Tuesday, April 29, 2008

Blogging the competition: adver-blogging

On frogblog today, Tim Leberecht discusses a small group of corporate blogs that we are now seeing pop up. Brew blog is one example. It's run by Miller Brewing Company, and rather than promote Miller, the writers spend their time chronicling the fumblings of its biggest rival, Anheuser-Busch. Ick - is this what we're going to do with our new connectivity tools? Use them and spend our time bashing one another? I'd be disappointed in any company who engaged in this kind of activity, and what's more, I'd stop patronizing the brand doing the adver-blogging.

The theory of glass houses applies. I understand wanting to keep tabs on your competition. I understanding wanting to your own horn to drum up business. But just as it does so often with political campaigns, I think the people and companies doing the bashing will ultimately get bashed themselves, with a vengeance.

I hope that we don't see this emerge as a growing trend. I'm much more interested in hearing a company's own stories in their own words. See Tim's original post at http://www.frogdesign.com/frogblog/adversarial-blogging-the-brew-blog-and-co.html

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