MGM Outreach goes Awry
Andy Sernowitz talks about how MGM/ABC appear to be astroturfing blogs in the comments. Someone is promoting a movie DVD and saying how good it is without declaring that they are apparently being paid to promote the site – at least that is the conclusion looking at the content and the emails. You quickly learn how to spot (most) of these. I usually let them through with an editorial comment attached.
Bu how come big companies like this are still not learning from their and others’ mistakes. There have been so many cases of astroturfing being spotted, why bother. It’s either the brand itself or an agency working for them, both of whom should know better.
It astounds me too, but I am sure there must be some successes, or else firms would never do it. It’s only when they get showed up do we ever hear about it. Even if it does get spotted, unless the person spotting it themselves has an influential blog or YouTube channel, who is going to hear it?
It’s problem enough that in the EU it’s been outlawed (in the UK, where we are based, it comes into force next month) – after that there will be stronger means of recourse than simple naming & shaming. Then perhaps we’ll see what the extent of it is.
In the US, the FCC have come out against it, but there’s no laws as far as I recall similar to the EU stuff. We do need a few good examples to be prosecuted.