Flap Over 'Atlantic' Scientology Advertorial Shows Perils Of Native Ads

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"We screwed up," said The Atlantic, explaining that it had pulled an advertorial sponsored by the Church of Scientology from its website: "We now realize that as we explored new forms of digital advertising, we failed to update the policies that must govern the decisions we make along the way."

The brouhaha showed that publishers can sail into uncharted waters with native advertising. The Atlantic garnered a wave of negative Web attention for reportedly not marking the piece more clearly as an ad (it even had a comments section -- and as at least one commenter noted, when have ads ever solicited comments?), but also for not "ensuring that these ads actually reflect what readers are actually interested in," writes Jared Keller.  Or as one commenter puts it: "If the company or organization that wants to advertise is despised by your audience, perhaps you should just say no."

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1 comment on "Flap Over 'Atlantic' Scientology Advertorial Shows Perils Of Native Ads".

1. Paula Lynn from Who Else Unlimited
   

   commented on: January 25, 2013 at 3:48 p.m.
   Bad publishing decision which the publisher needs to take responsibility since he/she didn't bother to do their homework about this. The publisher and gang need to be required to be re-educated about these activities or find another source of income in a different profession where paying attention to his job is not important.

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