I totally get what you’re saying (advertising to the same audiences for free), but I guess part of the “paying thousands of dollars” is being the first to show the ads… I have posted ads on my blog for the same reasons that you listed. I’m curious as to whether it was the design house or the magazines that were the ones upset over the controversy (if that’s what you’d like to call it?). Personally, I think the whole thing is ridiculous — in the internet age, nothing is private and nothing remains a secret. At least not for long…
xx
neutraltuesday.blogspot.com

I am most guilty of this but I’m not hurting anyone, I don’t post up-to-the-minute info like most bloggers because they want to be the first and I don’t generate any income from using any pictures. If they don’t want their new pictures to be everywhere, they should lock that shit down or not have it on the www at all.
I’m a poor writer but my visual sense is keen so I like to put up stuff that I’m interested in at this time in my life as a visual diary.
If anything, I think I’m a positive marketing tool for all the brands that I like.

As someone who works in PR for a major fashion brand, I can understand the anger houses feel when their ad images are leaked to the blogosphere. With no disrespect to great blogs like fashionista (!), the issue becomes one of control. Fashion houses usually pay models and photographers for the rights to high-profile ad campaign each season on a contract basis. Basically, they pay for the time that the ads will run in the press. Leaking the images earlier that te contractual start date could mean that their rights to the images will expire earlier than planned. Also, a lot of fashion houses give exclusivity to certain magazines to run the best or select images from the ad campaign before they pay other books to run the images so this becomes a problem for a house when it ends up in the hands of a blogger. Of course, I do agree with #4 that better efforts should be made to ensure that images aren’t leaked… And finally, I’m surprised by Katie Grand’s apology — if I’m not mistaken she styles the women’s Vuitton shows and should know that, even though she’s also the editor of LOVE, fashion houses have particular standards to uphold.

*feeling guilty*
Although I think I posted maybe a couple of days after…
http://layersandswathes.wordpress.com

Is anyone else reminded of the incident that happened last year, when a certain designer (can’t remember who exactly) flipped out over some pictures that Susie Bubble took of herself while wearing one of their bodysuits? The whole affair seemed to end up rather dismally for the designer, after Style Bubble’s 4.4 gazillion readers got wind of it. They got what they wanted–the pictures have been removed from Susie’s blog–but they also generated an enormous amount of hate amongst her fan base.
It’s really quite maddening that brands and fashion houses have yet to figure something out; the people who read fashion blogs are also the ones that buy, or aspire to buy, their clothes. Alienate them and you alienate your customer. This is especially true for edgier brands like the one from the incident I mentioned above (the bodysuit in question was skin-tight, made of hot pink, neon blue, and chartreuse panels of spandex…and may or may not have had shoulder pads).
I’m actually skeptical that this all HASN’T been figured out. I’m with #2: it’s more likely that magazines are leaning on brands to complain. And really, if all the free online advertising is devaluing actual print ads, they do have reasonable cause for objection. But, even so, trying to control people’s online activity seems like an expensive, losing battle. Fashion publications have made real strides in the past year to integrate the internet into their functioning, but if magazines want to stay viable in their current form, they need to redefine their utility for readers. Instead of presenting themselves simply as purveyors of the latest flashes and fads in the pan, perhaps magazines should try appealing to a more emotional, nostalgic side of people, the one that used to read the newest Teen Vogue (or i-D, if they were precociously hip) in their room on Sunday, with chinky, girly music playing in the background. People these days don’t buy magazines for news, or even for editorials; that can all be gotten online. People buy magazines because of the feeling: holding the images in your hands, thumbing through the pages, taking everything in. Somehow, that’s lost when you’re sitting at a desk somewhere, staring at a computer screen.
If the real issue is that no one is buying magazines anymore, why not address that? Why not make peace with bloggers over the ad images and then use them and their influence to remind people why magazines are awesome? Use prominent figures like Susie Bubble and Tavi as spokespersons for an online campaign for print media (both already profess their love of mags fairly often). Put them in ads. Ask them to blog about their love for mags. They’d already be writing tons about being a part of the campaign. Something like that could have huge populist appeal, and could probably be done at a relatively low cost. Internet ads are much less expensive than those in print, and the buzz generated by the bloggers themselves would most likely be free, seeing as they’d be flattered and all.
Yeah…let’s do that!

Well said kelleyd!

kelleyd, that was the smartest thing I’ve read all day.

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