Google Rakes In Visitors From Hoax Marketing
Google has been very clear in the last few weeks that they want to protect their users from seeing fake or hoax stories. They discourage the user of hoax marketing and want people to show prominent disclosures next to any fake materials.
This rule however only seems to apply to small web publishers, when it comes to big sites like YouTube this rule doesn’t seem to apply.
Millions of people have viewed the videos below in the last week and no doubt a large number of them actually believed mobile phones could cook popcorn. Wired magazine even took the trouble of asking a physicist for his expert opinion on the matter.
These videos are far more dangerous than a hoax news story because they are affecting peoples daily lives and behaviour. Videos shot in this style are hugely believable and a large number of people will have been sucked in by them.
So Google, when can we expect to see some kind of disclaimer added to the videos and will all links to the videos be devalued? Or is this a case of “all websites are equal, but some are more equal than others”.
Patrick Altoft is Director of Search at Branded3, a Leeds SEO & Digital Agency specialising in SEO, Web Design, Development & Social Media.
Comments
Read the 9 comments below, or add your own!
this part;
[Or is this a case of “all websites are equal, but some are more equal than othersâ€.]
should maybe read;
[Or is this a case of “all websites are equal, but some are more equal than others, especially ours (google)â€.]
I assume that all videos on YouTube are for entertainment.
I’m not sure that I actually think this video is in any way ‘dangerous’ but do agree that the story in question was barely different to Ray Ban’s ‘catching glasses’ ad, or any of the other viral videos that contribute so much traffic to YouTube…
Or perhaps,
Those who influence our stockholders call the shots?
Due diligence is a must when considering what to believe online….
Barbara
I doubt these hoaxes were put up to garner linkbait though, unlike the hoaxes Google6 are talking about. You-Tube has a policy of user-mopnitored content – the only model possible to cope witht he massive number of submissions.
I agree that this sort of stuff does have damaging repercussions – affecting people’s beliefs on mobile phone usage for example – but Google have repeatedly said that they aren’t going to gpo out and judge the ‘truthiness’ of every website. If someone reported a You-Tube hoax to them and demonstrated how it was designed to game to Google system, then they may take action. Otherwise, it’s You-Tube’s repsonsibility to address the ‘truthiness’ of content appearing under their banner in much the same way as Wikipedia does.
Google is the new Microsoft.
I wouldn’t compare fake news and hoax marketing to YouTube videos.
A place where anyone can submit more or less any form of content cannot be governed to make sure that the content is real or fake.
I wouldn’t be surprised if the YouTube disclaimers and legal documents already cater for such fake material
Don’t make Google look stupid.
Really, it’s not that hard to understand. Even though some people rather push their agenda, it’s much simpler to point to this: the disclosure of the hoax made G look pretty bad in the eyes of the people who found themselves fooled by the story and ended up connecting Google to it. Google is very careful about it’s image and user experience and does not like it.
Before it was a innocent hoax whose only victims would perhaps be other marketeers who lost some marginal attention. After that it became Google’s fault, and Google must deal with it. Like someone else pointed at the linkbait issue, it’s about being on Google’s shoulder or not, not any kind of marketing morality.
It’s such a good hoax though, given that we’ve heard how cell phones can a) fry your brain (so why not popcorn) and b) cause explosions at gas pumps (still waiting for the viral video of that one).
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September 15, 2009 at 9:56am