Comments

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  Max Pesling February 12, 2011 at 11:06pm

  NE News, I would go further, eTN is more than "not evenhanded journalism," it's not journalism AT ALL. I think most people don't realize that everything they write about has been paid for. It's not journalism, it's advertorial content masquerading as journalism. And it's full of the most egregious typos and bad English. All of which leads to the question: who's paying for their trashing Puerto Rico?? OK, maybe not the Seychelles, I was being facetious, but who? Or is it, as you suggest, a vendetta because PR Tourism didn't buy an ad?

   

  Whatever it is, I hope people will keep going to Puerto Rico. It's one of the most fascinating destinations in the Caribbean.
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  Hal Peat February 12, 2011 at 9:55pm

  @NE News & @Max - Re: Puerto Rico and the PRTC - after passing through San Juan many times over the past 8 years as a hub on my way to other island destinations in the region, I finally made a point of going there to visit last October.  My only regret?  That I hadn't done so years sooner - it is a fabulous place and a marvelous people.  Great visit, tons to write about from it.  Will be back again later this year.  PRTC and Edelman PR both excellent.  I'm also as much mystified by the writer's big issue with other journos going back who've already been.  I guess he never heard of either follow-up reporting, covering an event (San Sebastian Festival) or the simple fact that someone else found much more to explore in the same destination.  Anyway, I'll guess I'll be committing his Cardinal Sin of visiting twice and going back myself later this year:)
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  Northeast News February 12, 2011 at 6:18pm

  I'm as puzzled as you are, Max. The article asks, "Why in the world would [Puerto Rican Tourism Company] bring journalists to a press trip if they had already been there?" That's not a very smart question. Doesn't the author know that travel writers, just like news reporters, must revisit places regularly?

  The deluge of Seychelles stories on eTN is also puzzling, as you say, so I do assume there's some financial connection. The Seychelles would not, of course, see Puerto Rico as a direct competitor (Mauritius, maybe, but not Puerto Rico), but there still might be a financial explanation for the Puerto Rico-bashing.Maybe PRTC backed out of buying an ad or sponsoring a special section on eTN? I'm just guessing, obviously, what I do know that we're seeing there is not evenhanded journalism. 
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  Max Pesling February 12, 2011 at 5:54am

  Okay, so what's up with eTurboNews constantly bashing Puerto Rico? Not long ago Dr. Elinor Garely wrote the most scathing report about one of my favorite destinations I have ever seen. Tonight, I just read eTN Editor-in-Chief Nelson Alcantara's shockingly, intentionally negative report on Puerto Rico. What gives, folks?
  
  On another front, is anyone beside me annoyed by the CONSTANT coverage of the Seychelles on eTN? Seems every time the prime minister sneezes, there's a story on eTN. Can you connect the dots? Call me cynical, paranoid, or just plain evil-minded, but one could, in a moment of unfettered imagination, suppose that the Seychelles is trying to grab market share from other tropical islands and has started a smearing campaign to make sure American tourists don't go to San Juan, and oh, by the way, here are 3,452 stories on the Seychelles in case you're considering another destination.
  
  Now of course I'm not suggesting this is the case, I'm trying to be funny here. But still, WHAT THE HECK IS UP??
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  joao cabral February 11, 2011 at 4:59pm

  spectacular wild dolphins http://portugaldreamcoast.com/en/the-family-of-wild-dolphins/
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  Buzzy Gordon February 11, 2011 at 3:41am

  Not sure how this will translate into enough new revenues for AOL to justify the cost of this acquisition. Seems to me another example of AOL having more money than brains.
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  David Paul Appell February 9, 2011 at 3:57pm

  FYI re AOL/HuffPost, 3 interesting snippets from today's MediaBistro newsfeed:
  
  
  
  
  
  LA Times / Tim Rutten: Whatever the ultimate impact of Aol's $315 million acquisition of The Huffington Post on the new-media landscape, it's already clear that the merger will push more journalists more deeply into the tragically expanding low-wage sector of our increasingly brutal economy.
  Slate: Making a living off the news is hard, and if Aol and The Huffington Post have figured out a way to fool search engines into pushing visitors their way, I salute them. But there's a long-term problem with their strategy: They won't be able to fool the computers forever.
  
  
  HuffPost / Hilary Rosen: In all the media buzz about the Aol deal with The Huffington Post, one issue keeps coming up that makes no sense to me: Will Huffington Post bloggers still submit their work for free when HuffPost founders just made a lot of money on their investment?
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  Scott Burgess February 9, 2011 at 5:39am

  Being a writer and the editor for my site, I've turned away much better writers because I can't pay them. And having written for HuffPo a few times for my day job, I  stopped only after only a few times because I didn't make any money and found my work being treated as if it were merely "content" with ill timed postings.

  For me, I'm willing to share content with another travel blogger -- where the benefits are mutual instead of trading "exposure" for free labor. And with the $1.39 a day adsense brings me, it's not like I could pay anyone much of anything.
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  Hal Peat February 8, 2011 at 4:02pm

  Regarding this question of no-pay at HuffPo - I guess you all missed the conversations that ensued elsewhere when certain travel bloggers went and wrote for free on HP and then justified it in blogs again elsewhere on the basis that they got a readership boost back on their own individual blogsite thanks to the linkback that HP allowed. Then there was another HP blog controversy last summer when someone wrote a (free) HP blog in the travel section entitled "Why WE travel..." which additionally tried to assert the One True Way to travel and write nowadays. He was rightly taken to task by Mike Barish on his blogs on Gadling. Then yet again, if you noticed any of that out of the corner of your eye but wisely decided to ignore it entirely, so much the better for you. I should be so wise myself. "If you wrestle with a pig, you'll just get mud on yourself -- and the pig will enjoy it."
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  Sam Scribe February 8, 2011 at 12:53am

  Quite right, Allan. Unless I have the story wrong, A.H. retains her position as editor of the Huffington Post, so the message to me is that HuffPost is successful as is and AOL has no incentive to amend the business model. 

  I've canonize Samuel Johnson, who said, "No man but a blockhead ever wrote, except for money."