this post was submitted on 25 Apr 2024
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Reddit, AI spam bots explore new ways to show ads in your feed

#For sale: Ads that look like legit Reddit user posts

"We highly recommend only mentioning the brand name of your product since mentioning links in posts makes the post more likely to be reported as spam and hidden. We find that humans don't usually type out full URLs in natural conversation and plus, most Internet users are happy to do a quick Google Search," ReplyGuy's website reads.

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[–] chiliedogg@lemmy.world 127 points 6 months ago (2 children)

The law requires YouTubers to identify sponsored segments. I don't see why that shouldn't also be applied to social media posts.

[–] hayes_@sh.itjust.works 80 points 6 months ago (2 children)

The law does apply to social media posts.

The social media company has to mark sponsored content and give users the means to do so themselves (when the partnership is between the user and a third party rather than the social media company).

Unfortunately it’s hard to prove and profitable to lie.

[–] Black_Gulaman@lemmy.dbzer0.com 18 points 6 months ago* (last edited 6 months ago)

social media corporations can be made liable under the law, well how about here in Lemmy, where the instance owner may not even know that companies are creating bots and posting discrete advertisements, or hiring trolls/shills to advertise for them?

[–] 2deck@lemmy.world 4 points 6 months ago (1 children)

Is it difficult to prove that's what's explicitly being sold in this case?

[–] pumpkinseedoil@feddit.de 3 points 6 months ago

It's hard since it could theoretically also be an actual user who used that website themself.

[–] obinice@lemmy.world 2 points 6 months ago (1 children)

The law requires YouTubers to identify sponsored segments.

In which countries, though? That's a key point that seems missed from a lot of responses discussing "the law".

Laws vary quite significantly from nation to nation, and without that key context, there's not much that can be garnered.

[–] conciselyverbose@sh.itjust.works 1 points 6 months ago

The US, for one, which pretty much makes it apply universally anywhere on YouTube, Reddit, Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, etc, as they're all US companies.