Anything goes on the internet. As it should be, I hear 100 million bloggers cry, but do they feel all warm and similarly free speechy about advertisements? We can all muster up outrage when Microsoft closes down a blog that attacks the Chinese government, but can we muster up the same amount of choler in defence of Midway Games and its online video advert for the computer game Mortal Kombat?
After all, it did show a man's heart being ripped out.
The Advertising Standards Authority banned that viral advert in December, the first time it had acted against a viral.
I suspect a certain proportion of the netelligensia would condemn Microsoft for its disgraceful actions in China but at the same time warmly welcome it and other multinationals being held to account for some of their more spurious, or even, blatantly false claims in their advertising.
Is there a contradiction here?
The director general of the Advertising Standards Authority, Christopher Graham, admits he can pull a billboard off a poster site but has no power to do the same for adverts in TV via broadband or on mobile phones. He has warned that cyberspace could become the "wild west" if it remains unregulated. But in the same breath he said chaos is unlikely, because a) consumers will complain, b) brands will worry about consumers complaining and c) if all else fails, the government will legislate, which nobody wants.
So he is assuming that everything will be peachy - is that optimistic, naive or what?
Probably, I think considering that pushing the envelope is in the genetic code of those you live in adland. But at the same time, I'm not in favour of regulating the net. I have always thought that either you believe in freedom (of commercial) speech, or you don't.
