

The Internet Split (the rise of advertorial content) - donmcc
http://www.mondaynote.com/2012/10/21/the-internet-split/

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petercooper
This trend is not new, although it's certainly accelerating, which is natural
given the current media landscape. The marriage of content and advertising
gets around a lot of issues, such as ad blocking and banner blindness. Any
time I hear proprietors complaining about ad blockers, I tell them they need
to reconsider their content/business relationship.

It has worked for TV, movies, and respected magazines are also on the
bandwagon. Monocle magazine, for example, seems to blur the line a lot, and
you end up with entire supplements written in-house promoting a _country_ on
the behalf of a tourism or business board. They're well produced and the angle
is clear. Lots more about this model at
[http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/24/business/media/24carr.html...](http://www.nytimes.com/2009/08/24/business/media/24carr.html?_r=0)

All that aside (and I think it's a step in the right direction anyway), PR
flacks have been achieving similar ends for decades by bribing, coercing, or
even entering fully fledged business relationships with journalists and
publications. At the least, most modern attempts are reasonably transparent,
rather than pretending to be something they aren't.

