Facebook Commercial Featuring Reporters’ Faces Without Consent Gets Taken Down
Image via Mercigod / Shutterstock.com
A strange advertisement for Facebook was running on The Atlantic’s website, showing up in the middle of an article.
Its contents, captured in screenshots by Recode Media host Peter Kafka, depicted a conversation between Facebook executives and two journalists, Sara Fischer and Peter Rubin.
Did a double and triple take here: Atlantic’s site running sponcon from Facebook featuring Facebook execs interviewed by real reporters (@sarafischer, @provenself). pic.twitter.com/VZxpDpATwB
— Peter Kafka (@pkafka) November 1, 2021
This interview had been recorded as part of the Atlantic Festival, which is the publication’s annual live event conference, and the advertisement appeared to have been paid for by Facebook itself.
Fischer, a reporter for Axios, later responded to Kafka’s tweet, saying that the interview had been done with “complete editorial independence.” Axios wasn’t told that Facebook would be using the interview to advertise for itself.
Which means that if Kafka hadn’t noticed this and pointed it out, neither reporter nor the publications would’ve been aware that their interview was being used for sponsored content.
It’s unclear if this fact was intentionally left out when the interview was scheduled, or if there was a miscommunication somewhere along the timeline.
Fischer added that The Atlantic has removed the advertisement from its website.
🤔The interview was done with complete editorial independence, which is why Axios agreed to it. We were never made aware that it would be used for paid advertising. The Atlantic has confirmed that the ad has been taken down.
— Sara Fischer (@sarafischer) November 1, 2021
[via Input, cover image via Mercigod / Shutterstock.com]
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