Whether or not these influencers should have to label ads is one thing.
But... I'll note how "little guy" regulation works relative to major players.
You don't see court, legislature decisions, or such upending the business model of a FB, Google or whatnot. Every word will be negotiated, Google and/or FB will have control over implementation. Often, the regulation will be a net positive, given that it can slow small competitors down. The process will take years, the roll out will be gradual....
"Influencers" or really anyone selling content via platforms can have rules slapped onto them by either the state or the platform without notice, lots of potential for revenue disruption...
It's easy to belittle the little, and this article kind does it too: "The court said one fitness influencer should have been clear she was advertising when she was paid to promote a brand of jam."
Meanwhile.. FB, Adwords and such got decades of lead time. Extreme tolerance of various dubious practices as regulation designed to be business friendly at the cost of timeliness & effectiveness was slowly formulated. No parliament demands Fast and Furious post little notices, nor have they over decades.
This is frankly not true in a lot of European countries. Google, Facebook and every other company cannot advertise things like toys, tobacco or alcohol to children here in Denmark, and they have to clearly tell you which parts are advertising and which aren’t. This is why Facebook has an “suggested” and an “advertising tag, that you can even click on to be told what metrics decided that you should see it. As well as options to ignore advertisers or setup personal preferences.
I’m not going to defend Google or Facebook, but they didn’t add those things because they wanted to. They added them because their platforms would be banned from Europe if they didn’t.
Influencers are actually some of the only advertisers who aren’t well regulated in Europe, and it’s honestly a real issue when they have more reach than national television stations.
In Denmark alone we’ve had issues with influencers advertising plastic surgery or sugar dating to teenagers and below. Things that are extremely illegal through any other medium, but because “influencers” fall outside of traditional law, it’s been very hard to stop them with the legalisation that we have. In fact they have only been stopped by being publicly shamed in other media, causing them so much bad press that nobody wanted to pay them to advertise things.
So it’s actually quite the opposite, but I’ll be the first to agree that the platforms should also be held into account for the things they allow influencers to post. Not a very popular opinion on HN, but as far as I’m concerned Europe would lose nothing by kicking non-EU software companies where it hurts.
I did not read netcan's statement as the thesis that there is no legislation regarding "big corps" in the EU. I read it as a statement about speed and willingness regarding the establishment of new laws or law changes.
Whether the statement i interpreted is true i cannot tell, but it would be interesting to have data points on it.
The thing I think is false is your portrayal of EU legislation targeting the little person while leaving the big corps alone. Because reality is quite the opposite.
We are struggling to handle “influencers” because they are a “new” concept in terms of legislation. They fall into a loophole, and dealing with it isn’t “quick” as you suggest, but something that has been slowly grinding into gear over the last decade and will in all likelihood take at least another decade to reach any form of completion.
By contrast the big Corps you say go free have been handled by advertisements legislation that has existed since the dawn of the news paper and which regularly gets updated.
The issue influencers pose the traditional legislation is that they fall into the category of being private individuals voicing their private opinion, which used to get regulated by the media platforms they did it on, but this isn’t true with SoMe because of the other legal loophole these platforms exploit by not being forced into an editorial role for the content they host.
That’s another issue that will also take decades to see decent legislation, but as far as advertisement goes, big Corps are covered while the little guy is not.
>> they (Google & FB) didn’t add those things because they wanted to. They added them because their platforms would be banned from Europe if they didn’t.
These regulatory environments, including european countries, merge regulator and platform. One controls the literal regulation, while the other controls implementation. Both are heavily involved in each others decision making.
I'm not saying that advertising plastic surgery or sugar dating to teenagers is good, or should not be regulated. Lots of things are troublesome and need courts and legislators to do stuff. I'm just noting what happens the difference depending on who's pocket book it impacts.
No countries, certainly not EU countries, make quick turnaround decisions that could gut a major revenue stream at FB-scale.
You’re right, but it’s worth pointing out that the other party being slowed down by these rules are corporations that are paying influencers to post ads, some of which are quite large. They’re losing a source of sneaky ads hidden as genuine personal endorsement.
Advertising exists, and I have no problem talking about that as a whole.
"Paid influencing" is <1% of that near trillion dollar market. The real meat is divided between giants like Google and FB. They own the platforms, dictate terms and cut content makers in on a sliver when and if they choose. That is true for music, porno, instagram garden influencing...
The advertising buyer side has a megacorp presence, but it's mostly a lot of everything and there's not much power concentration. Platforms generally want to own the connections. Advertiser-influencer, artist-listener, youtuber-viewer, etc. Sponsorships and paid placement is a workaround. It's what TV, cinema, games and such got away with for decades. Maybe there are transparency rules or somesuch somewhere... but nowhere does regulation upend the business model or get overly handsy. When it's an instagram people instead disney, open season.
I'm not against regulating advertising. I just think picking on the smallest, ugliest kid and then running off is scapegoating.
> You don't see court, legislature decisions, or such upending the business model of a FB, Google or whatnot.
Because they usually follow the laws, and their context is always obvious. The problem with the "little guy" influencer is the not so obvious mix between personal actions and business.
Sometimes they show you their dog pooping, the next second they tell you how awesome the shit-bags of $COMPANY are. How should the viewer know whether this was now a paid placement, or just the personal opinion of that person. With Google and Facebook you will never seen such things, and when they tell you how awesome their newest Service is, everyone knows the intention behind it. Para-social effects are not the same with an anonymous company.
In the past big monopolies have been dismantled. See for example AT&T. Google, Facebook, Amazon, they exist for a relatively short period of time. Don't you think they will also be dismantled in the next 10-30 years?
Not sure why it's a bad example. 35 years later it did not "just re-merged", it still is in a few pieces. You need to think about how the present would look like if there was no breaking up. And that present likely would not have google, fb, amazon - only AT&T.
The diagram has 3 input companies and 3 output companies, so at a surface level it seems nothing has changed. Even Google Fiber couldn’t compete with the big guys because (at least partially) these utility companies are so entrenched in lobbying etc.
I don’t doubt the break-ups are effective in the short term, but the long-term behavior in this case seems to be less affected.
I wouldn't call Instagram influencers the "little guy", many are millionaires (either off the back of social media or old school Kardashian style). They milk their fans through unregulated advertising and get richer.
With the attitude that regulation disproportionately effects start-ups or small businesses no regulation would ever end up law, which seems to be the point of this style of comment.
Many is relative. The big "little guys" are making just a per mill of the whole. If you earn as much as a regular office worker, you are already part of the 0.1 top-Influencers. The millionaires are even lower, 0.01% or 0.001%. But the laws apply the same for all of them.
And from my understanding, the poor influencers are the most harmful ones, as they sell even the most awful trash. While the rich ones at least usually have some standards. An exception are the single cases of rich bitches who directly scam their followers with something illegal.
Irrelevant. The people who own the most morally corrupt and toxic companies, that are destroying the planet, have all the money in the world to advertise and influence "organically" when everything they do is as inorganic and unnatural as it gets.
Industrialists will be first to the guillotine(in Minecraft of course).
Can’t wait for this legislation to be extended to legislators, “this legislation contains a paid promotion” would be a great label to apply. Perhaps traditional media outlets should be required to do the same thing with their advertisers. Maybe doctors disclosing which companies have sent them off to a “medical conference” in Las Vegas or some other holiday destination would be a good idea too. You could think up new ones all day…
Who cares if they're the little guy. The influencers are lying to their followers to fool them into wasting their money, so they can profit. Little guys also includes shoplifters and con-men. They're still bad for others.
Well, I think the point here is that you don't become good or evil, or do harm or not do harm, by virtue of being big or small. Yet that seems to be the primary axis on whether legislation pampers its target or not.
But... I'll note how "little guy" regulation works relative to major players.
You don't see court, legislature decisions, or such upending the business model of a FB, Google or whatnot. Every word will be negotiated, Google and/or FB will have control over implementation. Often, the regulation will be a net positive, given that it can slow small competitors down. The process will take years, the roll out will be gradual....
"Influencers" or really anyone selling content via platforms can have rules slapped onto them by either the state or the platform without notice, lots of potential for revenue disruption... It's easy to belittle the little, and this article kind does it too: "The court said one fitness influencer should have been clear she was advertising when she was paid to promote a brand of jam."
Meanwhile.. FB, Adwords and such got decades of lead time. Extreme tolerance of various dubious practices as regulation designed to be business friendly at the cost of timeliness & effectiveness was slowly formulated. No parliament demands Fast and Furious post little notices, nor have they over decades.