Has the New York Times Run Afoul of the FTC's Endorsement Guides?
from the ethics,-ethics dept
Terry Heaton and Jeff Jarvis have commented recently on the conflicts of interest implicated by the adulatory coverage of the iPad in the New York Times and other media companies. They point first to the expectation that widespread adoption of the iPad will foster consumer adoption of a platform where media giants can show their content for a fee — thus enabling them to move more easily to a paywall revenue model.Dan Gillmor shares these concerns, but notes an even more concrete conflict of interest — Apple’s advertising of the iPad consistently features a screenshot of the New York Times app, including of course the Times’ logo. Although Apple no doubt hopes to show that its device can be used to read the Times, surely attractive content to many of its target consumers, the image is also terrific advertising for the New York Times. Gillmor indicates that he has no doubt that Times’ reviewers truly believe the contents of their swooning coverage of the iPad, but argues that the benefit that the Times is receiving is a conflict of interest that ought to be overtly acknowledged and discussed by Times management. Yet, he reports, nobody from the Times has been willing to respond to his questions about the issue, such as whether the Times has received any compensation for the display of its logo on the iPad as shown in the ads. Gillmor raised these concerns a week ago, and the Times has yet to address publicly the possible conflict.
One may well wonder whether Apple or the Times has violated the Federal Trade Commission’s Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising. The placement of the Times’ logo in Apple’s ads is surely a thing of great value, and readers of the Times’ reviews might well want to take the provision of free advertising to the Times into account in deciding whether to give full credence to the objectivity of the Times’ news reports and reviews of the product. The benefit of having such advertising could well be a “material connection” that has to be disclosed both by Apple and by the Times under section 255.5 of the FTC Guides, as illustrated by Example 7.
Surely, what’s good for bloggers who praise products ought to be good for the New York Times and professional journalists.
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Filed Under: apple, endorsements, ftc, ipad
Companies: ny times
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Conspiracy
Naw. Must be a conspiracy. (grin)
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Re: Conspiracy
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The Iphone was understandable, it was fundamentally different. From an end users experience it was game changing. But the Ipad.. not so much. Every time I look at one, or even think about one, I keep coming up against its limitations. In another 4-5 year of constant refinement, development, and hardware upgrades; it could be the product I keep reading about everywhere. But the reality of the product, and the thing I keep seeing talked about, are not the same thing.
And the laughable thing, which no one seems to ever mention anywhere. The day an android table is released, no matter how rushed or god awful it is, it'll be closer to being what all these reviewers are gushing about. Why? Because while you can't really use Google Apps easily on an android phone, on a tablet, the amount of money and development Google has dropped into that department over the years comes into its own.
I don't want one of those either.
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iPad is just a media viewer
-CF
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Makes no difference, these guidelines weren't intended to be enforced against big media giants and mainstream corporations, only against individuals and startups and small businesses.
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honest reviews , with good writing
"Looking at the iPad From Two Angles"
By DAVID POGUE
"Apple’s iPad seems to be hated by techies and loved by everyone else. Here are separate reviews for the two audiences"
http://www.nytimes.com/2010/04/01/technology/personaltech/01pogue.html
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Re: honest reviews , with good writing
I think the point of this post is to point out how ridiculous the FTC's rules are and not to bash the NYT or the iPad.
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Re: Re: honest reviews , with good writing
True, the rules a a little off-base.
I guess just get sensitive about the times tech section before my morning coffee. (note to self ,, coffee first -- then read techdirt)
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Re: honest reviews , with good writing
On the contrary, that article omits the biggest criticism by far among "techies": that the iPad is not meant to be capable of running any program by any developer, but only those apps approved by Apple in its notoriously inconsistent, anti-competitive, and at times downright absurd review process.
The fact that the article links to Slashdot seems to suggest that the author would have at least, say, searched for iPad on that site and been made quite aware of this criticism, so I can't help but wonder whether this omission may have been disingenuous. A weak negative review followed by a strong (and twice as long) positive review is probably more effective advertising than just a positive review.
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Does anyone see a connection?
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Off the subject ... and watching the first shoe drop ...
and the second shoe drops ...
Steve jobs main concern is the sale of hardware period. If he make money off subscriptions so be it. He isnt doing this to save the news papers he is hyping this to sell more iPads.
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Mr Pogue Mr Conflict of Interest
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