Writer Claims Bitcoin News Sites are Accepting Cash for Coverage

NEW YORK (InsideBitcoins) — Cryptocurrency news coverage often ranges from blatant hype to downright hysteria. There are so many novice news sites in the mix that honest, accurate and objective coverage can be hard to find.

In fact, one self-described bitcoin journalist claims more than a few websites offer “cash for coverage,” often undisclosed or barely revealed payments for promotion.

“Sites that accept cash for coverage should just not be trusted,” writes Tom Butterfield in an article for Medium.com. “Once a ‘journalist’ accepts cash of any sort to write a piece they are biased and will write more positive things. Sometimes — even worse some of these so called ‘journalists’ will extort companies and allow them to not have a negative piece published if they simply pay.”

Butterfield sought to prove the existence of “payola journalism” by contact several bitcoin news sites with the following message: “Hi! I’m working on a new Bitcoin exchange that will be launching soon and we are looking to get some coverage. I was curious if we could pay and have your site feature us in an article? Anthony.”

Sadly, he found several takers, including what he calls “questionable” tactics employed by some of the industry’s biggest news outlets. Butterfield names names in his expose, including a list of “The Super Super Super Bad Players” all of which “accept paid submissions from a single broker and as such should never ever be trusted,” he claims.

“We can barely trust any Bitcoin news sites,” Summerfield writes. “We have a lot of really, really, bad players.”

Editor’s note: InsideBitcoins does not accept payment for content promotion and does not publish “sponsored posts” or paid affiliate links. Display advertising is clearly marked as such. Staff writers and contributors are required to disclose any investment held that may represent a potential conflict of interest.