The Ethical Dilemma of Native Advertising:
An example of Native Advertising as seen in “The Atlantic” where there is an article promoting the church of Scientology.
Source:
http://www.huffingtonpost.com/js-mcdougall/dont-ruin-the-web-two-rul_b_5744140.html
This blog post is a commentary on the article linked above. The article discusses Native Advertising in news websites and the ethical and moral dilemma in such advertising on such sites.
Native advertising is an advertising method where advertisers pay to have an non-intrusive ad-experience in the same form and performing the same function as the entries in the medium it is placed in.
In the case of native advertisement present in online news websites, the ads would take the form of articles. These articles are known as sponsored articles.
The ethical dilemma of this topic is the fact that those who visits such news website are there to be informed, and when there is no distinction between propaganda and information then the sole purpose of visiting such informative websites is abolished.
I believe that there should be a separation and a line between advertising and news because individuals rely on such websites and view them as trustworthy sources of information. But also, in order to provide the news, such establishments need funding, funding that mainly comes from advertising. Therefore, unless we as readers wish to fund such establishments, this ethical dilemma will continue to exist.
Additional Reading: (Examples of Native Ads)
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