Advertising

A new TV ad is running in Utah, criticizing government-run internet providers. The ads are part of a $1 million blitz to warn about problems associated with municipal internet systems, including high costs and a lack of regulatory oversight. The Domestic Policy Caucus is running them under the name NoGovInternet.com. The campaign makes the argument that government should not be involved in providing internet access.

A bitter battle is taking place between Big Tech and the free press over how to share in the income that news content generates for technology giants. The future of our news ecosystem, a linchpin of democracy, depends on the outcome. Platforms gained their audience in part by sharing news content free.

Charter will comply with a series of recommendations made by The National Advertising Division (NAD) of Better Business Bureau (BBB) National Programs about certain claims the company has made about T-Mobile fixed wireless offerings, known as T-Mobile 5G Home Internet and T-Mobile Internet Lite. NAD recommends that Charter discontinue claims made in the “Game Time” and "Move Out" commercials, which suggest that T-Mobile Home Internet services provide “spotty,” “glitchy,” and unusable service, and that T-Mobile Home Internet is too slow for five people to use simultaneously.

Mass Priorities is the group calling on local governments to prioritize improvements in water quality, education, and bridge infrastructure over investments in government-owned broadband networks. It is making its message known with a half-million-dollar, three-month advertising barrage, which kicked off on October 31. What is not clear, though, is where the freshly launched group got its money. The Mass Priorities website says that it is a project of the Domestic Policy Caucus, which Policy Director Christopher Thrasher confirmed.

My perception of internet service providers (ISPs) and cellular advertising is that companies push the envelope more every year in trying to make claims that can give them a marketing edge over the competition. What’s funny about many ads is that carriers try to differentiate themselves from their competitors, even though their peers are delivering essentially the same product to the market. The competition between cable companies and fiber overbuilders, however, is not based on equivalence.

NTCA–The Rural Broadband Association launched its new “Broadband Built to Last” ad campaign, which aims to educate policymakers and the public on the critical role the Universal Service Fund plays in getting and keeping rural consumers connected to high quality, affordable broadband service. 

Cox Communications is being pressed to change or alter its "powered by fiber" ad claims to "clearly and conspicuously disclose" that its cable broadband service is not offered with fiber-to-the-home (FTTH) technologies. The National Advertising Division (NAD) made the recommendation following a challenge raised by AT&T, a Cox competitor that is expanding and upgrading a portion of its footprint to fiber. In its assessment, the NAD noted that Cox's cable broadband service delivers service over fiber to the node, where it's then transitioned to coaxial line

The former head of search at Google told colleagues in February 2019 that his team was “getting too involved with ads for the good of the product and company,” according to emails shown at the Justice Department’s landmark antitrust trial against the company. Google maintains a firewall between its ads and search teams so that its engineers can innovate on Google’s search engine, unsullied by the influence of the team whose goal is to maximize advertising revenue.

The major online platforms are breaking up with news. Some executives of the largest tech companies, like Adam Mosseri at Instagram, have said in no uncertain terms that hosting news on their sites can often be more trouble than it is worth because it generates polarized debates. Others, like Elon Musk, the owner of X, have expressed disdain for the mainstream press. Publishers seem resigned to the idea that traffic from the big tech companies will not return to what it once was.

Some of the nation's top cable operators have begun to ramp up promotions focused on smartphone subsidies. These cable-led promotions mark a shift in the dynamics of the US mobile market, according to MoffettNathanson. Analyst Craig Moffett said this new wave of mobile promotional offers from operators such as Comcast, Charter, and Cox illustrates that they're indeed needed in today's competitive market. "Cable's emergence as a promotional discounter was entirely predictable, notwithstanding their early protests to the contrary," Moffett explained. However, he tempered predictions on how we