Advertisements Disguised as News Items

While skimming over the news on my PC, as is my wont, I came upon the page below from Yahoo! News. At first glance it appears to offer bite-size bits of articles with the option to click on them for the full story. But have a look at the third “article”. It is not a news piece at all, but an advertisement disguised to look like news.

That’s a wee bit sneaky.

I understand that advertising revenue is what makes the Internet, if not the world, go around. By all means place advertising on webpages, but please don’t try to slip them in as news. I realize that there is a small … very small, note indicating that this is a sponsored ad, and not news. But I think the Yahoo! News folks may have to rethink this as I believe more people will be put off than encouraged to follow the link.

As for the advertiser, Harry’s, do you really want to appear as a company that has to trick people?

DCMontreal – Deegan Charles Stubbs – is a Montreal writer born and raised who likes to establish balance and juxtapositions; a bit of this and a bit of that, a dash of Yin and a soupçon of Yang, some Peaks and an occasional Frean and maybe a bit of a sting in the tail! Please follow DC on Twitter @DCMontreal and on Facebook, and add him on Google+