Naw, this site isn't negative at all. Merely a co-incidence that all the negative reviews have links, but not the positive ones.


Or is this to make up for the objectivity points that Mouse Planet lost by inserting a commercial for the Treasure Planet video game in their review?


(Sorry, I'm sounding REALLY SNIPPY!)

Just for the record (again), what Darkbeer chooses to post has nothing to do with MousePlanet policy or opinions. We gave him access to the News forum because he was duplicating much of our work anyway.

We've requested that individual movie reviews not be posted as news links, but beyond that he can post whatever he wants.

Originally posted by Kuzcotopia
Naw, this site isn't negative at all.

First off, the title of this thread was pretty darn funny. Also, the obvious negative trend in the linked articles was pretty obvious to me, which is why I mentioned it in one of the threads that Darkbeer linked to. He says that its just a coincindence based on the timing of his Google search. I'm more of a cynic so I took that explanation with a grain of salt.

However, the idea that "this site" is negative based on those three links seems a bit overboard. The "official" MP review (or whatever it would be called) by AVP which appears on the front of this site is very positive. The general tone in the threads on this board by people who have seen the movie has been very positive.

Making a statement like that based on some of Darkbeer's links would be like someone saying that this site is negative because another poster has written cynical and negative comments about.....ohhhh....say...... The Christmas Shoes and.......... uhhhh....... maybe..... Tuck Everlasting. Now, is that person negative in general? Does their negativity reflect on the whole site? Is it fair to say, "you should see the Tuck Everlasting thread, those guys are just too negative on that site."

Glass houses and all that. Funny thread title, though, thanks.

You can call MousePlanet a garbage scow. As long as you don't call Alex a swaggering, overbearing, tin-plated dictator with delusions of god-hood, we're fine. (Then again, I could always use some time to catch up on my technical journals.)












[Note: Semi-obscure Star Trek reference (http://www.fortunecity.com/lavender/hoskins/85/ep-42.htm)]

Originally posted by Kuzcotopia
Naw, this site isn't negative at all. Merely a co-incidence that all the negative reviews have links, but not the positive ones.

Or is this to make up for the objectivity points that Mouse Planet lost by inserting a commercial for the Treasure Planet video game in their review?

So, let me get this straight.

I, MousePlanet Columnist, write a mostly POSITIVE review (http://www.mouseplanet.com/more/mm021127.htm) of the movie.

Al, the Editor of MousePlanet, writes a POSITIVE review of the El Cap experience.

And a reader posts links to OTHER sites where OTHER PEOPLE have written negative reviews of Treasure Planet.

Yet this all somehow confirms your belief that MousePlanet is a negative site?

I am consistantly amazed at how the "MP is All Negative" attitude seems to persist, despite anything we actually say or write. I've long felt that some people spend entirely too much time pointing out typos than actually READING the columns.

I'm still trying to figure out how anything that was actually published by MousePlanet regarding this movie can possibly make you think we were being negative.

Oh - and that wasn't a commercial for the video game. It was a mention of a contest to WIN the video game. If you find it objectionable, you need not participate.

AVP

Originally posted by AVP
Oh - and that wasn't a commercial for the video game. It was a mention of a contest to WIN the video game. If you find it objectionable, you need not participate.

AVP



Disney’s Treasure Planet, a futuristic twist on one of the greatest adventure stories ever told – Robert Louis Stevenson’s “Treasure Island” – comes to life on PlayStation this holiday season. Players join young Jim Hawkins and Morph, his devoted pet and protoplasmic “shape shifter,” as they solar-surf and combat enemies, including space pirates, alien creatures and robots in this comedic intergalactic adventure.



That's not a commercial?!!?

I don't find it objectionable from the "I don't want to enter a contest" standpoint.

It does look like Disney paid for the article.

There should be a firewall between editorial content, especially reviews, and the advertising for that same content. Any paid or compensated material should be labled as such.

Put the contest in a banner on top of the story.

The headline "Adrienne Vincent-Phoenix reviews Treasure Planet, A Concise tour of the Port Discovery Tent, Win one of Five Playstation Games!" That mixes editorial content and advertising.

So If I were really cynical I could say,

This site is really negative, except when Disney is footing the bill.

Originally posted by Kuzcotopia
So If I were really cynical I could say,

This site is really negative, except when Disney is footing the bill.

You really don't make sense.

First, you attack a post full of positive suggestions with negative comments and then continue to with anyone who posts positively in favor of it.

Now, you take a thread, that seems to post both positive and negative views about a film {talk about being fair} and jump all over it. And then all over MousePlanet.

The contest for the game was describing the game. There are a lot of video game players on this site as well as people who enjoy Disney movies.

To me, who cares if Disney is paying for it,this site is a tribute to Disney . A lot of people enjoy this site, for free.

It's their website. For, against, whatever. But it's pretty standard that movie reviews don't include a paid promotion for the videogame based on the movie.

Darkbeer posted some news items, which were at his discretion, and randomly were negative. I know that. I was just goofing on them a bit with this title and my first post in the thread.

The main Review/Article/Advertisement story that ran, that is a seperate issue, linked only by subject matter.

When you have a website with a staff of contributors, lots of things can happen at the same time that don't seem to have any rhyme or reason to them.

Last week, for example, Kevin Yee posted a great article on Roller Coaster videos. In the story, he had a paranthetical "in the interests of full disclosure, I used to work with the creator of these videos". Not entirely neccessary, as that work relationship was not a journalistic conflict-of-interest, but welcome and above-the-board.

To do that on one hand, and then this week post an article with a paid advertisement/contest as part of the article, and no "full disclosure" statement and no title labling it as advertising, it made me wonder where the advertising began and the article ended. The contest certainly was advertising though AVP disagrees above (was Mouse Planet paid to run this contest or not?), but then I read back, I wasn't sure if the review of Port of Discovery was a review or an ad. The writing style and the byline of the first page made it clear that the movie review was in-fact a review, though.

And again, this is someone else's web site. They obviously run it however they want to. I'm happy just to read stuff every now and then and post stuff every now and then.

(Trust me, MouseWife, it's not all negative!)

It's just for someone like me with a journalism background, this is one of the main "don'ts." The Los Angeles times disciplined a bunch of people and re-structured their ethics guidelines last year over this very issue.

And another big "don't" of journalism is that you don't selectively quote only one point of view, especially when that point of view is the minority, as happened on the forum reviews of "Treasure Planet."

Al has said before something to the effect of "This isn't a news site, and it isn't a fan site." I guess that would make this an opinion site, and they don't have to follow all the rules of journalism in that case.

So why do they get testy when I suggest that they are biased? "Of course we are biased!" they should say. "We have opinions, it's an opinion site!"

I already apologized for sounding snippy. Do I have to do it again?

Originally posted by Kuzcotopia
That's not a commercial?!!?

No, that's not. That text is on a page CLEARLY labeled "Contest", and has nothing to do with my review.

This site is really negative, except when Disney is footing the bill.

Actually, this site is honest, regardless of who's "footing the bill."

BTW, the contest is sponsored by SONY - notice the sentance "MousePlanet and Sony PlayStation have teamed up." Disney had nothing to do with this at ALL. And, to answer your question, MousePlanet was not paid to run the contest. Sony donated the games, as they did for other sites. There was absolutely no compensation.

Yes, I attended a press event - that's pretty common, and has nothing to do with my review. MousePlanet attends lots of press events each year - if your theory was correct, and our tone was influenced by these events, then this would be the happiest website on earth. And since you obviously don't think that is the case, then your argument is flawed.

AVP

Adrienne,

I appreciate the clarifying information. This sounds like a promotion for winning videogames that was pitched as a fun plus for readers to win a game, and for Sony to promote their game on your site.

As a reader, I didn't have enough information to guess if Sony or Disney paid Mouse Planet for this promotion or not.

Seperation from your article would have made me not have to guess, as it would be clear that your article was entered seperately from the promotion (as the banner ads are, for instance).

Labling something "Contest" doesn't tell me who is paying for the contest, so it doesn't tell me if it is advertising, promotional or editorial content. In television game-shows, when a prize is given to a contestant and shown on the show, a disclaimer runs at the end saying "a promotional consideration was paid by the following..." It lets the audience know that, while no money may have changed hands, that Datsun B2-10 was given free to the game show in exchange for the promotion on the show. A prize may be as small as a box of Rice-a-Roni, but it does have to be reported, per FCC Plugola regulations.

Those regulations, of course, do not apply to the internet, thank goodness. I merely use it as an example of what other media do as a matter of policy in this arena.

As for you attending a press event, I wasn't concerned about that. I've been to many of those, and it never interfered with my objectivity as a reporter. I'm sure you are the same in that regard. I read your review of Treasure Planet with interest, and I'm more excited now to see it since your positive review.

Thanks again!

In television game-shows, when a prize is given to a contestant and shown on the show, a disclaimer runs at the end saying "a promotional consideration was paid by the following..." It lets the audience know that, while no money may have changed hands, that Datsun B2-10 was given free to the game show in exchange for the promotion on the show.


From the very first line of the contest page, where we list everybody who was involved in offering this contest:

To celebrate the release of Treasure Planet on the big screen, MousePlanet and Sony PlayStation have teamed up...

From the rules page, where we list everybody who has a financial stake in this contest:

3. SPONSOR: The Promotion is sponsored by MousePlanet Inc., 401 N Brookhurst St Ste 108, Anaheim, CA 92801 (“Sponsor”).

It was a MousePlanet contest, we were under no contract to anybody as to method or timing of giving away the games provided by Sony. So far as I know, we could have distributed them to staff and they couldn't have said peep (though they probably wouldn't do it again).

So, we divulged those materially involved and those financially responsible. Were we also supposed to explicitly divulge those who had nothing to do with the contest (Disney, the El Capitan Theater, Electronics Boutique, Nintendo, Dodge - manufacturer of the official press preview transport vehicle, etc.)?

So far as I know, MousePlanet has never done anything previously that should cause you to suspect that we are surreptitiously selling our editorial content (heck, this is only the second time - to my knowledge - that a third party has been involved in anything we've done).

Thanks for the info, Alex.

I didn't see the rules part where Mouse Planet was listed as the sole sponsor of this contest. I don't think it's an accurate way to describe the promotion, but there you go.

Like I said before, if this contest was seperated from the Movie and Port Discovery Review, no second-guessing would be neccesary. I would have taken it as advertising, just like the banner ads. As it was, it left me wondering if Page 2 was advertising as well.

Originally posted by AVP
I've long felt that some people spend entirely too much time pointing out typos than actually READING the columns.

And then there are those of us who, while reading anything, have typos jump out screaming at us. An off-switch would be nice. Oh well.



I have to say, when I first saw the subject line of this thread, I had no idea that the thread starter was referring to MP. I actually thought "garbage scow" was some weird esoteric magazine or site or something. What is a garbage scow anyway?

Anyway, I have to admit that I've not seen all the so-called links to negative reviews of "Treasure Planet", but if there were, they would all have been posted on MousePad, which is different than MousePlanet. I just read the official MousePlanet review, and I'm not sure how comments like "While you may have read Treasure Island by Robert Lewis Stevenson and seen its many movie adaptations, Treasure Planet, the latest version offered by Disney, is an entertaining film that is absolutely worth your trip to the theater" can be interpreted as being negative.


Oh, and for the record, I'm about to post a less-than-stellar review of the film myself.

That's a great idea. I'm going to create an avant-guarde art and literature magazine and call it Garbage Scow!


A garbage scow is a ship that hauls garbage. A nautical reference. Trying to be funny. Failing.

As they might say on the Hollywood Squares,

"Very funny, Kuzcotopia. Then a man in a hat can come out and explain the joke to the audience!"

The 3 negative reviews were on Mousepad, linked by darkbeer, the positive review with advertising attached and not clearly enough deliniated for me was by Adrienne Vincent-Phoenix and ran on Mouseplanet.

I was chastizing them for two seperate journalistic no-no's. The selective, non-representative quote on the one hand, and the blurring of content and commercial on the other.