Guido Fawked - Advertiser Hypocrisy

After Peter Oborne called out the Telegraph for bending to the will of its more valuable advertisers, there was much positioning out there in the blogosphere to demonstrate that spirit of independence that would permit no such thing to happen there, no sirree. HSBC was not going to to censor free speech elsewhere. But one participant in the new media world then chose his words with apparent lack of wisdom.

The effects of living in a very draughty glasshouse

At first, the perpetually thirsty Paul Staines and his rabble at the Guido Fawkes blog were cock-a-hoop at the news of the Tel’s exposure, and claimed an exclusive for “Leaked Memo Shows Telegraph Offered Sony ‘Support Across Editorial’”. “Media Guido has obtained a memo sent in October from Sony to the Telegraph’s ‘Create’ department, which produces sponsored content. The Deputy Managing Director of Sony Pictures thanks them specifically for their ‘unique’ ‘integrated… editorial and paid for’ content” they told.

The Fawkes folks continue “Stuart Williams openly confirms Sony received ‘support across editorial, promotions and media’ as part of ‘the partnership with the Telegraph’ on the film Fury … Incidentally, the Telegraph review of Fury described it as ‘astonishing’ and ‘gripping’ drama that ‘brings us as close to an understanding of war as cinema can’”.

Only one conclusion can be reached: The Great Guido is heaping ridicule on the hapless Telegraph, the inference being that the Fawkes blog would not stoop to such practices merely to score More And Bigger Advertising Revenues For Themselves Personally Now. However, and here we encounter a significantly sized however, someone chez Fawkes seems to have forgotten Staines’ comments of the previous week.

Here, he was invited to give the Guardian the benefit of his superior insights after the Fawkes blog was given a makeover. He “said that he wanted the site to become ‘more of a news website’, adding that it was dropping the word ‘blog’ from its masthead”. Yes, what the Fawkes rabble produce is now, courtesy of TurdPolishers’R’Us, news. You really couldn’t make it up. But then comes the whoopsie.

There was to be a separate environment section: “We’re thinking it’s going to be called Gaia Fawkes. It’ll cover energy and other issues, plus the Green party, which I think will be a big thing in the next few months … We want energy companies to be able to place their corporate responsibility advertising with us without fear”. What would that mean, other than that the content would not be unhelpful to them?

I’ve said for some time that the Fawkes rabble have sold out to the press establishment, gradually desisting from saying anything critical of the papers with whom they do business, which even extended recently to the Mirror titles, after they persuaded the Sunday Mirror to run the Brooks Newmark sting. Now The Great Guido wants advertisers to be able to place their advertising in his care … without fear.

They looked from man to pig, and pig to man … and so it goes. Another fine mess.