TECH
6:22 PM PDT 06/29/2020
by
Abid Rahman
Almost 250 companies have signed up for the #StopHateForProfit campaign that is pushing for the social media giant to tackle hate speech and disinformation on their platforms.
American corporate giants Ford, Pepsi and Microsoft are the latest front-line companies to join the growing advertising boycott of Facebook and its affiliate Instagram over their inability to deal with hate speech and misinformation on their platform.
“We are pausing all national advertising on social media over the next 30 days to reevaluate our presence on these platforms,” Ford said in a statement to Ad age. “The existence of content that includes hate speech, violence and racial injustice on social platforms needs to be eradicated. We are actively committed to industry initiatives led by the Association of National Advertisers to drive greater accountability, transparency, and reliable metrics to clean up the digital and social media ecosystem. “
Ad age reports that Ford has spent $ 2.9 million on Facebook advertising, year to date, but only $ 57,000 in the past 30 days, according to data analysis firm Pathmatics.
Fox Business reported that food and beverage conglomerate Pepsico, the parent company of Pepsi, Gatorade and Mountain Dew, had “quietly” joined the Facebook and Instagram boycott without an official announcement about a policy that will cause the company to suspend advertising. on social networks in July and August worldwide.
On Monday, it was revealed that tech giant Microsoft had suspended Facebook ads in May, long before organized boycotts were launched. Axios He reports that Microsoft’s pause in Facebook ads was a concern about where its ads are displayed, rather than Facebook’s policies, but that the company has recently extended that suspension globally.
On June 17, a group that included the Anti-Defamation League, NAACP, Sleeping Giants, Color of Change, Free Press, and Common Sense launched the #StopHateForProfit social media campaign that urged companies to suspend advertising on Facebook and their Instagram affiliate for The month of July.
Since the campaign launched, almost 250 companies have pledged to stop their advertising on Facebook, Instagram, and in some cases, Twitter and other social media platforms. Outdoor clothing firms Patagonia, The North Face and Arc’teryx, outdoor equipment company REI, tech companies Dashlane and Upwork were the first to say they will join the boycott. In the past week, Adidas, Starbucks, Diageo, Vans, Levi’s, Ben & Jerry’s, HP, Magnolia Pictures, Hershey’s, Blue Bottle Coffee, Pfizer, Mozilla, Verizon, Coca-Cola, Honda and Unilever are among the big names. joined the boycott.
Facebook has faced strong criticism, externally and internally, in recent months for the misinformation and racist content spread on its platform, and in particular the posts by President Donald Trump that have been widely condemned as dangerous or incite violence. The company’s CEO Mark Zuckerberg has been adamant that Facebook will not regulate online speech. “I firmly believe that Facebook should not be the arbiter of the truth of everything people say online,” Zuckerberg said in an interview with Fox News last month. “Private companies probably shouldn’t be, especially these platform companies, shouldn’t be in the position to do that.”
Last Friday, when the advertising boycott began to gain momentum, Facebook said it will mark all posts “newsworthy” by politicians and political groups that break its rules, including Trump’s, as well as a ban on posts that discourage voting. with false statements.
