The problem with this article is the author draws a dubious line between three different things. Facebook and Twitter provide a service for no money but you en

The problem with this article is the author draws a dubious line between three different things. Facebook and Twitter provide a service for no money but you end up paying them in content which they trade to advertisers (who then give them money). Making social networking nothing more than a traditional transaction with a middleman. The Huffington Post doesn't pay its authors or provide a service but they do offer a chance at fame through a famous distribution model. Making it a lot like gambling where most people pay more than the experience is worth (by generating content and never getting famous) while a lucky few extract a huge portion of the value (by becoming famous). But The HP is just like the Casino extracting a piece of the action through advertising. What Business Insider does is just kind of slimy. But it mostly quotes famous people who don't seem to care if Blodget takes money from them. So we're talking about three very different phenomenons