Electronic Arts Unveils New Policy For Marking YouTube Videos As 'Supported' Or 'Advertisement'
from the huh dept
While the past few years have seen a torrent of criticism heaped on the video game journalism world, far too little of it has been focused on the cozy contractual deals being worked out between publishers and YouTube personalities that review games. With some of these arrangements having come to light, most notably concerning Nintendo and Warner Bros. games coverage, it’s fairly safe to assume that many other publishers do something of this sort. These arrangements work something like this: the game publisher will offer access to the games for review by the YouTuber, so long as the YouTuber agrees to offer generally positive reviews to the product. The YouTuber benefits by being first to market with reviews, the publisher benefits from positive coverage, and the public gets spit in the eye while losing their trust in the personalities they have followed. Add to it all that some of these arrangements fail to follow FTC guidelines on marking paid-for material and you’re left with the inevitable understanding that this is an arrangement that can only last for a short period of time, as the public trust in the reviewers will torpedo to the point of losing the audience completely.
It’s devolved to the point where even companies from which we’ve come to expect the worst are trying to get out ahead of all this. Electronic Arts, for instance, best known for its annual rivalry with Comcast over the “Worst Company” award, has developed a new policy for marking YouTube videos produced under this arrangement that is actually quite good.
In a post on EA’s German news blog (translated by NeoGAF), EA announced that they’re stepping up their disclosure game by contractually requiring content creators to disclose with EA-provided hashtags and watermarks. The watermarks are pictured above. I reached out to EA in North America, and they confirmed that it’s a company-wide thing, though some rules vary by region.
“Supported by EA” is to be used in situations where EA has paid for access to the game (travel, review copies, etc), but did not influence the video/stream itself. “Advertisement,” on the other hand, is exactly what it sounds like: EA provided material or directly influenced the direction of the content’s, um, contents.
The disclosure logos themselves, seen at the link, are simple and clear. It’s actually the exact kind of transparency we would hope for. No longer should potential customers wonder if a review has been influenced in any way by EA, or even if EA has taken some actions to ingratiate itself to the reviewer. It’s clearly labeled.
Now, we’ll have to see how this ends up working in practice. Questions remain, such as how big the logos will be, whether YouTubers will take things a step further and call attention to the disclosures, or if nefarious omissions of the disclosure logos will occur. But in concept, it’s quite good, and perhaps not the kind of thing we would expect to be pioneered by EA. So good on them.
Filed Under: advertisements, sponsored content, video games, videos
Companies: ea, youtube
Comments on “Electronic Arts Unveils New Policy For Marking YouTube Videos As 'Supported' Or 'Advertisement'”
So…wait…this actually is about ethics in game journalism?
Huh.
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So does this mean GG will stop harassing people online? Or that it works and they’ll now harass more people?
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Yes?
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Most of those folks are happy to harrass and abuse anyone. GG was just the handy excuse at the time to be pricks, They’ll find another soon enough if they feel like the old excuse no longer works.
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Not really, it’s mostly about EA not getting nominated for any more “worst company” awards.
helping
it is to lol
“No longer should potential customers wonder if a review has been influenced in any way by EA, or even if EA has taken some actions to ingratiate itself to the reviewer.”
*Should* being the operative word. We now have to wonder whether this arrangement is actually being followed 100% of the time, or if there’s still some under the table goings on that they think will go unnoticed so long as the have the public disclaimer available on a majority of works.
Sadly, as with DRM and every other shady practice involved by EA, they have lost the trust long ago of everyone paying attention, but the general public typically doesn’t do that so long as said company has a monopoly on the things they want.
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EA is dead for me. I don’t even bother to pirate their games to try anymore. So, spot on.
I will just leave this here:
“not the kind of thing we would expect to be pioneered by EA”
So we are expecting it not to be followed.
The one constant I have learned with EA is, they will screw over their customers every time in some way