FTC warns board game content creators, publishers to disclose relationships
boardgamewire.com
boardgamewire.com
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=40Q7usuG2Cw
I think Benn is above reproach ethically here -- see how much Behringer dislike him -- but I also think he is wrong. The fundamental problem is that if an influencer reviews a product negatively, they'll stop giving him stuff to review, for free, on loan, or whatever, and he'll lose a monetization source. And if he makes a habit of this, vendors may stop sending him stuff out of fear of his reputation. This strongly encourages influencers to provide positive reviews.
Influencers think they get around this ethical conundrum by only reviewing stuff they like and refusing to post negative reviews. But as a result all we get are positive reviews. When synthesizer X has 10 positive reviews and Y has 20, is this because Y is better or because Y got in the hands of more reviewers? We cannot tell. All we have is a sea of thumbs up.
The problem is conflating influencers and review outlets. These are two very different things although influencers do everything they can to blurry the lines.
Influencers are a new breed of advertisers and propagandists, which are far more appealing for commercial goals. Don't need all that "truth" and "integrity" getting in the way.
If you trust the source of your information because they've been credible in the past, the ecosystem of reviewers matters less than an individual's relationship with a specific publication (or influencer, etc.)
On an individual reviewer basis, it's all about trust. Drive by consumption does not do well in this model.
As to ``only positive reviews'': restaurants have been known to shutter when they lose a star.
The closest some reviewers get to outright panning something is making a pros/cons list comparing a given model against an inferior model from a different manufacturer as if they were in the same class as the sponsored model (the other manufacturer usually has a more expensive model available that would compare more favorably, given the chance)
also, you can tell when a bit of kit came with a list of talking points in the box, and when a review i'm watching makes the same talking points as the others i've seen, that manufacturer has _less_ merit in my mind (the least their marketing team can do is personalize the talking points they send out...)
Any time I see an source that is only producing positive reviews, I know for a fact that I can't trust what that source has to say.
I hope no one tells the FTC about paid Amazon reviews, they'd probably have a heart attack.
The problem I found was that all the games revewied were linked in an affilaite sales agreement.
This created a 'bubble' of games that many reviewers reviewed.
Searching further, I found that board games are so loved by millions that you can find quality reviews from peoplw who buy many games. You can even find views of the full contents of games so you can make a further informed decision.
None of this was on social media, just a good old fashioned web search.
BGG does have a very clear bias against traditional games (see Clue, Monopoly, etcetera), due to it's roots, but that's changed a bit as board games have become big again.
People who don't give glowing reviews don't get contacted the next time around.
In many of these niche communities I suspect it is far more about the perceived clout (Oh, hey, I get to play it months before you do!) than the actual financial incentives.
It isn't saying that they can't do that, just that if they do they most disclose that they received compensation.
Sounds immanently reasonable to me.
Sure.
But if you don't reveal that they've given payment in the form of a free game, you are giving a dishonest review. Free stuff is payment. And everyone knows it is payment - Free meals and other benefits at a job are advertised to entice you. It might not be taxed, but is definitely part of your pay package.
I'm pretty sure the FTC knows about the Amazon reviews - they've taken action against some of them. They may or may not have the budget to go after more and may or may not have the power to go after all of them.
Doesn't apply to movies, TV shows, and music videos right? Every once in awhile I see the 4th wall broken to make light of it being sponsored product placement, but it doesn't happen enough that I suspect the same sort of rules don't apply.
I actually think it'd be great to have it obvious ad messaging be embedded in movies for different scenes where it pops up in your face that "this is an ad for Bose" or "this is an ad for Pepsi." Having that front and center, especially if it destroys the value of the media some would be great. Because maybe then there'd be a little more concern around what it means to make quality.
For what it's worth I have often seen stuff in credits pointing out what companies have provided things for a show on TV ("nobody watches the credits" well I do so your point is actually empirically false! Though I understand).
I think with this entire topic there are many knobs that can be turned. We might not have them set at the right level, and we can adjust. But it's totally not a binary thing. Though I would honestly be very up for much stricter disclosure rules on this point for things advertised to children.
My personal feeling is at one point in your life you learn that media is given access to stuff for advertising purposes, so every brand made visible is just "obviously" product placement. If there's an explicit endorsement really make it loud if it's an ad/all the conditions of the review. But I don't feel like watching Lydia Tar use a Macbook is really much of an endorsement of anything, and do not feel the need for this to be an ad (just like I don't need a disclaimer about Tar being an ad for the Berlin Philharmonic).
Yeah, it's worst, because it's a psychological manipulative tactic.
On the other hand, undisclosed sponsored reviews gravitate towards false advertising or deceit.
The point isn't to cut down on psychological influence. The point is to cut down on deceit AKA false advertising
James Bond using a Sony doesn't deceive anyone. James Bond doesn't exist and doesn't have opinions.
Psychological influence is also a deceit.
It certainly applies to movies and TV shows. Near the end of the credits (for US productions), there is almost always language like "Promotional consideration" and then a list of brands
“But the plans were on display…”
“On display? I eventually had to go down to the cellar to find them.”
“That’s the display department.”
“With a flashlight.”
“Ah, well, the lights had probably gone.”
“So had the stairs.”
“But look, you found the notice, didn’t you?”
“Yes,” said Arthur, “yes I did. It was on display in the bottom of a locked filing cabinet stuck in a disused lavatory with a sign on the door saying ‘Beware of the Leopard.”
― Douglas Adams, The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy
As far as I can tell, if the reviewers want to include the disclaimer in their credits, that is also fine. They just cannot include it separately from the video.
Forbid product placement.
What is the false advertising when James Bond uses a Sony?
Don’t they disclose this in the credits?
This isn't clear if an influencer says "I love Red Bull" on their Instagram feed; do they genuinely love it, or were they paid to say that? This is the distinction the FCC wants made clear.
Pepsi can pay $10MM for the main character in a kid's movie to drink a Pepsi.
But if a small board game company sends an influencer a free board game, an influencer is not allowed to review it.
Personally, I think having "background" props is much more insidious. At least with social media I know I can expect grift. Seeing someone drink Pepsi in a movie is more like seeing your friend drink Pepsi.
John likes Pepsi, and he's cool. Think I'll drink some.
If you watch e.g. Masterchef, they are very coy with how they phrase their product placements. They don’t endorse, they say something like “X contestant will have no problem getting up to temp on their stove” as the camera pans over the logo. They don’t spend longer than maybe 3 seconds featuring it. As far as I can tell, TV and movies play by the same rules, they just know what boundaries to not cross.
Even if a character states "monster is their favorite drink" that wouldn't constitute an endorsement, because it's simply the mark of a fictional character.
But influencers/actors/etc saying "monster is their favorite" is an altogether different thing, because a viewer would assume that's actually their opinion being stated -- that it's being endorsed "in fairness". [0]
The fundamental problem is deception, and product placement isn't deceptive (it's just hoping you see it enough you'll think it's "common"), but paid endorsements definitely can be.
[0] From the endorsement guide: https://www.ftc.gov/system/files/ftc_gov/pdf/p204500_endorse...
Example 6 is about an actor who says a home fitness system is “the most effective and easy-to-use home exercise machine that I have ever tried.” One commenter asserted this would only be deceptive if the actor had not used the machine. The example is intended to illustrate why this statement is an endorsement and is not intended to address all the ways the statement could be deceptive or who could be liable for any such deception. The Commission notes, however, there are multiple ways in which the statement could be deceptive, including not representing the actor’s actual opinions or misleading consumers as to the machine’s effectiveness or ease of use.
Yes, they are, they aren’t allowed to fail to disclose the fact of the donation when reviewing it.
> Personally, I think having "background" props is much more insidious.
The FTC has power to deal with deceptive, not with insidious (the latter is dubious as a power of government at all under the First Amendment, but its clearly not, whether or not within the power of government broadly, not something Congress has by statute assigned to the FTC the way they have dealing with deceptive trade practices.)
Half the comments in here are some version of "what we can't review board games now?!?!1" when that's the opposite of the case. The problem is that "content creators" don't want to disclose what they're legally required to.
What about capnolagnia (smoking fetish) films and photos -- is the smut industry getting paid off by big tobacco?
I’m fairly confident that much of it is, that spending on it is systematically not properly disclosed to the FTC, and that approximately 100% of the cases outside a documentary or newd cobtext involving a recognizable brand are paid (in cash or otherwise) product placement, the last bit the same as with non-tobacco brand placement, and the rest as has been documented through 1994 by internal tobacco documents compared to FTC reports, with no sudden shift after 1994 that would indicate a behavior change.
It has dropped somewhat from the peak in 2005 to a little below the 1991 level by 2016. And we know from comparison of internal tobacco firm documents on product placement with their reports to the FTC that almost half of what the companies internally documented spending on product placement between 1978-1994 (that’s the latest the internal records that have been subject to outside examination go) were not reported to the FTC as spending on paid endorsements as required, and that that includes 100% of product placement spending in that period after 1988. [0]
And, we know that recogbizable branding is still displayed on screen and that with every other categort of goods that invariably, outside of news/documentary context, involves direct or in-kind payment for promotional purposes.
Nobody thinks a movie is a representative endorsement or review. There is no such distinction for content creators.
This really isn’t hard to understand.
I loved it! I thought it was great that there was a federal agency focused on pro-consumer stuff like this that otherwise falls between the cracks of modern life. I’m glad to hear the mission of the agency remains intact.
“I’d like to see Instagram offer more accurate tags/labels, as there is a literal difference between getting a cardboard box and receiving money to express an opinion, but it will do for now.”
Is it no longer customary to send back or donate a review copy of a product? When I reviewed video games many decades ago, we normally sent back the review copy we (the publication) were provided. For smaller ticket items, like music CDs, I don’t think were were ever required to send those back, but we either donated them or kept them on the publication’s shelves, but individual reviewers were definitely prohibited from keeping any of those as their personal property.
I agree that there’s a distinction between a paid endorsement and reviewing something made freely available, but if there’s any personal benefit accruing to the reviewer, I do think that should be disclosed. And that why I think the absolutely best avoidance of conflicts of interest is to not accept even a review copy that must be later be returned or given away, but to pay for the item like any other consumer, though I acknowledge this is not always practical given publication budgets these days.
The influencer could be mandated to give it to the local board game club.
There's some real low hanging fruit here:
https://search.ftc.gov/search?utf8=%E2%9C%93&affiliate=ftc_p...
https://search.ftc.gov/search?affiliate=ftc_prod&sort_by=&qu...
https://search.ftc.gov/search?affiliate=ftc_prod&sort_by=&qu...
https://search.ftc.gov/search?affiliate=ftc_prod&sort_by=&qu...
Mostly, the good creators are still people who like board games and there's not so many that have more of the "pro influencer" vibe. Not surprisingly, there was a pretty big shitstorm around one of the channels that always seemd super influenc-y recently (don't want to explicitly name it but the channel name related to the typing in Python).
However, I'd argue that board gamers tend to be overly enthusiastic in reviews in general and focus mostly on the positive. We (I'm not a content creator just a player of games) want to like games as a default :D I'd also say that written text is still quite valuable in board gaming circles with boardgamegeek as the obvious example. At least I tend to research there and get my first contact with new games from Geeklists and the likes rather than from videos.
Apart from review videos, another kind of video is rules explaination (or playthrough) type of videos. These are somtimes payed for because (frankly speaking) the publishers couldn't do it themselves at these price points. To me this is a perfectly fine source of income for youtubers. Some content creators also do this for free anyways but typically these videos are very neutral just focusing on the rules. From a customer's point of view they tend to be quite good to get an impression of the games without any review content.
Sorry for being so cryptic :D
I mean, it seems a bit silly to focus on board games, since they're generally pretty cheap, but I've seen videos on YouTube where people review multi-thousand-dollar TVs or computers, and it's unclear if they purchased the item or the company sent it to them.
Even if it's subconscious, I think it might be hard to trash-talk an entity that just gifted you something that you could easily re-sell for several grand.
As far as I'm concerned these reviews are effectively worthless so I don't know how they stay in business.
There's always going to be conflicts of interest; people should at least be aware of them.
Yes, especially if you want companies to follow suit.
I think stuff like this is inevitable to some extent, humans gonna human, but I think that the viewers of the video have the right to know about these potential conflicts of interest.
> The new guidance makes it clear reviewers and other media creators should clearly disclose when they receive free products or other perks from a company, even if they aren’t specifically asked to mention those products.
...
> The FTC says disclosures should be kept simple, such as “This is an ad for BRAND”, and should be prominent on each piece of media which contains that product.
By this standard, if a movie critic for a newspaper watches a pre-release screening of a movie for free, then their review article should state "This is an ad for Paramount Pictures"?
Free copies of games / albums / books / etc for reviewers has been a standard practice for ages as far as I know. Is the FTC challenging this generally? Or is this somehow specific to reviews done via social media?
Many do fail to do so, but it varies how much people will go after it.
https://tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pmwiki.php/Main/NotScreenedForCr...
Neither of these things magically make your review more trustworthy.
Getting free stuff taints your review, and it doesn't matter if it is low value or not. And to be fair: People get their utilities turned off for these amounts. These amounts keep folks from affording medicine. Some of them simply wouldn't be able to review so many games if they didn't get them for free.
People are more likely to view the company favorably if they are getting the product for free - and are likely to review games they wouldn't otherwise review. They should reveal this sort of bias. And it doesn't matter if you are "low stakes" or not.
On other hand any sort of other monetary compensation or personal connections or involvement should be much more scrutinized and public.
I think we should even start to implement system where the compensation paid for sponsorship spot and so on should be presented with the add.
This is so partial and tip-of-the-iceberg of what things influencers don't "properly disclose", that it's beyond stupid to single out.
I get that there should be some disclosures, not saying that people shouldn't have to do that upfront.
Q: A year ago, I was given a free $60 video game (and
nothing else) in exchange for live streaming my
game play. I still love the game and stream it. Do
I still need to disclose that I got the game for free?
A: How long it would be reasonable for you to make
disclosures really depends on the expectations of
your fans. After some period of time, it probably
wouldn’t matter to them that you got the game for
free. If you’re choosing to play a game a year
after you got it for free, it probably means you
truly like it. The analysis would likely be
different if, instead of a $60 video game, you got
a free $50,000 car and continued to post about it
over the life of the car.”