Weekend Discussion: Who bears responsibility for poor content?
Dear Deb:
I read your discussion at WAHM regarding the responsibility of content sites, with interest. I too have wondered why content sites don’t accept more responsibility for placing poorly written and researched articles on their site. I especially wonder who is liable if someone follows some bad advice as a result of something posted in one of these articles.
Would you mind posting this as one of your weekend discussions? I’d specifically be interested in who bears MORE responsibility - the writer or the website. Yes, I know we writers have a responsibility to turn in the best work we can, but $5 a pop doesn’t offer much in the way of motivation. Doesn’t the content site owe it to their readers to provide accurate well written content, and if not, why not? (At the risk of inciting another riot, the particular site I have in mind shall remain nameless.)
By the way, I loved your idea of a disclaimer. (I said these sites should at least offer a disclaimer next to each article saying basically to take the advice with a grain of salt. - Deb ) Keep up the good work and thanks for everything you do for us.
Sincerely,
C.H
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Friday, March 30th, 2007 at 5:08 am under
I wonder the same thing. Who is responsible for the content? Most ads for content writers goes something like, “must have excellent English and be 100% original…will pay 1c/word.” How much quality does an “editor” expect at that rate of pay? My guess is not much, but would rather have the content (accurate or not) then have nothing.
With that said, I think there are some websites that DO attempt to qualify the writer’s content, such as: 451Press, b5media, and About.
Ultimately, the “editor” should take responsibility while the writer, for reputation sake, should write a factual piece. Then again, from where are writers getting their facts? From the internet…and whatever is used as a resource may be lacking facts and the inaccuracy is just passed down the line. ARGH.
Point of reference: My doctor laughs at me when I tell him “I read it on the internet.”
June 28th, 2007 at 5:10 amI’m largely agreeing with Trish. If you don’t offer enough pay so that a writer can make a decent living off it and spend more time writing and researching thoroughly, you can’t expect a top notch piece. And really, even when more ethical writers pass a job up, someone out there will take it up at the dirt rate being offered. Notice also that these editors are not coming back refuting poor content!!
June 28th, 2007 at 5:10 amI say it’s the website. They decide what they publish, ultimately, and they don’t have to publish something that is poorly written. And if they do want better content they need to pay more than $2 per article. You know what they say, you get what you pay for!
June 28th, 2007 at 5:11 amDeb and CH left something out. In Deb’s discussion on the WAHM board she engaged in a debate with a (rather snotty) writer who at first refused to answer the “who is responsible for bad content” question. The writer really didn’t care about the site’s poor content as long as her article was on top of the search engines. Seems to me she’s part of the problem. I wonder…is it enough to be on top of the engines when your work clearly sucks.Further, how does it benefit your career to have your name associated with a site famous for housing badly written content? Is having your sh***y content at the search engines worth the possible hit to your career? I guess it’s ok if all you want to be known for is $3 SEO work.
As far as I’m concerned, a site *does* have a responsibility but if writers want to clean up the Internet and keep themselves from being lumped into the same group as the guys that write crap, they should stay away from the Write for Crap article sites. The “writers” are just as much a problem as the sites.
June 28th, 2007 at 5:11 amThe writer is responsible for doing good work. I don’t care if s/he’s making a grand per word or a half-penny. Voluntarily accepted low rates don’t eliminate responsibility for factual accuracy, legality, etc.
The publisher is responsible. They’re making the final call on publication and are putting the work under their masthead. They don’t get to “blame the writer.” That story certainly wouldn’t work if the writer was a full-time employee of the buyer and it shouldn’t work because of a freelance/contract labor arrangement, either.
So, both are responsible in my estimation.
If you were involved, you share responsibility, except for really extreme cases.
Of course, I’m talking about it based on my own ethical and moral positions. I’m not addressing it in terms of legal liability.
I’d think that the question of liability for erroneous, libelous or otherwise actionable written materials will depend on the nature of the work, the flaw(s) in the text, the presence and impact of disclaimers and other moderating statements and any contracts or agreements regarding indemnification, etc.
Cool topic. It’ll be interesting to read what everyone else thinks, too.
Carson
June 28th, 2007 at 5:11 amAs much as I wish everyone would take responsibility for their own accuracy, *within reasonable limits,* I’m really bothered by the trend in this society to make people legally liable for “bad advice.” People sue over utterly ridiculous things all the time, and I don’t see that as a good trend.
If the consumer takes bad advice without doing his/her research, I feel like the consumer shouldn’t get to blame everyone BUT him/herself.
June 28th, 2007 at 5:12 amM. I realize we live in a litigious society, but the truth of the matter is that there are lots of people who believe what they read simply because it’s in print. My grandmother was a very naive soul and would read every piece of junk mail sent her way. As a result she fell for many scams. I’m not saying she shouldn’t have done her homework, but those who don’t write web content are a little more trusting of the information out there.
After my discussion at WAHM last weekend, I took it upon myself to read a lot of the articles at a certain site. There was some good stuff there and there’s other stuff that I’m sure was Googled and written in five minutes.
My opinion:
If a writer is contracted to write, no matter how little the amount, he’s responsible for producing quality content. Likewise it’s a content site’s responsibility to make sure all of its content is accurate and well-written. If that means hiring fact-checkers and editors that do more than run an article through Copyscape, so be it. I’d hold both parties accountable.
What really appalls me is the attitude by some of the writers who contribute to these sites and don’t care that they’re seen as content mills with a bad reputation. My good name is worth more to me than the money. Sometimes that means being careful with whom I associate. Yeah, I’m a snob.
June 28th, 2007 at 5:12 amMost content sites either don’t give writers contracts or don’t cover this issue if they do, so the legal position is fuzzy. I rarely write for content mills, but I do a lot of non-fiction writing for encyclopedias, businesses, workbooks and such. Generally my contracts say that I warrant that the information is original and correct or would be considered correct based on a reasonable amount of research using credible sources. That’s not the legal language they use, but that is the gist of the agreement.
I think this is a good rule of thumb. You should do some quick research to make sure that someone with appropriate credentials would generally agree that the information or advice that you are dispensing is accurate, or at least not wrong, misleading, or harmful.
The editor/publisher also has a responsibility to read the material(I’m convinced some don’t) and decide if it is credible because by publishing it on their Web site, they are giving it their implicit okay.
As a writer, I have to wonder who these other writers are who don’t care if the their content is even remotely accurate. Do they think they are going to be able to use these articles as clips, or do they actually think they are giving good information even though they haven’t checked it?
I don’t think working for el-cheapo content/SEO sites is a good career move for people who want to make good money as writers. The sites have no professional credibility. The clips, such as they are, are worse than useless, because they tell a careful editor that the writer is someone who will slap together a couple paragraphs and call it done. In addition, the writer who produces drivel is using time that could be spend querying for better work with a much better pay scale.
I’ve heard all the arguments for doing SEO/content work on the cheap - that it takes no time, takes no research, provides rapid income, lets you work at home. But I still don’t buy it as a good move for anyone who expects to continue working as a writer. Note: I’m talking about the 300 words for $5 type sites. There are legit content sites out there, and guess what, they pay decently and expect quality work.
June 28th, 2007 at 5:13 amLegally, the responsibility for inaccurate content would depend on the contracts in place between the writers, editors, and site owners. I strongly suspect that most site owners have taken good legal advice to insulate themselves from liability.
Ethically, the responsibility is shared between writers, editors, and site owners. Each has a moral responsibility to the reader to produce the most accurate writing possible.
Practically, the responsibility is disavowed by all parties in many cases. In general, writers seem to take the issue of good content more seriously than do editors and site owners. It’s only on writers’ blogs and forums that I see discussions like this.
Financially, a great deal of the writing on the internet has the ultimate goal of selling something, directly or indirectly. This often leads to strangely limited or distorted content.
As I’ve said before, if I were still teaching university undergraduates, I would not allow any content sites to be used as source material for their papers. Some are slightly better than others, but there aren’t any I would trust for my own research — which means I wouldn’t let my students rely on them either.
The problem is by no means limited to internet writing. It is simply more obvious here.
June 28th, 2007 at 5:13 amI think the responsibility for good content rests with both writers and publishers. On my end as a writer, it’s my responsibility to ensure factual accuracy, produce work that is free of errors in spelling, grammar, and punctuation, and provide information to a specific audience. However, once I submit my completed work to a client, I have no control over what the client does to change each piece (I’m talking here about Web content specifically, not articles for publication, where I might retain some of the rights).
I could submit an error-free, factual piece that does a great job of informing site visitors on a topic, but if my client makes changes that result in factual or grammar errors or cuts my piece down to a length that makes it less informative, I can’t control that because I no longer have the rights to each piece.
I agree with Lou — it seems like writers as a collective group are the most concerned with this issue. It seems that we are the ones who want to produce the best quality work while publishers are more concerned with Adsense pages and keywords (even misspelled ones).
August 15th, 2007 at 9:40 amI agree with those who have said it’s both people’s jobs to make sure it’s good quality, and publishers should also pay for the desired quality.
Some editors seem to think all writers only want minimalist pay yesterday, and fail to realize the long-term view some (or many?) of us hold, as we seek to build up reliable, respectable names.
Actually, reliability and respectability seem to be going out the window, these days, with a dog-eat-dog approach to life. (Or perhaps I should call it selfish and bratty.) This bad content problem might be an offshoot of that.
August 20th, 2007 at 10:23 am