MSN to Tempt Bloggers with Traffic and Ads?

Susan Mernit blogs that MSN Network GM told Mark Glaser how Microsoft might work with bloggers in the future... 

"If you're a blogger, MSN might come to you and say, 'We want to distribute you. We'll send you traffic and we want you to run these ads on your site, and you'll get a share of revenues on that. That's probably an offer that many bloggers are going to be interested in because they don't want to have to invest in creating that kind of infrastructure, and they would value the traffic."

Comments

[Rick Herrick]

How enthusiastic will Microsoft be about directing traffic to blogs that, for example, contain anti-MS screeds? Or pro-open source viewpoints? How about blogs that concern themselves with anti-trust or anti-globalization activism?

Basically, how much control will MS exert over these blogs? How much editorial influence, both explicit and implicit, will the corporatization of blogs carry?

[Korla Pundit]

Heck, I would mostly worry that just having any connection to Microsoft whatsoever would crash my site. Just from the aura.

Somebody will have to do the difficult job of actually reading their clickthrough agreement to see what kind of control they would claim over content.

No thanks, Mr. Gates. I am more than happy to pay good money for web hosting and post glowing reviews of Mac OS X and the G5 pro bono.

[Joseph]

Kausfiles is already hosted by Microsoft.Slate.

Is Microsoft directing traffic to blogs anymore corruptive than newspapers printing op-eds or columnists?

[Paul Siegel]

Ever since the Internet began, Microsoft tried to control it. They got rid of Netscape because it had a browser everybody was using. They tried exercising control through their operating systems. This did not work. They are attacking Open Source. We must make sure it does not work.

Now Microsoft is trying to gain control of bloggers. At the present time, bloggers seem to be a truly independent group of people. Some are liberal, some are conservative, some are religious, some are amoral, some are just independent thinkers, some are mostly emotional. They write about what they damn please. Microsoft does not like it. Somehow bloggers must be made part of its system so that it may exercise control.

All members of the Internet must fight Microsoft on this. We want to keep the Internet Open and allow every single person a voice. This gives strength to the little guy against the powerful. It is one of the few remaining strengths for the little guy.

Don't allow Microsoft - or any other powerful entity - control over bloggers. I am one blogger that will have no truck with Microsoft.

[TM Lutas]

I believe that you should be willing to take money from anyone insane enough to advertise on your blog and that you should be strong enough to say what you believe in regardless of what effect that will have on your advertiser base. If you're going to depend on blogging for a living, you have to diversify your revenue base so that the loss of any advertiser will not leave you impoverished. If your blogging revenue is a sideline that gives you pocket change, you have to get your mind fixed on the idea that you can live without Microsoft's pocket money if it means compromising your principles.

Diversification of revenues and refusing to sell your soul for a little pocket change. Bloggers who can run that sort of a site can safely take Microsoft's offer. All others should stay away. In fact, they might want to stay away from blogging revenue period because they don't have the head for it.

Bloggers - people who discuss news on the internet are shaping the way news is distributed on the internet. This is a very profound thesis.

[Thom]

Paul Siegel writes (or wrote, to be precise): "Now Microsoft is trying to gain control of bloggers. At the present time, bloggers seem to be a truly independent group of people. ... Microsoft does not like it. Somehow bloggers must be made part of its system so that it may exercise control."

Mr. Seigel is apparently one of those folks who like to make things much more complicated than they really are. I'm not certain what drives this impulse in some people, but what IS certain is that there's a good bit of it out there. It must be that portraying everything as Big and Dramatic is irresistible to these folks, a way to add a splash of sizzle into their processing of the world.

There is a relevant point ready to emerge from this opening salvo of psychobabble, and it is this: Siegel's analysis is, like, wrong.

Now, to be fair, he's not the only errant soul around here. One of the Trackbacks listed above bears the title, "Will Bloggers Be Assimilated?" That is its actual title. That is its real title. That is its authentic, irony-free, bona fide title.

To the inevitable disappointment of the Siegel sorts, the answer is really simple and undramatic and conspiracy-free: Bloggers who want to be "assimilated" can choose to be. Bloggers who don't will not.

When a person who publishes a blog strolls outside and encounters a kid peddling lemonade, he chooses whether or not to accept the offer. When a person who publishes a blog encounters Microsoft peddling blog services, he chooses whether or not to accept the offer.

It's really simple. There's no coercion. There's no danger. There's no Siegel-styled drama.

Even if every blogger in the world were to take Microsoft up on its offer, it would still be inaccurate to portray the situation as Microsoft "exercising control". Rather, the accurate portrayal would be that of bloggers exercising control -- making their own decisions, carving their own paths, voluntarily choosing their own fates.

The notion of big bad monsters threatening our well-being is an ever-appealing story, one that starts in childhood. In the world of grown-ups, however, it's kinda crucial to distinguish authentic dangers from make-believe threats. And recognizing that distinction means you have to remember that adults, you know, make their own choices. In the realm of grown-ups, no company, Microsoft included, is shoving its Blog Domination plans down anyone's throat. Consumers run the show, because consumers make the decisions.

And it's the consumer-- not the Microsofts of the world -- who wields the actual power.

The Seigel sorts prefer to keep up the make-believe for a couple of reasons: Life is just plain lively when you're always fighting The Monsters. And then there's that self-satisfying sense of benevolence that comes with Guarding Your Fellow Man from the dangers he can't see.

The Siegel worldview, in other words, isn't just deluded -- it's insulting. It implicitly views fellow humans as helpless pawns at the hands of Microsoft or whatever other monster du jour. The Siegels get to be smart, but the rest of us all are sheep whose decisions aren't choices of self-interest.

I know this has been a ridiculously long and vaguely off-topic post. But again, it's basically a long-winded way of expressing something really simple: Siegel is just, like, wrong. And stuff.

[Subzero Blue]

This is very interesting news.
Anyway I wonder how MSN are planning on sending traffic to bloggers?
Will they be playing around with their search engine so that bloggers who are in their program get listed high in the search results?

[Steveo'Brien]

You have to give the devil its due. They've made more beds to lie down in with a guarantee of 93 virgins than anyone else on the planet.