Rant: Bloggers, we are better than job posting leads

It is an interesting state of affairs when we bloggers, in our never-ending thirst for more are sifting through job listings to get a lead on what a company is thinking. Forget high priced PR mouthpieces, simply post a free job posting somewhere and one of my cohorts will pick it up within the hour. Is this a good thing?

Companies relay information to the public in a variety of ways. They issues statements, hold conferences, grant interviews and even send anonymous tips. But the hot new way to let some information slip on the down-low is by putting up a job posting.

A job posting info leak is perhaps one of the best ways to leak info, for a company. Why? For the simple reason you can deny you were ever working on a product that never sees the light of day. “Oh, that? We really just wanted someone willing to clean out the employee fridge, we just gave it a nicer title than FridgeSweeper.” “Plausible denial” is what it was called in the Reagan years.

In my opinion (and you knew this was coming), this is the media equivalent of going through Steve Job’s trash to find out which sushi he prefers and how that will affect the new iPhone demonstration. It’s worthless. Bloggers are allowing themselves to be mongers of trash. Any post regarding info found this way is always couched with, “it is just a job posting, so you know you can’t trust it.”

It is as if they issued a press release with an asterisk saying, “we may do none of this stuff.” It could be argued that is the case with any release, but a job listing is even more flimsy.

Companies today know we stoop this low. The job postings have become just another tool for the internal marketing departments to spread their message. It is time we got off the crack. As a sign of commitment, I’ll not post another story about info dug up via a job listing. For at least a week.

Latest “stories” dug up in the job listings:
Windows Mobile getting Synergy from webOS: [WMpoweruser]
Apple putting 3G chip in Macs [Ars Technica]
Halo IV info leaks [Product Review News]