I’m glad it’s such a slow news day. Now I can concentrate on something that blew up on a few of the blogs last night: discussion/debate of the new FTC disclosure rule for bloggers, particularly as it relates to James Rocchi and others’ recent trip to Bora Bora on Universal’s dime.

Rocchi’s MSN piece about his Couples Retreat junket experience is a good read, but it doesn’t really convince me that a lenghty excursion to French Polynesia was worth his, the studio’s or our time in any way. But I’ve always felt weird about junkets. The few I’ve been to made me extremely uncomfortable, especially when there’s food and drink offered (I always decline since I suspect one day the world’s publicists will decide to poison the world’s film critics in a further attempt to rid the industry of negative reviews).

I don’t really have much to add to the discussion since I no longer review films or interview celebs and I always prefer to see movies with a real audience instead of with spoiled critics attending their third or fourth free press screening of the day. And unlike a lot of movie bloggers, I can’t use the t-shirt swag since I’m too thin for XL, which is typically the sole size available with complimentary clothing.

Honestly, I’m okay with the FTC regulations, as they benefit consumers, particularly those too dumb to tell when a site is professional and ethical and when it’s a lame freebie free-for-all like Blogcritics (which I admit I unfortunately used to contribute to before getting paid to blog). However, I’d much prefer an agency that would come around and regulate websites that “hire” and “employ” unpaid writers. Maybe if any of us could get a wage — not to mention a respectable wage — we wouldn’t keep pretending this is all a fun hobby, a la autograph collecting and fan fiction.

And on that note, I have one more point related to one of the blog posts quoted in this roundup. I’ll go on the record with others and defend Cinematical for being one of the few sites remaining that regularly pay all writers in a timely fashion — and for those not living in expensive NYC, they pay decently, especially for a time when adshare models are so popular. It’s true that I left that site a year ago in protest over a temporary financial practice by AOL, but in the past year I’ve had so many requests to contribute unpaid to numerous movie blogs out there, and I’d take Cinematical any day over any of that nonsense.

I’ll quit writing now before I get in or make trouble, but as always these matters can be best contemplated with the old idiom, “you get what you pay for.”

Check out what some bloggers have to say on the topic after the jump. And be sure to read the full posts I’ve quoted from, as well as the comments — many from other bloggers. It’s an interesting discussion going on.

• Here is one unapologetic part of James Rocchi’s coverage of the Couple’s Retreat junket:
  

  These opportunities are so that TV reporters can have brief, colorful bits they can make part of their pieces. My working for an online outlet, where brevity is the not only the soul of wit, but also the savior of bandwidth, means it’s unlikely they’ll make it into the final piece. Still, why not go? Swimming with the stingrays was unusual to say the least. [...] Again, someone asks you: Stingray feeding, how can one say no? The rays get fed, and you get a unique experience. Some of you may already have extrapolated this principle out to my entire trip, as have I.

• Katie Walsh at The Playlist reponds to Rocchi’s piece by questioning the point of it all:
  

  This move reeks of desperation — Universal is clearly throwing money at a bomb and hoping that it somehow translates into a box office bonanza. While this has worked in the past, this type of press junket model is completely outdated in this day and age, especially with the dire financial straits Universal has found itself in this year (they just axed two of their heads). The “lock up the press and stars in a hotel for 2 days” junket style has been the industry standard but it’s massively expensive and time consuming and everyone ends up pretty cranky about doing as many two-minute interviews as possible for 8 straight hours (especially stars, and when stars get cranky, they get demanding). Guaranteed the budget for this event alone would finance the entirety of a small indie film which is sad considering what a waste of time the film appears to be.

• Jeff Wells at Hollywood Elsewhere comments on his own post recommending the Rocchi piece:
  

  James Rocchi is an excellent, thoughtful writer of very high integrity. And he always wears a suit and tie, which matters in the grand scheme, I feel.

• David Poland at The Hot Blog divulges that he’s being generously comped for a trip to the London Film Festival this weekend just in time for it to be relevant to the discussion:
  

  The only travel I ever really accept is from a few film festivals each year. I am an active adviser to the Bermuda Film Festival and haven’t really covered the festival as a festival in years. Seattle is a regular stop, but for years now, I have hosted an event or been on the jury, singing for my supper, as Anne Thompson says. (I even paid for extra room nights this year… willingly. Things are tough in FestWorld there these days.) San Francisco is usually good for a few hotel room nights and I usually pay for a number of extra days there. I may do 10-15 days a year at other fests that pay airfare and hotel, though I have done less and less of that. I spend a lot more covering fests than is ever paid for by fests.

• Anne Thompson at Thompson on Hollywood breaks down what today’s film journalism entails:
  

  New media critic: get paid small sums by the story—or live off share of ads on your blog or site. Report on set visits (paid by studio). Post early photos, poster art, clips and trailers (supplied by studio). Attend junkets for access to filmmakers and stars (paid by studio). Attend film festivals for access (sometimes paid by junketing studio or festival).

  You do the math. Will the bigger sites adopt old journalism rules about conflict of interest and junkets? Not bloody likely. Most of them aren’t trained as journalists in the first place. They are film fans, thrilled to be sharing their passion with their readers. Most are barely scrabbling together a living wage. Will their need for studio access have an impact on what online media outlets will cover and write? Absolutely.

• Commenting on that post, James Rocchi adds to the discussion:
  

  Anne—not to disagree with you, but I find that when I look at the overall picture (and my tax returns), Junket interviews and Set visits are part, but not the largest part, of how I make a living. That’s still reviews and columns. And I do make a living; I’d be lying if I said that perhaps one employer with dental would be better for me than freelancing, but until that happens—which may never—I can lie to myself and say I’m a vital freelancer out there on a dream and a shoeshine.

• Also commenting on Thompson’s post, Harry Knowles of Ain’t It Cool News (in one of many comments) defends himself and his site from claims he/it are regularly bought:
  

  Actually - my guys on AICN do check with me regarding trips, and frankly there are rarely ever ‘gifts’.  Most ‘gifts’ are items that go in closets or storage facilities never to be seen again, except as reGifts.  There’s a lot of non-visible behind the scenes chatter amongst the various editors and writers at AICN.  A digital bullpen - and tons of cel phone conversations - while we publicly humiliate each other via the various social networks.

• Also commenting on the post, Edward Douglas of ComingSoon.net defends junket and set coverage:
  

  As far as set visits and junkets on location, these aren’t a secret once embargo is lifted and if you’re attending one, it’s usually to either write about being on set or adding flavor to your interviews. I don’t think it matters who pays for it or if you’re put up in a swanky hotel or have a meal or two bought for you. You’re attending these things to write about them and by writing about them, you’re revealing them to your readers and then it’s up to you if they have any influence on your review than simply being given a free screening.  But most serious critics/movie writers are more than capable of keeping those things separate from the actual movie that’s on screen.

• (Once again, read all of Thompson’s post and the comments, which includes representation from other bloggers unquoted here such as Sasha Stone and Bob Westal, among others)
  

• Dustin Rowles at Pajiba chimes in with his site’s stances on junkets and press screenings, the latter of which I totally agree with:
  

  In fact, we pay full price for movie tickets, and I’m of the belief that doing so makes us more honest critics. By paying $12 to see Are We There Yet?, I think our reactions reflect not just the wasted time we spent, but the money we lost in the transaction. I don’t believe for a second that most critics who attend press screenings are dishonest, mind you. I just think that, by attending movies like other moviergoers — with other moviegoers — our assessments are more closely aligned to our readers, most of whom don’t have the benefit of free screenings, among other critics, with seats often set aside for them. I might also note that, in our brief experience with press screenings (very, very early on in the game here), that the PR folks who arrange these screenings do occasionally attempt to influence reviews, even if it’s just to alter the language (PR folks don’t like critics to use profanity in their reviews, for instance). And lest you believe otherwise, PR people do hold some sway over critics, even if it’s just in their ability to revoke press screening privileges if they don’t like what they read (as happened to us, early on, when we refused to tone down the language).

• Liz Shannon Miller at NewTeeVee wants the FTC to also regulate product placement in online video, including web series like Fox Mobile’s Brainstorm:
  

  The second episode sets up the idea of confidence as being the key to selling something, and Brainstorm does not lack it. Of course, the second episode is also the one where we really start getting into the “oh, wow, Altoids are like awesome tingly flavor bombs!” stuff. Some of the phrasing is clever (an ad campaign structured around the idea of “Mouth Hobbits”?) but it’s still far more blatant than anything Mad Men ever did for Old Spice or Lucky Strike.

• Moviezzz at The Moviezzz Blog relates a personal story that shows how lame pay-for-post blogging is:
  

  I have never been paid for a review or a post.

  The closest I came to being paid was a while back, in the early blogging days, I remember a third party company asked me to mention a film on my site. It was a major theatrical release that I was going to mention anyway in my then weekly theatrical release listing. I let them know that I was planning on covering it. They said they would send me something for mentioning it. Weeks later, after I had completely forgotten the film and it was out of the theatres, they sent me a copy of the book it was based on and a $10 gift card to see the movie in a certain movie theatre chain. Turns out that the chain wasn’t even in my area.

• Somewhat related, at least to my issue with the confusions about whether or not bloggers are professionals or should be accepted (and paid) as such, Rachel Kaufman at Media Bistro’s Media Jobs Daily shares a story about the kind of person hurting the distinction: a blogger surprised to be denied unemployment while being paid (through adshare) for blogging. Here’s the part that angers me most:
  

  Confused, she contacted New York State again, stating that all she was doing was running a blog. The NYS DOL concluded that she was self-employed and no longer eligible for unemployment benefits.

  She contacted them again and was told she would have to claim earnings every time she received an AdSense check. She called yet again and was told she needed to declare she was working every time she updated her blog.