Let's Get Ethical

Yesterday's post opened up an interesting can of worms.  It was brought to my attention that there were a couple 'glowing' reviews of MoKo on the interwebs that directly contradicted what Rosa and I experienced.  A little research (aka Google) into it and I was able to find out what he was talking about. I'm not going to name names, mostly because I don't want to increase traffic to the ethical travesty that exists there. What I saw was two people whom attended a PR 'blogger dinner' and then wrote up the restaurant. They did not disclose the fact that they were there. They waxed poetic about the food, the chef, the drinks, you name it. This opened up a large conversation on the Twitter about the ethics of bloggers. 

Over the past several years bloggers have come under fire for a variety of things, including: not disclosing if their meal was comped, demanding free meal or bad review (aka blackmail), and being general celebrity chef star fucking douches.  The blackmail and douchbaggery aside, what are the requirements on admitting the meal was hosted? Essentially, there are 'guidelines' from the FTC:

• Endorsements must be truthful and not misleading;
• If the advertiser doesn’t have proof that the endorser’s experience represents what consumers will achieve by using the product, the ad must clearly and conspicuously disclose the generally expected results in the depicted circumstances; and
• If there’s a connection between the endorser and the marketer of the product that would affect how people evaluate the endorsement, it should be disclosed.

However, there are no fines for bloggers not in compliance and the FTC is not monitoring bloggers with no future plans to. It comes down to the personal ethics of said blogger to disclose or not.

The way I see it is this; if you want to tell a story, you have to tell the whole story. People read the words we bloggers write. By not giving the whole truth and nothing but the truth, we are misleading the consumer. If we tell the truth, admit a meal was hosted, then the consumer has the choice to accept our judgment, or weight it based on the facts presented. 

My meal at MoKo was overpriced for what I got. Had I attended the dinner with the other bloggers, I wouldn't have felt the pinch and it would have reflected in the subsequent post. However, I would have posted that it was hosted and let the reader do with that information what they will. Seeing as I did pay for that meal, I was outraged and that changed the direction of my post. I had no need to kiss the chef's ass and write flowery words over what was really mediocre food (even if it had been nominally less expensive). Though I'm not one to do that regardless if my meal has been hosted or not. 

It comes down to this: tell the truth, tell the story. Let the reader decide how to take your words. But don't think we (the other bloggers in the community) don't see you. Los Angeles has a small, tight-knit blogging community.  We talk. If you were seen at a PR event and that doesn't reflect in your post, expect it to show up in your comments. It's just a few words, it won't cost you a thing. Just like your meal.

UPDATE: It would also help to stay away from PR flacks that ask you specifically to not admit your meal was hosted. This does happen.