t think they would be stupid enough to create something like this. I’m not sure if they created the spat for a laugh or if they did it to gain some extra traffic but in my opinion it backfired as it hurt their credibility.
Overview
Crediblity is something which is very delicate. It can take years to build up a good reputation and minutes to throw it all down the toilet. I am not disputing that some web developers have benefited from marketing fake stories to promote their sites however in my opnion it’s something top bloggers should avoid like the plague.
It’s also very important to check the reliability of a news source before you report it (sometimes this isn’t always as easy as you think). You may find you have to apologise to your readers if you report a story which turns out to be fake, at the very least you would have to explain what happened.
From a collective point of view an increase in fake stories will definately hurt the credibility of blog writers. Top news agencies might be more reluctant to link to articles on blogs, at the very least they will scrutinize them more. James Mowery made a good point when he said that ‘Bloggers are beginning to prove why journalists still have jobs’.
So what do you think. Are fake stories hurting Bloggers Credibility?
For reference, here is a list of the articles mentioned in this post :
Cigar Jack | May 29th, 2008 at 12:21 pm #
Definitely not worth losing credibility over. I’ve also got a similar issue. I’ve got a potentially huge story I could break, but the one problem is I’ve got no real sources I can use to verify it. With only one source I’m not comfortable of going ahead with the story, unless I can get some documents or other credible source to back it up.
Chuck Simmins | May 29th, 2008 at 3:27 pm #
As a traditionalist, I provide the source link[s] of all stories I post. If I am the reporter, I say so in my story.
If the news media did the same, their batting average would improve. Instead, AP, Reuters, CBS and others have been repeatedly duped or complicit in both faked stories and faked images.
I have always been critical of the “anonymous” source. People should understand that leakers will always leak because they obtain a psychic reward from doing so. Either they feel good, feel famous, feel special or feel justified. Naming your source will never reduce leaking. It will, however, reduce false leaking.
Wouldn’t you like to know just who was telling the media that Jessica Lynch was such a hero, fighting the Iraqis until her last bullet? It never happened and neither the media who reported it nor the leakers received any sort of blame for writing a phony story.
Here’s my first post on “citizen journalism”.
http://northshorejournal.org/index.php/2007/12/unfettered-citizen-journalism-too-risky
Kevin Muldoon (Post Author) | May 29th, 2008 at 4:08 pm #
Jack - Are you still struggling to get sources for your story?
Chuck - Very good reply. You make a very good point about major news companies. Tabloids in particular are notorious for either reporting news wrong or just plain lying to get a story.
Cigar Jack | May 29th, 2008 at 4:10 pm #
Yeah no one really wants to take this public, but love to talk about it on the grapevine. Considering it would be outting someone who buys their tobacco on the sly and putting it in their cigars without telling the consumers and passing it off as a puro.
Cigar Jack | May 29th, 2008 at 4:12 pm #
Hard to understand unless you’re a cigar smoker I guess.
Arwen Taylor | May 29th, 2008 at 8:06 pm #
Yes fake stories hurt bloggers’ credibility. As bloggers, we have put so much effort in to building up credibility of the medium that it would suck to have it destroyed by a selfish few who want to use it for self-serving means.
As you pointed out, traditional news sources would hesitate to link or quote bloggers. On top of that, people who are new to the blogosphere would have a harder time taking us seriously. It’s like the story of the boy who cried wolf. After so many false alarms no one believed a word the boy said. I would hate for blogging to fall into that trap.
Rokchic | May 31st, 2008 at 6:05 am #
Yes I think that is the case also. I have been blogging for about 6 weeks now, I try and post every day. It’s a real commitment for me but I stick to it and I do it. My blog is real, it has drama in it without needing to make it up! haha
But on a serious note, if you are going to make up stories simply to get traffic to your blog, the minute people realise that it is fake - you’re going to lose them anyway. So really, the whole thing is pointless. As you, yourself pointed out Kevin - you unsubscribed from several blogs because you didn’t trust the author anymore…
Mind you, on the other hand, if someone is writing a blog for the entertainment factor - and they make up parts of stories or exaggerate, then they are no different from the gossip magazines that litter our stores. At the end of the day - you pick and read the magazines you trust right? So I imagine it will become the same with blogs. Give it time and people will realise which blogs are quality and which aren’t.
diy help | May 31st, 2008 at 7:32 am #
I seriously don’t think tht by creating fake stories is worth losing credibility over jz bcos you want to get more traffic… It’ll be a total mess once the truth is out and it can be reli ugly…
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