On purchased approval -- to sell

Ethics
1

A book titled “Leap-Frogging” hit the WSJ bestseller list for a week. Recently, the author wrote a mea culpa of sorts. He explains that if one’s book sells 3,000 copies (in the first week, I assume) it can make the WSJ list. I suppose this would be within a specific category: e.g. business-related books. He says he contacted many previous clients and asked them to place pre-orders. That way, all the sales would be in the first week. However, one could obviously fake the sales if one were willing to spend the money oneself. There are consultants who help authors get their books high on such lists. They argue that it is simply a way to create buzz, just like any other ad campaign… and caveat emptor. Clearly, this is – and ought to remain – legal. However, is this ethical?

 

Is it right to frame the question thus: “Is it ethical to pay people to pretend to like your product so that other prospects will buy it?”

 

Having an actress appear in an ad saying “I use Dove soap, etc.” is a bit different, because the audience realizes it is an ad and because going by what this one actress says is already a bit silly. An advertisement that says “Most loved sedan in the U.S.” is a closer example, but again the audience understands its an ad. if the ad said “best selling sedan in the U.S.” and if that is a lie, we’re getting closer.

 

Analogous is other types of purchased approval. For instance, there are people who pay to have others comment on their web-sites, to create a show of activity. I have seen models who pay people to post positive comments on their portfolios.

 

Many SEO companies also do a form of this. They have hundreds of people, all over the world, who will search for some terms and then click on a particular web-site, in the hope that it rise in search-listings. Some of them say you do not have to pay unless they get you to page one. [Admittedly, this is not all they do, just one component.]

 

There are lots of other examples, but this is enough to get the picture.

 

So, my question is: do you consider this to be ethical?

 

 

2

Sounds pretty unsavory to me. The actual pre-ordering thing isn’t so bad, since those people actually were purchasing copies with no bribery involved as far as I can tell, it just was a matter of when they were buying them. The other stuff though is too close to fraud for me. The people who are doing these things are counting on doing one thing and being assumed to have done another. I give it an ethical thumbs down.

3

Completely within individual rights, yes. (But that’s not in question.)

That it is an attempt to distort reality, and create misperceptions in others’ minds, makes me follow bluecherry in a thumbs down.

 

[bc, the fraud angle is worth considering, but I think “buyer beware” should be over-riding.]

4

The key is, is the audience being lied to?

As you pointed out, an actress saying that she like Dove is not a lie. She’s an actress. She’s acting. People know she’s acting. She’s painting an optimistic picture of what it could be like to have the product. Acting, whether it’s in a movie or a commercial, is not lying. It’s not even of any dubious morality, it’s perfectly moral and legitimate.

On the other hand, a best seller list purports to inform an audience about sales numbers. An author buying his own product is not a sale, neither is him paying a company to buy it. That is a lie, and the author is clearly at least partially to blame for it.

With the google example, I once again can’t find a lie. It’s not 100% clear what it means to have a website show up in a google search, but the main criteria is (somewhat vaguely) expected to be relevance rather than popularity. If my website really is relevant to a search criteria, why wouldn’t I make sure it shows up on the front page of Google? I have a product to sell, people are looking for that product to buy. It would be ridiculous to ask me to not try and get the shop that’s right by the entrance, in the mall, because that might be unfair to other sellers of the same product.

The “show of activity / positive comments” thing is right on the line. It all depends on whether the comments are true, false, or subjective, as well as on whether there is an active attempt to lie about the nature of this illusion of enthusiasm for the product. I think simply doing it, without informing anyone about it one way or the other, is fine. It is worth noting that the Internet didn’t come up with the concept of creating the illusion of enthusiasm for something. With many products (in fashion, pop music, media), the illusion of enthusiasm is a bigger part of the product than the actual product. Yes, there is a fine line between an actual lie and an illusion/suspension of disbelief that people want and can be expected to be aware of, but it’s an important line.

5

Well argued, I think.

Still, as an ethical concern it should be looked at from the p.o.v - not only of the potential ‘target’ or ‘victim’ of this action - but of the actor himself.

Essentially, would YOU do this?

If not, why not?

6

Well argued, I think.

Still, as an ethical concern it should be looked at from the p.o.v - not only of the potential ‘target’ or ‘victim’ of this action - but of the actor himself.

Essentially, would YOU do this?

If not, why not?

I would do all the things I consider moral, yes.

7

In line with the buyer beware, does WSJ share some culpability if this misleading does tend toward unethical behaviour?

8

I would do all the things I consider moral, yes.

Ha. Next question - would you consider such an act to be rationally selfish?

9

Well argued, I think.

Still, as an ethical concern it should be looked at from the p.o.v - not only of the potential ‘target’ or ‘victim’ of this action - but of the actor himself.

Essentially, would YOU do this?

If not, why not?

Good point. It’s well worth considering the kind of person doing that makes you into. Someone who preys on others becomes the kind person who can be preyed upon by others.

10

The person selling their opinion has every right to sell their opinion.
The person buying the opinion has every right to purchase what is voluntarily sold.

I think this is one of those caveat emptor and let the free market decide issues.

It is unsavory practice to lie for money.
But, if somoene does it often enough for a poor product they devalue themselves- which is their word… much like any other industry, lacking coerced regulation, can hang themselves by taking advantage of that fact.

 

11

At first I thought that, while fabricated testimonials (telling us that a real consumer thinks this, in a context where an ordinary viewer would accept the claim, as distinguished from the celebrity-endorsement case) are dishonest, artificially ginning up sales figures (e.g. with strategic book buys) or web traffic (e.g. by running a script that runs up your hit count) is merely a form of advertising.  On further thought I’m inclined to say that it’s a faking of reality and thus not what a rational individual would do.

 

On the other hand, if this is as easy to do as Trachtenberg suggests, the list-makers need tighter controls for the sake of their own credibility.

12

Tough one. I think it would depend on whether your product is good or not, and if you, as an author, can accurately judge your own works.

 

If it’s good, people will buy it.. but as an author you may not have the confidence that it will become widespread or gain enough attention unless it hits a bestseller list. (There are probably some stats that back this up. For ex, books that hit the NYT bestseller list recieve a lot of attention. I imagine that on average, those authors probably sell more copies than other authors who don’t get their books on the NYT bestseller list.) But if your book isn’t good, and you just want it on a widespread bestseller list to dupe buyers.. that is wrong. 

13

Ha. Next question - would you consider such an act to be rationally selfish?

Yes. That’s what I mean by moral.

14

moralist, on 26 Feb 2013 - 19:38, said:

Good point. It’s well worth considering the kind of person doing that makes you into. Someone who preys on others becomes the kind person who can be preyed upon by others.

Hold that thought for a moment, moralist. While that wasn’t really my point, certainly you are right as far as it goes, but there are further levels. You identify what “doing that makes you into” (a predator or prey) as not good for you, am I right? In other words - not in your self-interest; or - unselfish.

??

Careful - if you continue your line of thinking, you’ll conclude with rational selfishness as the only possible outcome.. :wink:

Next thing, to mentally remove other people’s judgments on one’s self from the equation, and what remains as primary is that one has acted against a just outcome in reality (“faked” it) AND against one’s knowledge and consciousness, therefore, immorally - to and of oneself. The predominant deception is self-deception: separate from, and before even taking into account the effects of this deceit on others - as likely unethical behavior alone.

Substituting the old oath -“As God is my only witness” - for - “As I am my only witness”- would complete the case for the ethics of rational egoism. Simplistically. (Highly.)

In the end, the OP’s ‘poser’ is probably border-line, morally, so I wouldn’t be as critical as I have above. Only not wanting you to misinterpret my earlier remarks.

As if you haven’t already seen, with rational selfishness Rand turned the traditional Judaeo-Christian ethics on its head.

1 Like
15

Hold that thought for a moment, moralist. While that wasn’t really my point, certainly you are right as far as it goes, but there are further levels. You identify what “doing that makes you into” (a predator or prey) as not good for you, am I right? In other words - not in your self-interest; or - unselfish.

??

Yes.

 

The secret of immunity to becoming the prey of others is to give up preying upon others. It is generally believed that one person’s gain can only come at another person’s loss. Those are both losses in terms of the creatures people devolve into by participating in that closed zero sum predator/prey system.

 

There is another system where both parties mutually benefit because they are neither predator or prey… and each of us freely chooses to which system they will pledge their allegiance.

Careful - if you continue your line of thinking, you’ll conclude with rational selfishness as the only possible outcome.. :wink:

I already do… :slight_smile:

 

Doing what is morally right is ALWAYS in your own rational selfish interest.

Next thing, to mentally remove other people’s judgments on one’s self from the equation, and what remains as primary is that one has acted against a just outcome in reality (“faked” it) AND against one’s knowledge and consciousness, therefore, immorally - to and of oneself. The predominant deception is self-deception: separate from, and before even taking into account the effects of this deceit on others - as likely unethical behavior alone.

Substituting the old oath -“As God is my only witness” - for - “As I am my only witness”- would complete the case for the ethics of rational egoism. Simplistically. (Highly.)

I totally agree. Never jigger with reality. 

 

If you do what’s right and let all the chips fall where they may… they will always fall in your favor.

16

With the google example, I once again can’t find a lie. It’s not 100% clear what it means to have a website show up in a google search, but the main criteria is (somewhat vaguely) expected to be relevance rather than popularity. If my website really is relevant to a search criteria, why wouldn’t I make sure it shows up on the front page of Google? I have a product to sell, people are looking for that product to buy. It would be ridiculous to ask me to not try and get the shop that’s right by the entrance, in the mall, because that might be unfair to other sellers of the same product.

Paying people who have no interest in my web-site to search-and-select, so that it comes on Google’s first page seems pretty analogous to paying people to buying my book that they have no interest in, so it comes on the WSJ list. Buying it myself, instead of paying others to buy it, is just a tiny step away. What’s the key difference, in your mind?

The person selling their opinion has every right to sell their opinion… … It is unsavory practice to lie for money.

Yes, people have the right to lie. I don’t question that. It is the morality that I’m wondering about. You say that lying in unsavory. So, I assume you think it might be immoral.

In line with the buyer beware, does WSJ share some culpability if this misleading does tend toward unethical behaviour?

They simply pick up top-selling numbers from Neilsen’s. Perhaps Neilsen’s or the WSJ will have to adjust their metric to lessen the impact of such gaming.

17

It’s a perception thing, isn’t it? People tend to buy perceived success. (Collective, subjective

undertones.) One negative effect is that we start automatically factoring-in the “gaming” of any and all products; or we take them at face value, with a possibly unrealistic outcome upon the economy as a whole.

(It’s reminiscent of the theatre world, where opening nights may have the house ‘papered’, seats

either pre-sold at a discount with block booking - also given free to friends and families. A savvy

theatre critic will deduct at least a third of an audience in a full house, to test the show’s

true popularity. Nothing new under the sun as they say…)

18

Paying people who have no interest in my web-site to search-and-select, so that it comes on Google’s first page seems pretty analogous to paying people to buying my book that they have no interest in, so it comes on the WSJ list. Buying it myself, instead of paying others to buy it, is just a tiny step away. What’s the key difference, in your mind?

The Google search results aren’t a “most popular websites” list. If Google decided to make an objectively “most popular” list every time someone searches for something, then things would be different. There would be an objective untruth in manipulating that system to put an unpopular website on a list.

But, as it stands, there isn’t. Google presents pages in order of “relevance and importance”, as per its PageRank algorithm. It’s a complicated algorithm, but the main method is counting incoming links from other important and relevant sites, to determine that supposed importance. To get a higher ranking, a website owner must get links onto those sites, through various means.

So, if were to look for an analogy, I think the closest thing is paying people to distribute fliers about your products (in this case, the fliers are links). For instance, if I made a site about Objectivism, I would want to put up links to it on this site, to increase my Google rank (however, there would be no point in putting those links up on a 10 times more popular site about vegetables). I’m sure there’s also no point in putting up a million links on this site, Google definitely accounts for that ol’ gag by now.

That would in fact be honest advertising. Google literally counts the number of ads for a site, weights them to reflect how many people are likely to see them (and how interested those people are likely to be in the ad to begin with), and then adds it all up to determine the site’s importance. One flaw is that Google does not consider the quality of the ads (in the case of fliers, it would see no difference between “Hey, stupid, go to 250 Fifth Avenue” and a beautifully written essay on why a group of people would benefit from visiting that address.

Of course, posting links in places where it is against the rules is called spam, just like in the physical world. However, unlike with the physical world, if a site wants nothing to do with ads aimed at Google, they can automatically add a “nofollow” tag to all the links users post, which cause Google’s algorithm to ignore the links. So, not adding that tag is consent to accept such advertising.

19

In line with the buyer beware, does WSJ share some culpability if this misleading does tend toward unethical behaviour?

Their job, as journalists, is to tell the truth. At this point, there’s no excuse for them not knowing about this. So yes, continuing to print the same list would have the same moral quality as anyone else (doctor, airline pilot, US President) being purposefully bad at their job.

But, knowing the media, I wouldn’t be surprised it that’s exactly what they did.

20

Doing what is morally right is ALWAYS in your own rational selfish interest.

I totally agree. Never jigger with reality.

A crucial reversal of that statement, here:

“Doing what is in your own rational self interest IS what is morally right.”

There’s a vein of ‘utility’ in your remarks, moralist.

I think I see what you are doing, and that is trying to derive an ethical system

  • downwards - from capitalism (which you strongly support evidently.)

What eventuates, I think, is a “rugged individualism” for which Americans were

justly admired (and envied) for a long time.

But attempting to connect rational selfishness with Christian ethics, through

laissez-faire capitalism (and individualism) is doomed to failure. They can never mix, though I have a sneaking respect for your efforts. Without bottom-up justification by way of rational egoism, one can only predict that capitalism would meet the same partial defeat as on previous occasions.

A utilitarianist rationale (therefore, collectivist) is worse than no rationale at all, in the end.