• Jalopnik, Thursday, March 8, 2012 10:17 AM

Matt Hardigree takes Chrysler to task for an effort to "buy off 'mommy bloggers'" with an iPad and a promise of a trip to NYC. He writes that the effort, called "Blogger Faceoff," pitted five (now four) popular "mommy bloggers" against one another in a vote-getting scheme disguised as a discussion of road trips. "A 'mommy blogger' is, if you're not aware, typically a mother with an Internet connection and no shame," he writes. Hard to argue with that one.

Evidently, each mom was tasked with writing a post for Chrysler answering the question: "How to keep kids occupied while traveling." These would get posted on Chrysler's blog and then, in theory, get other mommies to read it. Chrysler hired Ignite Social Media to handle. Things got out of hand because Chrysler was unclear about the voting procedures, per Hardigree. "Some of the mommy bloggers encouraged their readers to vote from multiple computers," he writes, "a move seemingly endorsed by Chrysler in their original official rules." He says vote-rigging accusations began, and things went downhill from there.

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