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Comment by logicallee | Hacker News Reader

The New York Times does not allow genuine native advertising. Pearl Automation was not able to pay the ad department a check, in exchange for writing a "native advertising" story about them.

They could have instigated it. But they didn't pay for it. This wasn't paid for out of their ad budget.

It's a huge win for their PR department - because they got the NYT to write that article (or were very pleasantly surprised to see it). Not paid for it.

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We actually agree. I think there's miscommunication going on here. Two facts:

1. NYT does have a native advertising unit. They produce posts like the one I linked earlier -- that article was sponsored by Cole Haan.

2. The Pearl article is not a native ad. If it were, it would be clearly marked as such (like the article I linked). It could be PR, but that's par for the tech industry (see: Apple's controlled leaks via WSJ/NYT over the years).

>But they didn't pay for it.

So the paidpost subdomain means nothing? I'm curious if that's true as it seems a rather odd choice for a subdomain.

The Pearl Automation story, which 'logicallee refers to, doesn't have a paidpost subdomain. The Cole Haan paid post which 'achompas linked to does.

Though it isn't necessarily implied that _all_ paid articles have that subdomain (somehow I feel like that would be a tricky thing to enforce at a big journalism outfit like NYT).

Why would that be the case? Ads are handled differently than content. Paid posts I'm sure have their own process independent of content. That's what CMS does. It's also clearly marked Paid Post, and it's styling is distinct from other NYT content. [edit to add: Indeed, given the size of the NYT, adherence to a well-defined process is a necessity. The likelihood that a paid post was mistakenly displayed as content would arguably be much less.]

The subdomain isn't the point, however. I was clarifying a misunderstanding in the thread.

If you're aware of paid content in the NYT that isn't marked Paid Post or something similar, please let me know.

I'm not sure how this one slipped under the radar then? Sounds like you might have an idea?

Also, describing the NYT in such a manner is an "appeal to authority."

I disagree with the contention that the Pearl Automation article is a paid post or "obviously paid content marketing material". It reads more casually, more like long-form journalism than a straight up article, but not like paid content.

Prior to this comment, I don't see where I'm arguing anything other than clarifying a difference between the Cole Haan paid post and the Pearl Automation article and that a larger organization needs more process to efficiently produce content at scale, neither of which I think is particularly contentious. Neither of which I see requires or is an appeal to authority. If you think otherwise, please feel free to point out where.

Do you agree with @harryh that the article is marketing material?

Also, @achompas's sibling post was the appeal to authority, not yours, sorry for the confusion.

Do you agree with @harryh that the article is marketing material?

I don't know what answer you're looking for beyond what I've just expressed above:

I disagree with the contention that the Pearl Automation article is a paid post or "obviously paid content marketing material".

If you consider good press to be marketing material, then yes, but I don't think this is an proper understanding of "marketing material". Or is it the idea it wasn't paid for? Even then, I don't think this article is the result of anything unethical, which I understand the label "marketing material" to imply. If you know of actual evidence that indicates such, I'm open to be convinced otherwise.

I'm baffled as to how my comments can be read as appeals to authority. A brief Google search surfaces clear comments by the NYT itself on its native ad policy.

I also think you're suffering from the conflation of marketing and advertising material.

I believe 'Hydraulix989 is interpreting the following as such:

[T]he NYT is a traditional institution with strong publishing process and serious concern for "separation of church and state,

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=13313026

I think they're saying that they can't be trusted to be honest about their own intent. I'm not sure if that's actually an fallacious appeal to authority, as I think that entails referencing some unqualified third party, but I may very well be mistaken.

Regardless, if 'Hydraulix989 doesn't trust the NYT, I can't imagine anything short of an audit by a trusted third-party would be convincing on this issue. To be fair, I would only be convinced that the Pearl Automation article is a marketing piece if there were some concrete evidence of unethical behavior along these lines.

Ah, I get you. I could understand that if, say, someone had not read comments from the NYT's public editor. One example:

http://publiceditor.blogs.nytimes.com/2015/11/12/as-print-fa...

Thanks for the link! I fear that in today's polarized environment, distrust of the media, and the serious missteps made by the NYT in recent years, the fact that the public editor is a NYT employee and published in the NYT would make them untrustworthy to a great many people. And that seems to often taint those who would give them the benefit of the doubt.

And I don't see this as an issue that's unique to any one political persuasion. The level of automatic distrust if not suspicion of bad intent all around greatly concerns me. I find myself actively and repeatedly checking myself to extend the benefit of the doubt and charity. We're increasingly and alarmingly encouraged to view things in a binary fashion, bucketing everyone into one or the other, rather than recognizing there's a wide range of values on all different issues, and that we share many even when we disagree on others.

</soapbox>

I think the opposite is true: the NYT is a traditional institution with strong publishing process and serious concern for "separation of church and state," as publishers call the sales/journalism divide.

If someone is publishing a paid article, it _absolutely_ needs to be marked as such.

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