Valleywag’s conflict of interest example

Last Sunday, I posted about when is an appropriate time to remove a comment on a blog/site. This week, Michael Arrington posted a story on TechCrunch about edgeio receiving a round of financing. He put the following note in the article:

I won't say much more here due to the conflict of interest (I remain on the board of directors of edgeio and am a stockholder).

Valleywag, a Silicon Valley tech mag, posted an article about it. It is worth the read. It goes back to the trust factor and how important it is.

A comment from the Valleywag post:

Good but not great Michael, your other two writers Nick Gonzales and Marshall Kirkpatrick should have taken this one. Or were you just so giddy to announce your baby stopped breastfeeding and now is suckling the endless bottle of funding?

I will leave it up to you after reading the Valleywag post if there is a bigger conflict of interest. One of the commenters had a good suggestion about clearly listing all of the sites and companies that the blog belongs to.

My suggestion has been that when a blog/site wants to post something that might be construed as advertising, they state that it is. Period. You can post whatever you want on your site, it is your freakin site. But just don't make us all out to be morons.