On Thursday night, The World Federation of Advertisers decided to ‘discontinue’ the Global Alliance of Responsible Media – an advertiser-led cross-industry effort to remove harmful content from ad-supported digital media, in the interest of protecting consumers and safeguarding advertiser rights on supporting suitable media content. This came after threats of legal action from X, outlined by CEO Linda Yaccarino.
The news broke just two days after X filed an antitrust suit in a Texas court, which alleged that GARM’s members illegally colluded to “collectively withhold billions of dollars in advertising revenue” from X. GARM members Unilever, Mars, CVS, and Ørsted are also named defendants.
There are so many issues we need to look at here. It was only July when X recommitted to GARM and proudly proclaimed that “X is committed to the safety of our global town square and proud to be part of the GARM community!”
So, what happened in the last month?
Let’s leave aside the frankly ridiculous notion that you can sue advertisers into spending money with you.
It’s more important that we consider what the future holds and what comes next.
Commentators and industry figures such as Alex Tait and Claire Adkins have both suggested that this will actually harm ad revenues for X. We share this view and, speaking to our contacts within the media agency world, we know that very few clients want to be on X and, frankly, it rarely gets discussed as a viable brand safe media environment.
The events of recent days have only exacerbated the feeling that X has no control over content moderation nor really has any inclination to do so. Indeed, Elon Musk himself has had to be called out over reposting obviously fake material.
NDA is urging advertisers to stand strongly with the WFA in future legal action and to keep holding the tech platforms to account. We include all of the major players here. We urge the industry to stay true to the principles of GARM and keep fighting for a better and more responsible media
Yaccarino talks about the X being the ‘global town square’. For many, including ourselves, it may be time to leave town.
