Talk Morgan Forums Community The Malvern Arms Asvertising standards in the digital age

Wondering if any of the diversly employed members have any experience (or unsupported opinions 🙂) about the crap that appears on social media in the way of ever-increasing advertising.

Just taking facebook, a random scan gives you stuff to supercharge your gut and melt away your beer belly .... regain your lost or thinning hair ... boost your libido and weld two bits of 1/2" steel together in the wink of an eye (not all the same product or I'd have my order in already !! 😆)

So many of them are obviously untrue and based on wild faux-science.

Now, in the UK adverts have to be truthful and claims verifiably backed up.

Now, I know that the interwebby is an international space .... so, at what point does an advert punted at me in my living room in the UK, in English with a .co.uk contact fall under said legislation?

Purely idle curiosity as I'm slim as a blade, constantly mobbed by attractive women and can mostly weld in a passable manner! 🙂

K

Sorry no experience but those amazing welding and plasma type cutting tools for peanuts look amazing, any feedback welcome!

You can complain to the Advertising Standards Authority about adverts on the internet, I have done this. The ASA will assess the advertisement for breaches of its code. You'd need to inform them how the advertisement had misled you, so you'd probably need to purchase a product and demonstrate that it was not as advertised before making a complaint.

Ads on Facebook can be reported to Meta, but in my experience all that happens is a few days later you get a reply that the ad doesn't go against their community standards. I think that Facebook's "standards" should comply with UK legislation - in adverts and everything else - but sadly that isn't the case.

Taffmog ... yep, they look great ... however, I have a pal who is a professional welder who's business has a proper Lazer-welder ... hugely expensive, takes skill to use well and seriously dangerous to life and limb in the hands of a careless operative ... makes me strongly suspect the vids of perfect welds of 5mm plate in seconds on your kitchen table are well shy of reality.

Ian ... not looking to complain about anything specific as I operate on the 'if it looks too good to be true ........' adage so don't buy much 'wonder-stuff' off unknown sources ... just wondering about what point does stuff floating in the digiverse suddenly find itself facing rhe realities of national law .... seems like a lot of things these days from vaping on trains to racing electric scooters down the pavement ... finger wagging but no enforcement teeth.

Begs the question of how we regulate multi-jurisdictional entities who's (often powerful and disruptive) presence in a country is largely limited to un-seizable clouds of pixels and the jobs of a handful of your own citizens in a rented office. Our institutions are struggling to adapt and in the meantime our protective legislation is being rolled back by default.

K

There's a chap on YouTube who runs a channel called 'Proper DIY'. He ordered one of those welding guns to have a look at it, and it turned out to be a crappy little soldering gun that was absolute rubbish.

I agree with K, it would be nice to think that these people would fall under UK rules for false or misleading advertising, but as the content is hosted from overseas I can't see it happening. Just another example of the enshittification of the internet.

Safest course of action I guess is to simply not buy anything from Temu.

That's the issue, the UK rules apply but there is no way of enforcing them on a foreign based operation. In any case, even in the UK the ASA has few sanctions it can impose other than order the offender not to do it again.

As it happens, one of the most recent rulings is for a laser welder. The complaint upheld isn't about the functionality but gender stereotypes!

ASA Ruling on Wuxi Zhan'ao E-commerce Co Ltd

The ad featured on-screen text that stated, “Smart operation, even women can weld well. The built-in laser intelligent application system makes it easy for even novice operators to operate”. We considered that the statement “even women can weld well” implied that women were less skilled than men at performing mechanical tasks and that the laser welding tool was so easy to use, even women would be able to use it.

We concluded that the ad included a gender stereotype that was likely to cause harm or serious offence and therefore breached the Code.

Wuxi Zhan'ao E-commerce Co Ltd t/a Lpows.com did not respond to the ASA’s enquiries.

Action: The ad must not appear again in the form complained about.

Of course, Wuxi Zhan'ao will take no notice and the ASA can't do anything about it.

Ironic comment on our society .... the fact it's fraudulent and illegal gets ignored and someone with a focus on gender issues pulls it up 🙂

You often see the same item advertised under several different 'cover names' ....presumably any enforcement just gets lost in a forest of ever-changing 'responsible parties' that dissolve like smoke to be replaced with another header from a list of thousands they have just sat waiting ... like being able to change the shop sign at a click of a button and claim to be someone else.

K

I just bought a strimmer advetised on YouTube and it isn't at all what I expected. I emailed the given address on the ad 3 times and still haven't got a reply. They stated returns must be posted within 14 days of receipt. I also filled out an online form from the company asking for a refund but again, no reply. Zero customer service, the company is Couameder, based in China, so it looks like I'm stuck with the thing.

Bob I always buy stuff via PayPal, when things go wrong they sort it very quickly. If a company doesn't except Paypal I go elsewhere.

I actually bought it with PayPal. I tried contacting them but it was a form to fill out and my option wasn't there.
Thanks for the tip.
PS - If you have any ideas about getting in touch with PayPal, I'd be grateful. Cheers.