cross-fading the line

Kudos to Tami Fenwick and Jeremy Armitage, who resigned as editor and reviews editor of dance site Resident Advisor after the business side of the Australian publication allegedly pulled a review of John Digweed's Transmissions 4 mix-CD and replaced it with one prepared by the ad department. The duo argues that one of the site's owner/salesmen feared the editorial review would sour his relationship with advertiser Renaissance, which puts out Transmissions.

"In a sense, it was the final nail in the coffin in an ongoing struggle to separate editorial and advertising," the pair state in an adios email that was forwarded to the blogga. "As a last desperate move to preserve the integrity of magazine, we threatened to resign if the new review was published. Our offer was taken up.

"... Behind this little battle was a bigger war—a battle of philosophies between editorial and the owners over whether content on RA should be advertising-independent. When we took over the editorial of RA in July 2006, we had a vision of being able to mold the site away from a progressive-house focused fansite into a proper web magazine with honest, independent content that could win over the trust and respect of readers. As with any good magazine, that means separating out advertising concerns and editorial concerns. Unfortunately, after months of haggling, explaining and re-explaining why this is necessary for the success of RA, we haven't been able to convince the guys at the top of the wisdom of this approach."

This is unfortunate. A site about dance music that is essentially run by advertisers is little more than a shopping site. An extra downside for readers, however, is that they assume that reviews and editorial content is independent from marketing or advertising material. At the least, publishers that let advertisers influence their content should be upfront and say so. At best, they should realize that building trust through an independent and sometimes critical editorial voice builds trust and a lasting relationship with readers - which then drives advertising. This sounds like RA has taken a small-minded approach.

I would also hope that artists such as John Digweed would reprimand their labels for such short-sighted marketing. Any good publicist will tell you all press is good press (except, of course, if you're a dance site that makes this kind of dumb-headed move).