Editorial Ethics Pt 3--Vendor Written Articles

In a perfect world, a magazine would have sufficient editorial staff and expertise to write all of its own articles. This is certainly not the case in the CAD, CAM and CAE industry, where most publications toil with a bare bones staff and a lean editorial budget. To fill the pages, publications use contracted writers that vary from professional authors, users, and more than ever before--vendors.

When I was with CADENCE, we had one author (columnist Lynn Allen)  who worked for the company (Autodesk) that made the product (AutoCAD) she wrote about. Nowadays, the number of pages filled with vendor written articles abound.

Take the most recent issue of April 2006 issue of Desktop Engineering site:

• HPC for the Road Ahead - about computers at Ford, written by Srinivas Kodiyalam and Stan Posey, both of whom work for SGI, a workstation manufacturer
• Leveraging Data - about EDM, written by Jerry Waxler, who works for Synergis. Synergis makes EDM software
• Commentary - by Buzz Kross of Autodesk
• Beyond Backsolving - about calculation software, by Tom Lee of Maplesoft, makers of calculation software

Cadalyst runs vendor written articles, too. So does Machine Design.

The advantages of running vendor written articles are:

1. They're almost always free. Vendors don't demand cash to write like most authors do.
2. Vendor articles are usually well written and the typical vendor is very knowledgeable about the subject they are writing about (although they are likely to contain biases towards their own products)
3. Publishers love to exploit the goodwill generated from getting an article published. How can an executive turn down an advertising campaign with a magazine that was kind enough to give him/her several pages--for free--to espouse their views to thousands of potential customers?

So what's the problem? Vendor articles can be informative and interesting. Take Lynn Allen, for example. There are thousands of AutoCAD users who stay on top of their game because of Lynn. A vendor telling how to make the best use of their product in a magazine read by that products users is an example of a good vendor written article. However, I am leery of articles that suggest a solution that just happens to be what they are selling. Well meaning as they may be, I cannot bring myself to read them, much less believe them.

So before it's too late, I hope magazine editors can work to reverse the trend. Vendors are like the smart kids in the class, always with their hands up, always ready with a neat, perfect paper to turn in. It almost takes no effort for an editor to fill pages this way. It's way harder to coax an article out of a power user, many of whom don't fancy themselves as writers. And if they do labor through their Miller time scratching out an article, it's likely they'll want to be compensated for it. To top it off, the article will take more editorial scrubbing as finesse with the language has never been valued by the technically gifted. However, the end result will be a valuable rapport between real-world experts and eager readers.

Comments

[Roopinder Tara]

Murray, "a" magazine became "AUGIWorld," the official publication of AUGI, Autodesk User Group International. http://www.augiworld.com/magazine/

[Murray Clack]

I used to write articles for AutoDesk Press' magazin called 'a'. I wrote a few articles for them which was to provide side-by-side comparisons of AutoCAD add-on products. That magazine was written by unbiased users for unbiased users. I have no idea what ever happened to that publication... is it still around?

[Dave]

You nailed it. I am sick of marketing types trying to tell us what we need ... and for a small fee I will provide it, oh and I have made it so convoluted and confusing that you will need to pay another small fee for me to explain to you how to use it. Meanwhile from a productive standpoint they have nothing to offer as, they are salespeople first and foremost. I have been looking for a place to absorb and expand in a place populated by action oriented people. I hope this is that place?

[ralphg]

To complete the circle:

The magazine offers the vendor his own article as a reprint.

The vendor then hands out the reprint as proof of his product's validity.

The image of drinking bathwater comes to mind.

[David Opsahl]

All issues of editorial ethics aside, I wonder if the more intruiging question might be - does it even matter?

I have worked in this industry since disks were formatted using paper tape, on both the customer and the vendor side. In the former, I never used editorial information for any purpose whatsoever; in the latter, I can't ever recall a prospect or customer referring to an editorial source as having had an impact on their decision to evaluate or not evaluate a product - much less purchase one.

That being the case, one has to wonder - who benefits from the placement of editoral material? I think the initial post of Part 3 has it nailed, finally; vendors can't say no to buying adspace when they are provided the opportunity to have their articles published for free.

Vendors gain value by the placement of editorial content because it can be repurposed as marketing collateral; publishers benefit because the vendors will support the publication with advertisting revenue. Its a neat closed system - except that the market isn't in the loop.

And I don't think the market particularly cares. The holy grail of marketing communications is referenceable case studies; the reason why should be obvious - what matters to people who are risking money and in some cases careers on the selection of a product or service is knowing that it will do the job they expect from it - period. And the most valuable voice in that situation is the voice of experience, not the voice of the vendor - however it's presented.

[Edwin Muirhead]

This strikes a chord: whenever I see an article by an employee of a CAD company (or related service-provider), I always prepare my pinch of salt... Even if they're being honest, there's little chance of them recommending a "competitor".

Anyway - I'd second your call for "valuable rapport between real-world experts and eager readers" - and make mention of Profiles magazine [www.profilesmagazine.com] - who always manage to attract several articles and tips from real CAD users (in this case Pro/ENGINEER + related software).

(ps - thanks for your writings here... the blog quickly secured a place on my RSS reader and my own blog links list, alongside Mr Grabowski)

[ralphg]

'AutoCAD Magazin', a German-language magazine, is completely vendor-written.

Almost as bad: stand-alone product reviews, where products are not reviewed in comparison with competitors.

Even today, Autodesk Marketing sometimes doesn't make it clear that Lynn Allen is an employee promoting Autodesk software, such as recent banner ads for Inventor.

Overall, I think vendors are quite happy for readers to be confused over the source of editorial material.

Around 1989-90, CADalyst's publisher decided on a 2-fer-1 deal for advertisers: take out a full page ad in the December issue, and get a second ad-page free written up in editorial style. The part that ticked us in editorial off, was that the second ad page was taken out of the page budget for editorial content!