I disagree. Disclosure by the blogger or journalist doesn’t make sending expensive gifts a good PR tactic. Disclosure in this case didn’t stop people seeing the gift as a bribe or as desperation on the company’s part.

It all came down to the value of the “gift,” which many people viewed as inappropriate. And as I’ve said, the very generous nature of the gift makes it unlikely that people reading the subsequent reviews are going to give them much credence, so where was the ROI in this?

You’re saying it was a PR cock-up because the company and its PR firm failed to insist on disclosure. I’m saying it was a cock-up for that reason — and because the gift was inappropriate. It was construed as a bribe by many people, which in turn undermines the credibility of positive publicity about the company’s product.

Sorry, that’s not good PR practice.

If you’re so inclined, you can hear more of this opinion in yesterday’s FIR podcast

That’s the real issue, isn’t it. The expensive, ego-stroking nature of the gift has very real potential to influence people who aren’t otherwise being paid for their reviewing expertise. You can see this in the drooling reaction of some of the bloggers to the machines they received.

As readers, we recognize the powerful incentive for bloggers to look favorably on their gift and so we will heavily discount anything these bloggers say in favor of the product. If Microsoft had simply sent them the software, this wouldn’t be as much of an issue.

If it was a detergent company sending a box of soap powder, we wouldn’t care. If, however, they sent a free new washer/dryer combo for the blogger to test the washing powder, we’d scoff at anything the blogger had to say about the washing powder, unless of course if he or she said the detergent didn’t work. We’d marvel at that!

Which, of course, brings up the most laughable thing in all of this. Microsoft has a product that it can’t get people to use unless they have new computers.

Now that’s funny.

Why not apply your argument of buying influence to any outreach by any company that involves the providing of a product to someone for review?

For instance, is Microsoft trying to buy influence when they send out copies of Windows Vista to journalists for review? Or if BMW provide new-model cars to car enthusiasts to try out? Or Nokia and Motorola send free mobile phones to bloggers for review? Or [fill in your own example].

Of course they all are as an ultimate goal, but I don’t see it in the negative way in which you portray it, as if all it is is some kind of underhand and devious activity.

The most obvious difference between those examples and what’s happening now is that the recipients of those products for review aren’t expected to keep them. In other words, the terms of the relationship and expectations on both sides are very clear indeed.

Based on what I’ve read to date on the many blogs posting about this issue, I don’t agree at all that Microsoft is seeking to “fabricate a blogger’s technology experience”. All they’ve done is provide a laptop and an operating system to a bunch of bloggers.

But - and here’s where it looks as though we might actually agree - the way in which this campaign (if that’s what it is) has been planned and executed is pretty poor indeed. Neither Microsoft nor Edelman should be surprised by the widespread negative blogosphere reactions.

As I said in my post, this is a tactical PR cock-up. Nothing more at the moment.

“…I don’t buy the bribery or influence-buying argument at all. More like really bad blogger analytics on the part of whoever at Microsoft and/or Edelman put this campaign together.”

And in the very next paragraph you say:

“It seems to me that they were more focused on the perceived influence of some bloggers than whether those bloggers were the right people to reach out to.”

Isn’t that influence buying?

Joel Spolsky’s views pretty much represent my own on this topic. It is bad for the blogosphere when people have to question the integrity of every positive review they read.

Blogs have little going for them besides authenticity. Don’t people mostly read blogs because they are personal, honest and believable?

But how authentic is it when companies like Microsoft seek to fabricate a blogger’s technology experience by giving them high-end laptops with pre-installed Vista and Office 2007? Would those bloggers have bought those things themselves or would they be using a cheaper computer and relying on Web-based tools and open source software?

It flies in the face of what makes blogs effective communications tools. Combined with pay-per-post, this kind of thing undermines the credibility of bloggers in general and it reduces their influence and relevance. It crimps the potential of blogs to attract new readers.

Ethics is not a clear-cut, black-and-white thing. People have different takes on what is ethical. You’re not concerned about this, I am. Neither of us is “right.” We just have different opinions. Many people think like you do and many people think like me.

As a communicator, though, you have to think about the entire audience. If an action like dishing out laptops to bloggers is going to create a problem for a sizable segment of the audience — as it has — then it’s probably not a good strategy.

My criticism of this entire episode is not of the bloggers, but of the people who came up with the idea (Edelman, Microsoft, AMD, who knows?). I’ve called them amateurs for failing to think through the consequences.

They didn’t forsee some basic consequences, including that any positive reviews would carry little weight and that bloggers seeking to reinforce their credibility would have an incentive to be critical of the software.

This was just plain bad PR strategy and execution. Heck, I’m not even a PR practitioner, and I can see that.