Regulators Warn Against Ads Masquerading As Real Content

Megalith

Megalith

24-bit/48kHz
Staff member
Joined
Aug 20, 2006
Messages
13,000
I wonder how an article about native advertising managed to put in a link (second paragraph) for a source that actually takes you to Newegg instead. What’s the worst case of native advertising you’ve run into?

Native ads are said to be more attractive to marketers and publishers because they are more effective at engaging consumers. With the ubiquity of traditional banner ads that are often intrusive and annoying, ads that blend in with regular content have emerged as a lucrative alternative. But the format has regulators worried that consumers will be unable to distinguish between true, editorial content and marketing aimed at convincing them to buy things.
 
Yeah, native ads are still wildly bullshit (but I'm just sick of advertising to begin with FFS) but my biggest issue is how well they're labelled as the article discusses.

It's one thing to try and make some article about some bullshit product seem legit...it's another to make that article almost unrecognizable as an ad when all that gives it away is the little bitty text at the very bottom say it's an advertisement.
 
The worst is when you read a lengthy article or blog review of a product that is actually an ad for the product/company that was paid to look like an honest review.
 
I don't feel the slightest bit guilty over using an adblocker for every site out there. Last time I trusted ads was during the innocent times of the 90s...
 
I saw one in the Dallas Morning News that was an entire page, but it looked just like the other pages. It had some bullshit articles around the outer edge, but the big article in the middle was about these "rare" coins that had been found some time ago and that the federal government was going to ban or something, but they were able to be sold for a limited time through a particular vendor. It was wonderfully done and looked extremely authentic. Because it had the fake articles around it, you didn't see the word advertisement next to the big story itself, it was on the very outside and didn't seem obvious.
 
There's actually a lot of evidence out there of how advertisements taken to the modern extreme are actually harming society.

For adults, there is so much information bombardment, as we see ads while reading email, while browsing the internet, while watching TV, while in our cars listening to radio, while looking out the window driving past billboards and guys waving signs around to getting to a ball game and hearing the announcer advertise more as the field is caked in advertisements that it screws with the brain, pushing out useful information and putting advertising material in its place.

And for children its apparently worse, as they had tests in which they showed various historical figures and even present politicians and people of import, and the children could not recognize them. However, subjecting them to Ronald McDonald, Jack from Jack in the Box, Wendy, Mickey Mouse, and other such corporate symbols to sell children goods, there was nearly a 100% identification rate.
 
Drug "supplement" companies have been doing TV adverts like this for years. Ever since the FDA let loose the taps on Big Pharma and Big "Supplement" (Snake oil) tv ads.
 
Microsoft is getting sneaky about how they embed ads on MSN. Like you see stuff that appears to be news, but it's an ad for some stupid Microsoft product that's buried in the article scroll-y thing. They're not too hard to pick out just yet, but it's almost as annoying as how they advertise via forum posts here on the sly through their heatlesssun account. :D
 
Megalith said:
I wonder how an article about native advertising managed to put in a link (second paragraph) for a source that actually takes you to Newegg instead. What’s the worst case of native advertising you’ve run into?

Native ads are said to be more attractive to marketers and publishers because they are more effective at engaging consumers. With the ubiquity of traditional banner ads that are often intrusive and annoying, ads that blend in with regular content have emerged as a lucrative alternative. But the format has regulators worried that consumers will be unable to distinguish between true, editorial content and marketing aimed at convincing them to buy things.
Click to expand...

Wow, that newegg link is very weird.
 
One of the major good things to come out of Gamergate is the OP that campaigned the FTC for renewed focus on the disclosure of native advertising and affiliate links. Of course you won't hear it from the mainstream media, though.

Sources for Operation UV
A rough timeline from relevant KiA posts:
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top