NEWS AND ADVERTISING BLUR

The launch of a new cellphone product last week raises ethical issues about the blurring of the lines between news and advertising.

On Friday (24 August 2007) both the Times of Swaziland and the Swazi Observer newspaper had front page lead stories about the launch by cellphone company MTN Swaziland of a new service that offers subscribers reduced rates. The package was described by the company as the first of its kind in the world.

Although both newspapers considered this launch to be so important to warrant making it the main news report of the day, the Observer went a long way further by also devoting two inside pages to the news.

Devoting three pages of a 36-page edition of the Observer to a commercial story might raise doubts about the news values at newspaper, but that is not what concerns me at the moment. The real issue is that the Observer chose to highlight the headlines on the two pages in the shade of yellow that MTN uses in its corporate logo. In addition, there were five pictures on the two pages, all with the MTN logo prominent, and in total there were at least 25 people shown wearing MTN T-shirts and caps, all in the corporate colour and all with company logos.

The importance that the Observer placed on the story can be judged by the fact that all the reports on the product launch were written by the Observer chief editor, Musa Ndlangamandla. The reports extensively quoted MTN company members saying how special the new product was. It was often referred to as a ‘world first’.

In case you were wondering, this ‘world first’ referred to a tariff programme that allowed Pay As You Go customers to get already existing cheap rates anytime of the day and not just at specific times. As ‘world firsts’ go this is pretty small beer.

Despite the use of the MTN corporate colour and all the pictures of the T-shirts and caps, this report was not an advertisement. It was journalism: albeit pretty lousy journalism.

There is something going on between MTN and the Observer. Only the previous Monday (20 August 2007) the Observer devoted another two pages (in the corporate colour yellow and with 11 pictures of people in those T-shirts and caps) about MTN. This time the report was about the start of MTN’s 21-day corporate responsibility programme during which staff visited a hospital and helped to clean up the grounds.

So, in the space of five days the Observer has given five pages to MTN. There is no evidence to suppose that MTN has made any payment for this space, rather it seems they are being given a massive free advertisement.

The saga of MTN and the Observer is important because in the Swazi press generally there is a blurring of the line between what is news and what is promotion or advertising.

There is a strong tradition in newspapers and magazines across the world of offering companies and organizations the opportunity to pay for favourable editorial content to be placed in their publications. This kind of editorial is sometimes known as advertorials, advertising features or supplements. Whatever you call them, they are all stories that provide direct support to advertisers.The ethical problem arises if the publication does not make it clear to readers that they are reading paid-for ‘sponsored’ editorial, rather than freely written, independent journalism.

Advertorials are advertisements (text and pictures occupying paid-for space), pretending to be independent editorial content. They exist because they can make money for publishers. Advertisers like them because editorial in newspapers is trusted more than adverts. However, the same argument is used by people who oppose them. Many times, the readers do not know that what they are reading lacks the credibility of editorial matter. The media in such cases choose not to clearly state the fact of an advertorial being one.

One piece of research conducted in India discovered that only eight people in a sample of forty were able to distinguish between independent editorial content and advertorials, suggesting that the media often choose not to clearly state paid-for text as being just that.

The example of MTN and the Observer blurs this line a little since it would appear that the Observer willingly gave MTN space that gave direct support to MTN, offering uncritical coverage of its product launch, using the corporate colours and publishing pictures of company T-shirts and caps with MTN logos. They did all this but there is no evidence that the Observer took money from the company for all this publicity.

But there are other examples in the Swazi press where advertorials or supplements are published without it being made clear to readers that what they are reading has been paid for by advertisers. Two recent examples of this are the three-page supplement on the refurbishment of Thokoza Church Centre dining facilities (16 August 2007) and the two-page Pre-School Supplement (23 August 2007): both published by the Times of Swaziland.

Unless, newspapers are trying deliberately to mislead their readers they should take as much care as possible to distinguish between paid-for editorial and independent editorial. To reduce the confusion they can do the following:

- Label all paid-for editorial in one of the following ways: ‘Advertisement’, ‘Advertising feature’ ‘Advertising supplement’. It is important to get the word ‘Advertising’ or ‘Advertisement’ in there somewhere so there can be no doubt that what is published is not independent journalism.

- Use a different type face for headlines and body text in advertorials and supplements. This will make the paid-for material look different from independent editorial.

- If reporters who generally write independent editorial for the newspapers have been assigned to write advertorials do not put the report’s name (by-line) on the advertorial. In this way readers who recognise the reporter’s name will not mistake the piece for independent journalism.