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Re:VPAID ads destroy performance and are still served by maj... by DanBC on Tuesday June 14, 2016 @06:42AM (#11901046)
I'm not sure vilified is the right word, but the FTC in the US and the ASA in the UK have both said that paid-for content needs to be marked as such.

The ASA rules are pretty tight. The user has to know something is paid for content before clicking. So a YouTuber putting out a sponsored video needs to include something in the title of the video, and the link, saying "sponsored content". A banner at the start of the video isn't enough.

Re:VPAID ads destroy performance and are still served by maj... by anexprogrammer on Tuesday June 14, 2016 @07:24AM (#11901218)
I wish a lot more people knew the ASA were a part of EASA[1] and that EASA even exist. ASA are happy to get involved with complaints about a wide range of countries[2] (basically all Europe, Canada, Brazil, Chile and the UK Commonwealth).

eg, if you complain about an advert from a Canadian firm the ASA will refer it to the appropriate national agency for you. My limited understanding is this is reciprocal for residents of those nations too.

The rules are being flouted wholesale, yet many nations have an ASA that could do something about it.

[1] http://www.easa-alliance.org/

[2] https://www.asa.org.uk/About-ASA/Working-with-others/Cross-b...

Re:VPAID ads destroy performance and are still served by maj... by Dylan16807 on Wednesday June 15, 2016 @07:03AM (#11908473)
Be wary of terms such as “sponsorship” and “in association with”

The ASA is generally likely to consider terms such as “sponsored content” as referring to a traditional sponsorship relationship, where material has been financially sponsored but over which the creator retains editorial control. Sponsorship of this kind is not covered by the CAP Code.

Using such terms to describe an ad feature is unlikely to be acceptable. Following an ASA challenge, the ASA ruled against an ad that was included in a “sponsored section” of a website and labelled as “in association with”, considering that the labels in themselves did not make clear the commercial nature of the content