When Comment isn't Free - Observing the rise of Trollonomics?

To start at the beginning - the backstory here is best covered by the Huffington Post, which also helpfully points to all the other stories covering it on the Web (the backstory to the backstory is best covered here, on Jezebel):

British newspaper The Observer found itself embroiled in controversy on Monday after it was forced to withdraw an incendiary op-ed about transgender people. The piece, [in the "Comment is Free" section] by controversial British commentator Julie Burchill, was titled "Transsexuals should cut it out." It was an attempted defense of Burchill's friend Suzanne Moore, who had aroused the ire of some by making a crack about "Brazilian transsexuals" in a column. But Moore could hardly have asked for a worse defense.

Burchill heaped on piles of bile, calling transgender people "screaming mimis", "bed-wetters in bad wigs" and "dicks in chicks' clothing," among other choice phrases. The trans community exploded with anger. A government minister called it "bigoted vomit."

And that was just the tip of it (follow the links for the rest)!

But that wasn't what interested me - Burchill is well known for her "controversial" approach (Belle de Jour more forthrightly called her a troll journalist), so that was all very predictable. No, what is interesting is what was going on behind this story.

The Observer is a Sunday paper that is owned by the Guardian Media group, which also owns the Guardian daily newspaper and the Media Guardian website. The company chose to put the article online onto said overall Guardian website, where the firestorm really kicked off - to quote said Guardian:

The online version of Burchill's column had attracted several thousands comments by Monday lunchtime, with the majority opposing the writer, while the argument on Twitter raged for and against her.

Never mind Monday lunchtime, there were about a thousand (mainly very angry) comments by Sunday lunchtime, and petitions were already being raised, polls being put up, complaint forms being syndicated all Sunday afternoon....and to say that the Twitter argument raged "for and against her" is somewhat disingenuous, on Twitter too (and every single poll going) the vast majority of people opposed the article, vehemently, from the get-go.

So, the key question is "why even put it online, and then, given the firestorm, why keep it there? The reason, (eventually) given by the Observer's editor late on Monday afternoon, was that it was all a huge misjudgement. But does this argument pass muster?

It didn't take more than a cursory read, even by a comparative editorial amateur like me, to see that the article was wildly over the top, was going to be massively offensive to far more than just the trans-gender community, and so soon into the Leveson Age to boot. Maybe I'm a bit more online savvy and could do something they couldn't, ie work out that online it would be seen by far more people than a few grumpy Observer readers - but I doubt it. Yet they still pasted it up online.

And then, when the complaints started pouring in on Sunday, It didn't take a genius to realise this was going to "trend" on Twitter, and for very negative reasons. Yet on Sunday the Guardian newspaper's Editor kept on repeating "it's not us, honest, it's those Observer people" and they still didn't take it down, despite said Guardian Editor also being a member of the board of Guardian News and Media, of the main board of the Guardian Media Group and of the Scott Trust, which owns The Guardian and The Observer,. I also doubt it was technically impossible to take it down, so there was either indecision, or a decision to leave it up on Sunday. (And those Observer people stayed under the radar all Sunday - odd that, for an entire organisation full of Journos who normally live their lives on Twitter, you would think).

And up it stayed all Monday, before finally being taken down in the late afternoon.

So, in effect a very respectable newspaper has played the sort of card that said well respected newspapers usually look down their noses at the more excitable blogs for playing, ie to "say or write deliberately provocative things in order to attract attention* " (to quote Belle du Jour again). Now why else, apart from misjudgement and indecison by some normally very media savvy and usually very decisive people, might one do such a thing, I hear you ask?

One other hypothesis that fits the facts as to why they left it up was to go for the hitz - the traffic spike must have been immense. The other possible hypothesis, that they were unable to take it down technically before Monday evening, is unlikely - there is no way that the Guardian website is left un-managed all Sunday, never mind all Monday - I'd bet real money that it could have been taken down at a few moment's notice, at worst within hours of the complaints rolling in.

Thus the really, really interesting question is this one - what is the cost/benefit analysis on playing for the hits, no matter how objectionable the content? Will the hits be seen to have been worth it in this case? In other words, even if done by misjudgement this time round, does this tactic pay, even for "respectable" online media?

If it was considered to be a success (under Wilde's Law, there is no such thing as bad publicity) we can probably expect a lot more "Controversial Op-Ed* "-as-journalism, even from "respectable" organs.

And if so, how long before they lose that respect, and - ultimately - does respect actually pay the bills? On that question hinges the future of the respected traditiional media.

Watch this space......

Interestingly, after it was pulled down, it has upset all the Free Speech-at-any-cost advocates too - so is this a dose of bad karma, or is more bad publicity a Wilde's Law second bite at the cherry?

(Personally I'm not sure it could have stayed up, as far as I can see quite a bit of it contravenes a bunch of the UK's laws - they would never have got away with this article if it was slating race, religion or (non-trans) gender, and I think it possibly could also get pursued under the incitement to hatred laws too - we shall see what happens to the Observer newspaper piece, which cannot be pulled down.)

Update - the Torygraph, arch-ideological enemy to the Guardian, has now republished the whole thing over here - all in the interests of Free Speech, you understand. Perish the thought that Trollonomics came into it

*aka "trolling"