Why Inc. began allowing contributors to write for its website

Former Inc. magazine editor in chief James Ledbetter writes for The Observer about the contributor model that allowed Heather Morgan, charged earlier this week with stealing billions in bitcoin, to write for the magazine’s website. Ledbetter left Inc. in 2019.

He writes, “We weren’t considering this step primarily for editorial reasons. Rather, we recognized in 2014 that while Inc.com traffic was growing, there were a large number of competitors in online business journalism, and our ranking in size – in the middle to lower end of the list – was holding our business back. Moreover, we had a sense that there was ample room to expand not only the volume of what we were publishing, but also the range. The Inc. brand was a credible vehicle for many other types of stories (such as personal finance and product reviews) and formats (such as video) than were feasible in a monthly print magazine. We believed that Inc.com readers would benefit by hearing from a much wider group of columnists: company founders, academics, experts in particular business areas (such as law, human resources, and accounting), marketing experts, cutting-edge technology CEOs, and many more.

“But there were abuses: Beginning in 2016, we learned that an unscrupulous group of marketers were offering to pay our contributors to link to their clients. We found ways to contain and crack down on that practice, and also assigned one of our reporters to investigate the practice. We also reported our findings to the Federal Trade Commission, although it must be said the agency did nothing to follow up.”

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