To think Mumsnet doesn't hate Instagram influencers?

[jamoncrumpets]

And for prominent influencers who I will not name here for fear of them kicking off and getting the thread pulled to even hint that this might be the case is irresponsible on their part?

SO much gets discussed on MN every day. So much gets criticised. Social media influencers are a new and intriguing phenomenon - why wouldn't they be discussed here? For better or worse?

Many people have supported influencers for the way they earn money. That gets ignored. Many have politely criticised and pointed out ways it could be more ethical. This gets ignored. One or two have made comments that are personal or cross the line, these have been pounced on and discussed publicly.

The 'arguments' die down. People stop caring. Then prominent influencers go and start the whole thing up again.

Blaming MN is just lazy and irresponsible.

Like my year 8 writing in green pen if I've said ‘don’t use purple pen’ but haven’t specifically said ‘use blue or black’. Maybe the hapless father act isn’t such an act if that’s the level of emotional maturity he’s working with.

You just know what a crashing bore FoD would be in real life. All the over-scripted, rehearsed vignettes of family life smack of trying oh so hard, and failing, to be authentic. Not sure why but he always reminds me of Dave Lee Travis - the hairy cornflake. There truly is nothing more cringe-able than actually believing you are someone. You're not.

The penny farthing day out is clearly marked with an ad hashtag.

At least he's saying it's an ad. Still so many of them who don't. I guess it's no different from 'paid for advertorial' written in the smallest of prints under an advertising piece that's made to look like normal editorial in a paper/magazine. We might be asking a bit much to expect them to go all out bold when other advertising mediums don't have to be so obvious.

Oh hi Cady, you heard the FOD klaxon then!

There were loads of other places he could have put that hash tag in that story where it would have been much more obvious.

What a chump. There's another blogger who has been mentioned on the threads recently (and is obviously still steaming about it because she wrote a blog about it) who has a saved story of shopping buys. Every single one is an affiliate link with a #aff in white writing - it's like hunt the hashtag as the white #aff is moved into a different position on each page and gets written in progressively smaller font on each page until it almost shrinks out of view. If that's how you make your money, just own it fgs.

Although I can't say I'm that bothered about the ad thing, given at least he is marking it. I'm still cringing from the supermarket stories tbh.

Moonkissed - I've been on the read recently, haven't been off just until FOD so bit of a bizarre remark.
The picture of the penny farthing day out in the squares clearly has an ad hashtag, that's all I was saying. You really can't miss it.

I missed it until it was mentioned. Why not put it in the same writing as the other hashtag? It is obviously done in white to make it less prominent. How can anyone argue otherwise?

At least it is marked on the actual grid post though, I can now see. I just find it interesting how some bloggers embrace transparency and own what they do and how they make a living, and some are obviously a lot more reluctant about it.

Surely FOD has peaked in his popularity and it's only downhill from here?

Cady when I posted the grid post hadn't been posted. All day he's done stories, NONE of which were marked as ad until the last one which was trying to be hidden.

He can’t retrospectively mark his stories from earlier today with ad, Cady.

I was horrified at his daughter standing up in the mov ing trolley, there was a news story about a similar thing and the trolley toppled over and the child suffered a broken neck. It also could have hit a shopper walking around the corner. It is just so inconsiderate and not what a parent should be encouraging in a public place at all.

It's so true about how if that was a different 'class' of family doing that shit in the supermarket, they wouldn't get away with it.

Also, FOD's awful metaphors: are they ironic? I don't really follow him that closely so I don't know if they are supposed to be a self deprecating in joke thing about how he isn't a very good writer?

The hidden text on stories, in the same swirly font color so small it's practically unreadable is definitely the next thing that needs to change. The #ad and #gifted message got through, the declaring of affiliate links is getting through (although #aff is lazy, just type out affiliate link, it's not that hard) but this trend of hiding the text is shady and deceptive. They're making a conscious choice to select the color, size and specific placement of the text, it's not an accident.

Must admit I wouldn't know #aff was short for affiliate link if I saw it anywhere. If anyone has affiliate links it's supposed to make clear in some way, just saying #aff wouldn't be.

@CadyHeron They probably tell themselves that if #ad is ok for advert/advertisement then #aff is ok for affiliate link. But the difference is that the word "ad" is understood in this context as an abbreviation in its own right but the word "aff" doesn't mean anything so it's not being clearly labelled. I'm sure at one point some of them were just using (g) for gifted but I think that got shot down pretty quickly.

Question, as it's unclear on a mobile. When making an ASA complain which drop down category is most relevant? I can't make out all the text. Hoping someone else has successfully lodged a complaint before and can tell me!

@CadyHeron - this is the story (10th story of this day out) which is the only one to feature the #ad. I missed it when I watched first - can you spot it hidden in there?

I'd be interested to know what FODs engagement numbers are like on stories vs. his main grid. Imagine a 10 "page" ad put out over stories is incredibly lucrative vs. one one square on the feed.

FOD isn't the worst offender, by far. The ASA need to issue clearer guidance though on how an advert is declared as such.

Meanwhile the M family have been on a 2 week holiday, sponsored by Neilson (we can only assume given the heavy promotion of them and their ongoing relationship with the company - they took over the Neilson insta feed at least one day) and not used ANY ad/sponsored/paid partnership hashtags that I've seen.

I agree, 5oclock, #aff is as meaningless as (g) and just smacks of reluctance to actually be clear with your followers. Interested to see what ASAs view on disclosures written in invisible ink is 🤔

Going to try and catch up

Does anyone know what these "Neon Mum Life Coaches" are that some instagrammers now say they are? Disappointingly, it seems to be mostly people who are flogging unregulated and non evidence based mental health or "mama" type paraphernalia. I'm surprised Neom are aligning themselves with that

Beauty box I used ‘ online display ads.‘
Went through ok as had emails back informing me they are investigating my complaint.
It‘s the only way to stop this crap from the most arrogant instahawkers

Most of them probably can't spell affiliate, their spelling is often horrendous (sorry, cheap shot). But true...