Ad Industry Under Pressure For New Media Regulation
The advertising industry must come to a quick decision over how to regulate new media, or face an unwanted system being imposed by an outside body, according to the director general of the Advertising Standards Authority, Christopher Graham.
“Unless the advertising industry focuses on this challenge now, there are lots of people out there who will come up with their own solution and impose it,” he said at this week’s Westminster eForum. “I don’t think the advertising industry has very much time left to adapt the ASA system for the new circumstances. I know it’s a cliché to say doing nothing is not an option, but… there are a lot of people who would be delighted to do something and they will do it if the advertising industry doesn’t get its act together.”
The discussion revolved around whether it would be appropriate to create a new system for the control of digital platforms, to lie over the ASA’s existing rules, or whether the current system was adaptable.
The session concluded with a vote, and a clear majority favouring the latter. Graham was adamant that a new system was not required. “Together, advertisers, agencies and media old and new can adapt the ASA system for the new circumstances,” he said.
“The challenge for self-regulation is not just the politics or technology, it’s even perhaps the new thinking around regulation itself. Content regulation and traditionally highly regulated media is challenged by the internet and traditional regulation and business is being challenged in the name of better regulation.”
Graham admitted that it was difficult to see the ASA being untouched by these developments. “The ASA will continue to play the referee with a pocketful of yellow and red cards, but in new media, with the absence of gatekeepers and uncertainty about legal enforcement, will the referee have any effect? I for one do not intend the ASA’s role in maintaining a level playing field in the new media future to be reduced to the equivalent of green keeper or the man with he roller,” he said.
“I hope the Committee of Advertising Practice will reach out to the new media players and invite them in to an advertising self-regulatory system for the digital age.”
Stephen Groom, head of marketing and privacy law at Osborne Clarke, was strongly in favour of implementing an overlaying system, with separate arrangements and stronger enforcement powers.
However, Graham believes that “the ASA has very real power simply in declaring what is or is not misleading, socially irresponsible or unacceptable” and that brand reputation and not the implementation of punishment in the form of fines are key.
Paul Fairburn, managing director of digital platforms at Chrysalis Radio, expressed concern from the floor, stating that the regulation of whole websites would prevent a lot of comment and editorial content, which is essential in a free democracy. He said that defining the boundaries between editorial and advertising will be difficult but necessary, and that regulating entire websites would signal “a whole world of pain for all of us”.
Brands are the key players in new media, according to Graham, and consumers expect the same standards in advertising whether brands are in the sphere of new or old media, broadcast or non-broadcast.
“The same argument that brought broadcast and non-broadcast together under the ASA one-stop sop should mean that advertising self-regulation covers all advertising whether in old media or new,” he said. “This is all the more the case as media converge.
“If self-regulatory structures don’t recognise that, it will call into question the effectiveness of self-regulation in conventional media in the long term, which is potentially very corrosive. The trouble is how do we keep advertising standards high in the digital age given that new media are so very different? Establishing a jurisdiction for a global phenomenon is to say the least problematic.”
The advertising regulatory bodies are currently future-proofing, making the self-regulatory system fit for purpose in the digital age, which, according to Graham, will not be an easy task.
Referring to the PCC’s recent decision to regulate audio-visual content, such as podcasts and on newspaper websites (see