With ads making him $6000 a week, I don't blame him. He is telling people what they want to hear and the ads reach people they're trying to reach. He gets invited to Apple events thanks to him being the unofficial de-facto Apple PR and he can't risk hurting that. There's no incentive for him to be objective, in fact it is in his interest to lay the spin on thick.
Wow, I have seen Gruber's site linked for years on various sites, but never knew about the sponsorship. If that's not a paid and bribed shill, I don't know who is.
Just imagine Gruber gets objective and starts sometimes criticizing Apple or doesn't spin things so much as he does for Apple. Or actually praise the other companies for good things they do. He will lose readership and growth of it. Apple will cut his access to Apple events which will make his articles further worthless. That's a huge monetary loss and strong incentive to keep spinning things and dissing competitors. hypocritically. Same with a a paid shill... stop toeing the party line and you stop getting paid...
Is this the first you've heard of journalism? The situation you're talking about here is hardly special to John Gruber. Even people who don't get paid are generally subject to similar forces. The only way to avoid it is just not to talk about anything.
http://daringfireball.net/feeds/sponsors/
With ads making him $6000 a week, I don't blame him. He is telling people what they want to hear and the ads reach people they're trying to reach. He gets invited to Apple events thanks to him being the unofficial de-facto Apple PR and he can't risk hurting that. There's no incentive for him to be objective, in fact it is in his interest to lay the spin on thick.
Get with the program!