Slashdot Mirror
Yahoo News Posts Advertisements as News
An anonymous reader writes "Yahoo is now putting ad banners as news stories. This is highly misleading and is an awesome way to sell out."
I don't really think Yahoo has been sold in in a few years, but this
is a new level of yucky. No doubt it is a sign of things to come:
the news is the ad. The ad is the news. It's one step worse then the
bizarre advertising/news merge that was amazingly evident when Disney/ABC was doing
with Monsters Inc while Time/Warner/AOL/CNN was hyping Harry Potter.
Oh, in case they change it, basically they have a list of news stories,
and one of them links simply to a page advertising (not surprisingly) X-10. The link isn't marked as an ad -- its simply one of the headlines in
the news list. It's one thing to have more ads... it's another to
simply disguise the ad as actual news. Update The ad was yanked.
For those who missed it, there were a dozen news articles, but one
was an advertisement. It was indistinguishable from the actual news.
Every paper news source will label Anything over 1 full page as an advertisement, so how can they get away with this. Actually it's even worse than a multipage ad that isn't labeled. It's like having an entry in the Table of Contents that says it's to a featured article, and instead takes you to advertising. How sickening.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
I can safely say that Yahoo isn't the first company to do this. Better yet, morning news shows are the worst. Weight loss, hot movies, fashion 'tips'... just thinly disguised product placement.
Dear sirs, it is my sad duty to inform you that journalistic integrity is dead.
Well, check out www.whatreallyhappened.com... there's still *some* left, I think. They're just alarmist, as opposed to corrupt.
How can anything that has the label "ADVERTISEMENT" (in all caps, to boot) above it be considered 'highly misleading'? It seems pretty clear to me....
Okay, you don't have to like this type of advertisement and there can be thoughts about the 'psudo journalism' feel of it, but as long as it says that it's an add, how is it any different from the "Special Advertisement Section" that shows up periodically in Newsweek, Discover, Sports Illustrated, etc.? Just ignore it and continue reading what you want to read....
-Mark
I quit watching TV as a teen because I was tired of the brainwashing. These days if I'm visiting someone who has it on I will watch with them so as to not be a snob. Recently I caught a little bit of Good Morning America. I was amazed by how much of the show is blatant advertising for products. My friend said most other "information" shows on TV are the same way. Every outlet in our culture is being geared towards the Consumerist movement.
So now the "News" sites on the Internet are doing the same thing. It's sad to see the progression of the Internet from a bastion of equal speech to yet another Consumerism-in-overdrive medium.
If slashdot starts redirecting the "Reply" button to ad sites, I'll post all my karma-capped UIDs/passwords on a first-come, first-served basis. The advertisers will win, and so will the trolls.
"What is the sound of one belly slapping?"
I followed the link and the "news" stories are clearly marked as an advertisement. Perhaps not blazingly marked, but the section that they're all in has the word Advertisement over it. It is also on the right side of the page where there is typically a advertisement banner, so if you have decent location memory (read: consistent page design)for ad placements, it should be noticeable as such.
It looks like all of the things in the "Technoscout" section are simply advertisements/product offerings displayed as news-like articles or press releases.
None of the articles in the main sections had any advertisements mixed in with them.
This doesn't suprise me one bit. At the risk of repeating the tired old mantra, concentration of big media will lead to lapses in journalistic integrity driven by the bottom line. I noticed the following recently: MSNBC did a piece last week about how well the X-box was selling (depite the fact that the PS2 out sold it 2:1 during the holiday season). Disclaimer: I have a PS2. The piece was done by a reporter who gave his two sons (14 and 17 I think) a X-box and see if they liked it. Suprise: they did. Thumbs up for the X-box. No disclaimer at the end of the story that Microsoft owns X% of MSNBC. You have to be a smart cookie today to see through the bullsh*t.
My 2 cents.
I agree. I see a brief summary, with a link for the full article. That, and a lot of other links. And there's a banner ad at the top. So what's the beef?
A simple browse through the X-10 Website will reveal this page, which details their advertising policies.
They even allow you to run a cookie which will completely disable X-10 Ads. All you have to do is click here and it X-10 ads will never again appear for the next month or so, then just click on it again to reset the cookie.
It isn't that hard folks....theres no need to bitch about it, just fix it!
-Julius X
remove "-whatkindofspamdoyoutakemefor-" from email to send
Since Rob (cmdrtaco) is making such a big deal about Yahoo advertisements that are incidently clearly marked as advertisements, I wonder what his reaction will be when Slashdot itself begins much more aggressive advertising.
For those who missed it, about two months ago Rob posted an article here explaining that Slashdot was seriously considering running large ads (kinda like CNet, etc) and possibly pop-ups, etc sometime in the first quarter of 2002 (ie. about now) too since standard banner ads aren't getting enough click-throughs.
Oh boy, it's going to be interesting to see the backlash from readers here when the BIG ANNOYING Yahoo like ads showup here on Slashdot - then perhaps Rob's article was just a red herring to test the waters so to speak to test reader reaction to Yahoo like advertising so Slashdot can see how aggressive they can be with their own advertising. Enjoy the final days of relatively ad-free Slashdot...
I had a really long, thought out post typed out. But then slashdot went belly up. Not sure exactly what happened, but for a forum which kicks microsoft in the head each time they fubar, i find it quite ironic that at least once a day i come to find that 1: im not logged in, 2: i can't post anything, and 3: a few posts disappear into a black hole, from which they never return.
Anyways.. to recap my post.. Advertising is not a sin to me - we've had to deal with misleading adverisiments in printed press for a long time. I think the group personality here lends itself to sensationalism way too easy. Me, i'd rather see 5 banner ads on CNN than have to pay for CNN. Its not 1992 anymore, and websites carry a LOT more data than before. The internet has become a part of our economy - not a novelty relegated to just a few fortunate souls in acadamia and dialup ISP patrons browsing websites served on T1's. This is the multimedia internet, and while you or I may or may not like the barrage of images and sounds, i'd be willing to bet Joe America uses it - or else it wouldnt exist. 'Tis the nature of capitalism.
I've posted a proposed end-users bill of rights in my journal. I'd love to hear more thoughts about it. I asked slashdot about it, and, somehow, the entire post was marked as "Rejected" as soon as the submit page came back up. Interesting, eh?
Not necessarily. How many people read InfoWorld, InfoWeek, Mac World, Mac Week, Computer Buyer, ... The list goes on and on of "magazines" that, as far as I can tell, are nothing but advertisements. Yet many decent magazines have gone under while these are still going strong.
It is my fear that as more venues repackage ads as news (TV news has been doing it for years), more people will just kick back and take the ads as news. I'm not sure if that's cause or effect of my cynicism. Maybe both.
That's nothing new. Lots of sites do it. There's a small image box above it that is obviously part of it and you have to be pretty dumb not to immediately realize that the entire bar is one advertisement.
If people can't realize that, then screw them. This is no different than all of the big-name news papers that have news-looking advertisements in them that say in small letters somewhere 'advertisement'.
Ho hum.
. . .but definetely not new.
Magazines and newspapers have adds like these all the time. Every so often I come across an interesting headline, but about three paragraphs I start to wonder. Sure enough, there's a tiny "advertisement" on the bottom of the page.
Some of the slicker ads on tv could pass themselves of as regular tv. Anyone see the adds for blimpie sandwhiches which looked like CNN segments?
Even on radio, at least locally, there are bits that sound like "man at the field" reports, but are in fact paid ads for a car dealer or grocer.
Just my opinion here, but I thought the slashdot crowd was by definition smart enough to know when to call a spade a spade. Geeks and nerds are also supposed to be savy to pop culture, but the crowd here is so sensitive to ads as to be quite incredible. Please get a grip everyone.
obviously no deficiencies vs. no obvious deficiencies
Well it may be be some special form of humor, an old english tradition called irony, which is often very subtle and misunderstood. Maybe not. Whatever.
What bugs me more is the fact I can't believe someone in the
+++ath0