That is, something along the lines of "We don't let our business relationships get in the way of our objectivity."
I have multiple problems with that. Â
1. Â Would a publication which did favor those whom it had a business relationship with say anything else?
2. Â I'm much less worried about explicit favoritism to advertisers than I am to much more subtle, and many times, not even intentional types of biases. Â
3. Â I'm not convinced that a publication that preemptively makes such statements is more trustworthy than one which doesn't.
The real issue publications have from my point of view is the unintentional biases. Â To me, it's pretty apparent when a review or article is nothing more than an advertisement in disguise, it's the more subtle type of article that worries me.
The type where the publication doesn't give an advertiser a free pass, but also doesn't give as much coverage to an advertisers competitors. Â The type where phrasing unintentionally makes an advertiser look better than if they weren't.
Basically, I think stating "advertising doesn't affect our editorial policy" is hopelessly naive about the way humans brains work.
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