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Brian Lam, the go-go-go force behind gadget superblog Gizmodo, explains how paying for traffic backfired until he dropped an iron fist. Brian's formula? Focus on consistent semi-hits, instead of drawing the mob with doofy, off-topic videos. I found most of this week's commentary on Valleywag's new bonus plan to be poorly reasoned and/or self-serving, in addition to getting our pay formulas wrong — is it good or bad that I'm starting to sound like Felix Salmon? But I'll let Brian have the last word.

At giz, the pay system has had the opposite effect, and we do far less viral work with mainstream appeal. Easy hits cause CPM deflation over time, making your real news posts, the core posts, worth less and less. It also rewards laziness, which I know have to slap down with an iron fist. So the funny random viral videos we loved posting so much before have become a serious problem with making sure pay is fair across the site. It forces you to be very careful, actually.

Also, everyone who writes for Giz has a talent for making traffic. Talent. Megahits are unpredictable, but making sure a post gets decent traffic is a matter of editing know-how and maybe marketing know how, too.