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Timeline...
2003
–
The advocacy group Commercial Alert
petitions the FTC
and the FCC for regulations to protect consumers from deceptive and unfair practices
in the product placement industry. The FCC has not yet responded.
February 10,
2005 – The FTC denies
Commercial Alert’s petition, stating that product placement is not
deceptive because “few objective claims appear to be made about the
product’s performance or attributes.” Regarding the impact on children,
the FTC rules that product placement does not make false or misleading
claims to children and therefore “even from an ordinary child’s
standpoint, consumer injury from an undisclosed paid product placement
seems unlikely.”
June 8, 2005 – FCC Commissioner Jonathan Adelstein
tells
The
Wall Street Journal : “The whole idea of product placement is to advertise to
people when they’re not expecting it. So the law requires that
advertisers disclose then when they’re on broadcast stations as
something that has been paid for, and if they don’t do that, it’s a
serious violation of the law.” Adelstein adds, “The FCC operates under
a different law than the FTC…We have no choice but to enforce that law.”
November 14,
2005 – The Writer’s Guild of
America issues
a press release and white paper titled
Are You SELLING to Me? Stealth Advertising in the Entertainment Industry.
The Guild states: “As parents, family members, neighbors and citizens,
we are concerned about the growing substitution of advertising for
creative stories, about stealth advertising, and about government
regulations that are being ignored.”
September 6,
2007 – FCC Chairman Kevin
Martin circulates a Notice of Proposed Rule Making (NPRM) on product
placement and product integration among FCC Commissioners.
September 20,
2007 – Writer’s Guild of
America President Patric Verrone testifies to the FCC on product
integration. He warns that there is a “huge problem” with integrated
marketing: integrity. He proposes that the FCC require a “crawl” at the
bottom of the screen during paid placements to alert viewers that they
are “being sold.”
September 26,
2007 –
In a three-page letter, Congressmen Edward Markey and Henry
Waxman commend the Chairman for initiating the
NPRM and urge prompt adoption of the measure. The Congressmen state
that without adequate disclosure, the practice is “unfair and
deceptive.”
December 11,
2007 – Item #5 on the FCC’s
Agenda for the December 18th meeting reads: “The Commission will
consider a Notice of Proposed Rulemaking seeking comment on trends in
embedded advertising and the efficacy of the current sponsorship
identification rules with regard to embedded advertising.”
December 14,
2007 – The American
Association of Advertising Agencies (AAAA), the American Advertising
Federation (AAF) and the Association of National Advertisers (ANA) write
to Chairman Martin requesting a downgrade from a NPRM to a Notice of
Inquiry (NOI), a purely investigative procedure that cannot lead to
rulemaking.
December 18,
2007 – Product placement is
removed from the FCC agenda.
January 17,
2008 – The advertisers write
Martin again, reiterating their request for an NOI. The advertisers
state: “Our member companies, along with others in the industry, stand
to be immediately affected by proposed changes to the sponsorship
identification rules.”
June 19, 2008
–
Twenty-three advocacy groups
urged the FCC to immediately
adopt a NPRM on product placement and integration.
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