Conflict of Interest? Advertisement for Toshiba PDR-3300 beside our HWC review same

[Dr. Data]

I understand balancing financial viability with ethics. However, I believe having the Banner advertising the Toshiba PDR-3300 camera literally inches from a HWC review of the item to be a bit..."in your face" conflict of interest.

It does not take a rocket scientist to discern that if we are taking money for a add....our review of the product can not be totally objective.

This may very well be suicide for the site. Once consumers learn that the content can not be trusted, they will go elsewhere. Once they go elsewhere, so do our $ from banner adds.

If the site wishes to be successful then HWC should be doing it cleaner, better, and with absolute professional and unbiased reviews. That is what attracts readers....and that is what attracts banner $.

At least have the courtesy to move the banner over to the left so that its more .5 inches from the headline. For a second I thought the banner and the headline were all the same thing (for crying out loud).

[egrevstad]

Dr. D.,

I don't know of and haven't seen any ads for the Toshiba camera on the site -- if you're referring to the rectangle on the front page above the table of contents that says "3 Megapixels for $349," that's NOT an ad but a spotlight or illustration that links to my review (if you remember, until this morning it was a link to the "Optical Mouse That Works in Midair" review of the Gyration Ultra Mouse, and in a week or so it'll be something else).

Sometimes vendors buy ad space in the right-hand of those two blocks; sometimes it's another one of those editorial spotlights (last I looked, an older Sony desktop review); but the left-hand one is always a 220x90-pixel teaser for some recent review, created and placed by me (it's especially handy once other articles push the review down from the top of the contents).

Even if Toshiba has bought an ad, it's news to me; I've had no contact with the company except for negotiating and just returning my eval loaner of the PDR-3300. I've been working for computer magazines (and more recently Web sites) since '82, and you and I are in 100% agreement about the need for absolutely professional and unbiased reviews -- that's what Hardware Central publishes and will always publish, whether a manufacturer succumbs to our sales team or not.

Thanks for reading,
Eric

[Dr. Data]

Eric


Thanks for clearing that up for me. So it only appears to be an add..but its actually a link to the article. Ok makes sense. I am new and just havent noticed before.

Thanks again!