We get it. You’re the all-knowing, sparkly clean ethics gestapo. You’re the (plus-sized) MODEL of perfection when it comes to PR and social media. What would all of us toddlers do if we didn’t have you to show us the way in this confusing world of lie-telling and fraud?

I hold myself to higher standards than that? Really? You know what, I think everyone would respect you a little bit more if you stopped pretending like you never break the rules. Or even bend them for the price of PR. Let’s just say as a former coworker, your level of professionalism was pretty laughable. Obviously, not much has changed.

Inserting sock now.

I laughed at your response. I agree.

It has been a circular argument here in Indianapolis for the past 12 months.

Businesses/authors have been hiring ghost writers for all of time. This is not a new concept and really not a big deal. Should the President be providing attribution for every one of his speeches?

Ummmm…no.

We had hired Bain and Company to tell us we needed to reduce heads and put more work onto fewer people. The result was people had far more to do, than they had time to do it. The outcome was a bunch of grumpy people working overtime and on edge. And, if you asked them to do one more thing, it could get edgy.

The books were cleaned for a merger with another company, but the boss decided against it. ATA Airlines would go on as a footnote in airline history.

With the recent layoffs and cuts in the workforce, there is a lot of this going on even today. Companies just do not have the resources or time to generate all their content. The only people they have left, spend most of their time in meetings talking about what they need to get done.

While I appreciate the hip idea that all companies should generate their “authentic” content, corporations are just not that efficient for it to be done. They are not going to invest headcount to do it themselves without first getting a grasp around what it all means.

So, they turn to companies like ours to not only figure out how to do it, but also get it done. So, they can go to their meetings.

There is no deception taking place. It is just simple execution of content from someone’s brain.

Bob Crandall, if you ever want to start a blog and need writers to do it for you – hire me. I would be the first in line to hear what is in your head. I know there are a lot of other people that would too.

Good words give a good consistent message, end of story.

Erik offers good words and seems delightfully cheerful when sidestepping drama.

While you make a valid point on the surface I dont think its completely true. Eric is basically saying he re-writes and re-edits what the “author” tells him to say. He isnt acting like he is Joe Smith and putting words in his head or mouth. I agree with previous points on your blog about perhaps putting a line that says as told to or something to that effect but its not outright lieing. If Eric logged onto a company blog that he ghost writes for and posted something on his own but said it came from the CEO that is lieing. All of his ghost posts are derived from an actual conversation with the person getting credit. I think you can play both sides of the line on this one without being dishonest.

This post was mentioned on Twitter by edeckers: New post: Making the Argument for Ghost Blogging. Yet Again. http://bit.ly/1tFFLf...