Each time I take a look at
games journalism I end up attacking a specific games media outlet, but today I’ll take a look at a place that should really know better – Forbes. Everyone is familiar Forbes, a huge, well respected print publication that also publishes on Forbes.com, the 287th largest website in the world. Apparently, the site that has the slogan “Information for the World’s Business Leaders” also likes to do a bit of games coverage, such as “
6 Reasons To Buy An Xbox 360 Instead Of A PlayStation 3” or… “
6 Reasons To Buy A PlayStation 3 Instead Of An Xbox 360“. Wait, what?
In each case, the title is created to stir up a bit of a fuss and, especially with the Forbes name attached, that’s exactly what each article did – even though they offered contradicting statements from the same author. In the case of the 360 being better post, a commenter called the article ‘link-bait’, to which the writer replied:
Link-bait? No. It’s meta-commentary, and it requires that you read to the end.
At the end, he had written:
All that being said, I think the “console wars” are silly. This piece is a companion piece to my earlier post “6 Reasons To Buy A PlayStation 3 Instead of an Xbox 360.” It’s not that I’ve changed my mind. Truth be told, there’s many reasons to buy either one of these consoles. They both have many wonderful qualities and many shortcomings.
The number one reason to go with either the PS3 or Xbox 360 is the exclusive titles, and that really boils down to a matter of taste. There are many great exclusives on both systems, but gamers will never agree on which are the best.
First off Erik, that’s not meta-commentary. You wrote an entire article with a flamebait article simply because your last one did really well. And, why is this little comment shoved at the bottom where you know most people won’t read it? Is it because it basically says ‘this whole thing is an opinion, all opinions are relative, and therefore this entire article is utterly pointless’? And, if that conclusion is what separates meta-commentary from link-bait, what does that make your pro-PS3 article that didn’t have a similar conclusion?
It’s not just games journalism, the same can be said for a Forbes contributor piece titled “
Why Apple is Great and Everyone Else Is Not Even Close“. I don’t even need to point out how utterly painfully one-sided and intentionally provocative that title is. Oh, and I’m not even going to mention that the writer of said piece owns shares in Apple… a fact that was only brought to light by a commenter, rather than being prominently mentioned at the top like it should be.
Of course, these are Forbes contributors. According to Forbes, ‘the opinions expressed are those of the writer’, and a line is drawn between them and full on staffers. But that’s wrong, people clearly see the Forbes name and not the fine print and are influenced by what they see as Forbes’ content. And, even if they see the fine print, it’s a bit misleading. These guys (and gals) are essentially freelance Forbes writers:
We are strengthening our staff of full-time editors and reporters and carefully selecting hundreds of qualified contributors. In fact, we now have 440 contributors, both paid and unpaid. Every single one was hand picked by those who can best evaluate their knowledge — our own editors and reporters.
Some great handpicking right there, I’m sure. But why on Earth would these writers want to write such obvious sensationalist articles?
It’s a simple deal: there is a flat monthly fee, a bonus for hitting certain unique visitor targets, and a fee per unique user after bonus targets are achieved. For paid contributors, the arrangement requires a certain number of posts per month and a specified level of audience engagement through our commenting system.
okay have at it.
....corporations?
