Hasta La Creative!

This should be familiar story by now, one that we’ve been writing about for more than a decade believe it or not, but yesterday people were shocked! Because another big wallet company jumping on the native content bandwagon ignored the FTC rules when they asked an influencer to pretend their review was independent and not paid for, and got their hand slapped as a result. Because even though the internet still seems like the wild west, people are still paying attention and there are rules.

In this case, Warner Brothers paid Felix Kjellberg, aka PewDiePie and nine other Youtube influencers to favorably review its game. But since they didn’t clearly disclose it, Warner Brothers Home Entertainment got a dressing down from the FTC. The game in question was Middle Earth: Shadow of Mordor. According to CNET “Those involved in the campaign were paid between hundreds to thousands of dollars for their participation, created sponsored videos that garnered more than 5.5 million views, received advance-release copies of the game and were told how to promote it. The arrangement required the influencers to promote the game positively, and to not disclose any bugs or glitches found while playing.” Because PewDiePie’s video was watched 3.7 million times, he is now this year’s poster child for smarmy behavior.

Warner Brothers is taking the blame for instructing its influencers to not disclose this information outright, to keep the sponsored ad under wraps and make it feel more native. How this was done was simple: put all the pertinent info beneath the “show more,” link, knowing very few people would bother. And thus a hidden disclosure it was. The FTC had a field day with making Warner Brothers an example although they weren’t fined so much as hauled in the principal’s office.

Jessica Rich. director of FTC’s Bureau of Consumer Protection, said “Companies like Warner Brothers need to be straight with consumers in their online ad campaigns.” And this is very true indeed. Where I call bullshit on the FTC is in letting the influencers like PewDiePie slide without also getting their asses handed to them, because there’s not one damn influencer on Youtube or