Journalists and Blogging Pay

Posted on March 20, 2006

Stephen Baker at BlogSpotting has asked whether he should be compensated for writing BlogSpotting for BusinessWeek while on unpaid leave.

Bloggers at the Washington Post are wondering if they should be paid extra. (ex BusinessBlogWire) This made me think about... myself. I'm on unpaid leave from BusinessWeek, and I'm continuing to blog on this commercial site. Is there something wrong with that? True, I'm continuing to receive benefits, including health insurance. But other journalists get the same benefits when they're on leave, and they don't have to blog.

Here's the key: I don't want to stop blogging. If BW kicked me off this site during this leave, I'd start another blog where I'd also blog for free--presumably, with less traffic.

Whether Stephen Baker should get paid for continuing to blog while on unpaid leave is a fuzzier matter than whether journalists should get extra pay for writing a blog. Journalists who work hard on a blog can end up creating something of a value for the media company they work for. In addition to the time they have spent writing Blogspotting posts, Stephen Baker and Heather Green have also created something of value for BusinessWeek. For example, Blogspotting now has over 850 inbound links according to Technorati. They have also directed lots of traffic to other other BusinessWeek articles and blogs which has probably led to still more links coming in to the Buinessweek.com website.

Many journalists may end up creating popular blogs on different subjects for the magazines and newspapers they work for. However, it is becoming clear that many journalists are not being compensated for writing blogs even though these blogs are adding value by acquiring links, boosting traffic and increasing brand awareness.