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Verizon suspends advertising on Facebook, joins growing boycott

reuters.com

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Re: Verizon suspends advertising on Facebook, joins growing boycott

#31

Post by ogre_codes »

forbiddenvoid wrote: post #6

Sounds like Verizon's Facebook advertising spend is losing value because of COVID-19, so they're using this a way to redirect focus away from the negative impact on their business. All of the companies doing this right now are 'pausing spend' rather than redirecting. They're reducing their marketing budgets and pointing the finger at Facebook so no one looks too closely at the implications of their reduced ad spend.

I suspect COVID-19 is making it easy for a lot of advertisers to drop FaceBook right now. Ad budgets are down and likely to stay down until this blows over.

Re: Verizon suspends advertising on Facebook, joins growing boycott

#32

Post by chris_wot »

rectang wrote: post #26
forbiddenvoid wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't fault Verizon for cutting budget. It's absolutely the right thing to do. But if we weren't in the situation we're in they probably wouldn't be doing this. The nuance between "we're going to stop doing business with Facebook because Facebook is bad" and "we have to cut budget from advertising and we chose to cut it from Facebook because Facebook is bad" is important. It's convenient to do this now, but hard to…

Why is it impossible that Verizon is responding, at least in part, to public pressure against Facebook?

The timing is quite suspicious.

Re: Verizon suspends advertising on Facebook, joins growing boycott

#33

Post by 0xDEADBEF »

metachor wrote: post #25
0xDEADBEF wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Selling lemonade, running a bike shop, etc.

You seem to be confusing small businesses with corporations, as if they have the same economic and power imperatives.

> You seem to be confusing small businesses with corporations

No, not at all. The question was:

> Can you give me an example of something businesses do which isn’t political?

And thus I gave 2 examples. A small business can also incorporate if they wish. And yes, the bigger a business gets, the hairy things get politically if they want to stay neutral or simply true to their business model, but they are not mutually exclusive.

Re: Verizon suspends advertising on Facebook, joins growing boycott

#35

Post by throwawaysea »

vvanders wrote: post #28
ve55 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's hard to phrase this in a way that doesn't sound snarky, but I mean it sincerely: Would you rather they become more like Twitter instead? Promoting virality is promoting outrage content, full-stop.

Honestly? I think all political advertising shouldn't be allowed, it gives those with a disproportionate amount of capital a lever of influence that runs counter to the democratic process. If you want to push an issue you should have to organize people who believe in your cause and have them involved. There's been plenty of examples of microtargeting's influence that makes me think it has no place in the political di…

What you're calling the democratic process is simply people willing to spend capital on a cause. It's just that their capital is time (and time is money). It doesn't make them any holier, and there's nothing morally or ethically superior about having to "organize people" without spending money. Put another way, I may be able to exert my political voice using money and I am not less deserving of having my opinion heard or any less deserving of influencing others than someone whose primary input is time (in lieu of other life pursuits).

Re: Verizon suspends advertising on Facebook, joins growing boycott

#36

Post by thephyber »

throwawaysea wrote: post #22

Keep politics out of business. Stop caving into activist pressure (whether internal or external) and online outrage. That isn't representative of what customers care about or want. Companies entering cultural/ideological wars (like Verizon) are doing so based on the voices of a small vocal minority of people. By adopting such stances, these companies are doing the silent majority of their customers a huge disservice…

> These companies are basically being gamed by sophisticated organization, campaigning, and manufactured outrage.

I'm sorry I lost the thread. Is "these companies" the boycotting companies or the boycotted?

> Stop caving into activist pressure and online outrage.

Is this post not "online outrage"?

Re: Verizon suspends advertising on Facebook, joins growing boycott

#37

Post by throwaway_jobs »

forbiddenvoid wrote: post #6

Sounds like Verizon's Facebook advertising spend is losing value because of COVID-19, so they're using this a way to redirect focus away from the negative impact on their business. All of the companies doing this right now are 'pausing spend' rather than redirecting. They're reducing their marketing budgets and pointing the finger at Facebook so no one looks too closely at the implications of their reduced ad spend.

>Sounds like Verizon’s Facebook advertising spend is losing value because if COVId-19

“We’re pausing our advertising until Facebook can create an acceptable solution that makes us comfortable,”

Doesn’t sound like it has anything to do with Covid-19 to me but rather advertisers don’t want to spend money advertising on a platform promoting hate speech.

But let’s say this was a conspiracy by all these companies to save their ad dollars because they are being wasted on FB, why would they be afraid of the “implications of their reduced ad spend”? Certainly there is nothing wrong with these companies coming out and saying we are not going to spend money advertising on FB because it’s a waste of money. What else is the implication?

Re: Verizon suspends advertising on Facebook, joins growing boycott

#38

Post by Barrin92 »

vvanders wrote: post #28
ve55 wrote: post #16

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's hard to phrase this in a way that doesn't sound snarky, but I mean it sincerely: Would you rather they become more like Twitter instead? Promoting virality is promoting outrage content, full-stop.

Honestly? I think all political advertising shouldn't be allowed, it gives those with a disproportionate amount of capital a lever of influence that runs counter to the democratic process. If you want to push an issue you should have to organize people who believe in your cause and have them involved. There's been plenty of examples of microtargeting's influence that makes me think it has no place in the political di…

Yep, it's pretty much how campaigns here in Germany work. There's about a few weeks of campaigning during which political posters and so on can be put up, but otherwise there's strict regulation on political ads.

Also the parties are significantly publicly financed and the amount of money is much lower, due to the much shorter campaign span, making the process much more egalitarian. For example the largest party in Germany, the CDU/CSU spent 30 million for the entire 2017 general election campaign (about 30-40% of the vote generally), and the smallest parties spend a few million with about 5% of the vote. So not much difference.

I'm completely shocked when I see US candidates in primaries spend tens of millions, or individual senators.

Re: Verizon suspends advertising on Facebook, joins growing boycott

#39

Post by dvtrn »

rectang wrote: post #26
forbiddenvoid wrote: post #18

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I don't fault Verizon for cutting budget. It's absolutely the right thing to do. But if we weren't in the situation we're in they probably wouldn't be doing this. The nuance between "we're going to stop doing business with Facebook because Facebook is bad" and "we have to cut budget from advertising and we chose to cut it from Facebook because Facebook is bad" is important. It's convenient to do this now, but hard to…

Why is it impossible that Verizon is responding, at least in part, to public pressure against Facebook?

I suspect you might not get an answer to this since it's not something anyone has actually said here.

Re: Verizon suspends advertising on Facebook, joins growing boycott

#40

Post by wesleytodd »

0xDEADBEF wrote: post #23
birdyrooster wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Can you give me an example of something businesses do which isn’t political?

Selling lemonade, running a bike shop, etc.

There are permits required to run a lemonade stand and a bike shop. Who do you think sets the rules for those permits?
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