Something that Sally from Who’s the Mummy said in a recent post has got me thinking:
…many of the parent bloggers I speak to are desperate to make some money from their blogs. As one blogger told me last week: “I’m just so sick of working for free.”
Now I recognize that I’m as much of a corporate whore as the next man (free blu-ray player and trip to London anyone). But seriously? Complaining that blogging without being paid is “working for free”? Do you charge for taking family photos too? Demand money for doing your garden or reading a book?
I’m being unfair. I don’t actually know the context of that particular conversation and so shouldn’t really comment. But it does raise a wider issue – the increasing commercialism of parent blogging.
Its pretty widely accepted that UK parent blogging today is probably at around the same point that US Mommy and Daddy blogging was three or four years ago. When I first started All That Comes With It people like Clare’s Dad and Idaho Dad were able to list just about every Daddyblogger in the world on their blogroll. Sure, it was a long list, but it was doable. What’s more, If you go back two or three years again you could do the same with Mommy bloggers as well. These days however US parent blogs of both genders number in their tens of thousands.
Here in the UK parent blogging is now slowly gathering up more steam. Mummy blogs are popping up everywhere, becoming so numerous that you couldn’t follow them all even if you wanted to. Daddy Blogs are less common, but new ones are slowly starting to appear here and there and the momentum is growing.
However there is a fly in the ointment. Currently it seems that every second blog that is starting up is doing so with a hearty scream of “SHOW ME THE MONEY!!”. The ethos of blogging appears to be moving from the ‘zine mentality of the 70′s into the greed is good mentality of the 80′s. We’re sliding from do-it-yourself punk into slick and commercially driven new romanticism.
But I don’t want to be a new romantic damnit. I don’t suit the makeup.
This could all be sour grapes. I could be taking this attitude because other people seems to get more PR pitches and free stuff than I do. I could well be sticking out my bottom lip and proclaiming “I don’t want to play your stupid game anyway”. But still, I’m becoming increasingly uncomfortable with the compromises I’ve already made on this blog to commercialism (the blu-ray reviews, the advert I filmed for Disney, the walking sock contest I recently held).
In my day job we frequently get visits from pharmaceutical reps. Ostensibly these visits are to inform us of latest research on their products and discuss medication side effects and treatment strategies. But in reality the research they present has been so heavily spun it can’t be trusted, therefore any claims that rep visits are updating our professional knowledge is completely laughable.
So why are the reps let in the door? Because they bring lunch that’s why. Bribery, pure and simple. They bring cakes and flapjacks and buns; crisps and sandwiches and fruit. All paid for indirectly by the taxpayer through charging the NHS inflated pharmaceutical prices.
And that’s just the nurses. The doctors get free holidays and weekends away out of the fuckers.
I made a decision a few years ago never to accept anything from a pharmaceutical rep. So while my colleagues are munching on chocolate eclairs and pringles I sit self righteously in a corner, pointedly not eating anything and smugly reveling in my highly evolved sense of ethics.
Of course none of my colleagues notice my silent protests. And even if they do they often mistake the smug look on my face for an expression of gastric discomfort and assume I’m not eating because I’ve got trapped wind. But still, it helps me sleep at night and that’s the main thing.
My current dilemma is that I’m unsure if I should extend my “no cake” policy to blogging. The reason I blog is to document my family life and connect with friends. Bringing commercial aspects into that seems to sully it a little. I feel tainted somehow, like I’m exploiting my family and my friends in order to get free stuff.
On the other hand I have developed a pretty strong editorial process. Every blu-ray review I’ve done has been completely honest and I’ve turned down a few very tempting freebies because I felt them to be incongruous to the blog. But I still feel uncomfortable. Like I’m teetering on the edge of a slippery slope
Then again, I seem to be uncomfortable with everything at the moment, as evidenced by my propensity for “thinking aloud” posts recently. My mojo is back, but it seems to have brought a tendency for rambling and wordy introspection with it.
I must make it clear that I’m not judging others for taking up these freebies and PR offers. In particular some of my best blogging buddies are in that grey hinterland between pro and hobby blogging, and so their relationships with companies and professional media types are wholly appropriate and I would not criticize them for them .
But I don’t want to be a journalist or a copywriter. I thought I did in my early twenties, even getting myself the ubiquitous media studies degree. But then I quickly realized that life wasn’t for me and chose to be a nurse instead.
So now according to Erin I have to come up with my traditional poignant open-ended morality statement. I think the best way to describe my dilemma is that I’ve always viewed blogging as an extension of my home life rather than my work life, and the potential to get material gain from writing here has muddied the water for me somewhat. My fear is that by treating All That Comes With It as a commodity rather than an artistic expression (*snort*) I’ll spoil it for myself somehow. But the lure of cool free stuff can often seem very tempting.
So far I think I’ve struck the right balance, but I need to be mindful that my greed doesn’t tip my own self imposed see-saw of integrity.
How about you, what are your thoughts?
