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blackuigryphonvr · 4 years

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#PokemonGo #Niantic #Wayfarer #Abuse #CyberBullying I’m currently suspending ALL of my nominations for PokéStops in South Field, and my local area due to a pattern of very bad abusive behaviors collectively done towards me from a group of local individuals whom I’ve actually never ever done anything, but are trashing me behind my back.

I DO NOT APPRECIATE players ganging up on my nominations and ABUSING Niantic’s system to accuse me of being a Nazi and committing a crime! How dare u! It’s like I’m having my own version of the Warren/Sanders back-stab!

WHO in their right mind would ACTUALLY BELIEVE that I’m a Nazi?! WHO would ACTUALLY believe that I would ABUSE Niantic’s system to harm others in my community?

This has been a constant pattern of behaviors of a number of things dating back to June, and this confirms a lot of things I was already catching onto, and suspecting. This also strongly confirms my #1 suspect, and I already suspect up to 9 other persons as well as alt accounts.

Do u have any idea how much research I put into this spot since 2018? I didn’t just pull this out of my ass. It’s not only historical but prehistoric. There is NOTHING DIFFERENT about THIS SUBMISSION than all of my others that went through.

But I’ve noticed that whenever I publicly divulge where and when I’m submitting nominations and mention it publicly on social media, or the local Discord thread, those locations get rejected for reasons that make no sense at all.... but, the ones that did make it through were ones I never told anyone I was doing.

Before Wayfarer even went live, I had reservations about sharing my intel, which I’d been gathering since 2018 hoping to turn into a PokéStop eventually... but, I decided it was better to let go of it, so that others could do it. I gladly, And freely gave out my details, added info to Google & Yelp and even went to long lengths of so much research to share which maps to check, which historical archives to use.

I noticed that much of the ones I openly shared with others often got stupid reasons for rejections. So, we had to come up with better methods to submit nominations with less room for potential rejections like having cultural n historical information or good photography exposures. But, when they didn’t tell others they resubmitted, it got accepted.

Also, I was very vocal about my plans and wishes for which locations I’d been scouting out the best locations for Community Days, especially Public Parks! As a Mom I care about a safe place to play, free parking, and safe access.

I recall feeding my intel to others, publicly, and being told by a head person (whom I trust) that my info was being shared with someone whom wanted to do those locations. Specifically, South Field And Stella Tirrell Park.

I wanted those spots to become high quality places to play Community Day, but I HAD A STRONG INKLING that these places could become a PokéGym since there was an older PokéStop there. I told people this. Yet, no one bothered. Months blew by, and nothing...

Well, I finally hit Level 40 at the end of 2019 so I hustled to get my submissions done. It took days for me to plan out which ones I wanted, and which ones would be more likely than others to go through. But my Stella Tirrell submissions were screwed. I thought it was very strange.... but I still had 1 that go frozen in the cue. That one didn’t even go into voting until last week. And because no one was actively trying to screw me, it went through and now Stella Tirrell has a PokéGym.

But, also, I turned the Jet into a PokéGym in South Field. I did the work. And it paid off.

But I never told anyone that I was doing those.

Well, someone assumed it was another player. So I asked who they thought did it.... and THAT was the person at the top of my list as a suspect. This person also is very well liked and many people believe this person to be a nice person.... I know this because I also fell for the “nice guy” act until their behavior shifted by June. This person was also the very first local player I ever met at a Raid, and used to say hi to me driving around at night in places I was playing the game. This person has been so overtly passive aggressive towards me, and also tries to play it off at other times like it’s fine. But the cold shoulder treatment is so overt when they show up to Raids. Acting nonchalant but also actually repulsed by me, or that I don’t exist. Or: sure! I’ll help you.... sorry, I have to leave. Over and over!

Well, after mentioning a number of things recently ( if u scroll through my posts) u can see what I had to say about my recent successes getting 2 new PokeGyms myself that were MAJOR. Stella Tirrell and South Field. Any of these local players could’ve submitted any of those nominations but never bothered to BECAUSE the intel came from me.

So, when that nomination FINALLY wet into the VOTING on Thursday Night, by the morning it was screwed.

When I checked the email and saw the reasons why, I WAS FLOORED!

This was NOT just some instance of a lazy person reviewing and just picking any reason. It says “the Niantic Community of Players” decided this.

Think about that.

Multiple people went looking to find ANYTHING matching the locations where they knew I wanted PokéStops and meticulously went through ALL of the rejection reasons and SPECIFICALLY picked to accuse me of committing a crime!

Not claiming my photos were bad.

No. They accused me of abusing Niantic’s system to commit a crime to harm people in my community.

Well, I let others know in my community, and on social media.

I find it to be very strange than within a few hours a different PokéStop nomination went through in South Field. It’s just so strange!

Dude! Just play fair!

Even if I didn’t like someone, Or didn’t approve of them, I WOULD NEVER EVER ABUSE NIANTIC’S system to hurt Another player, or try to destroy their credibility to submit a PokéStop nomination. I would NEVER stoop so low as to lower my self worth enough to be THAT MALICIOUS! I have self respect. And a person that has self respect is respectful to others, and treats others with dignity.

I also wouldn’t go out of my way to try and kick people out of the game, or stop them from ever playing the game again, or stop having access to the Discord server.

There’s definitely been some very bad things done to me that qualify as bullying. I don’t like it. But, I don’t want to kick them out of the game permanently, or have them banned from the Discord server. I’m not evil like u are. I also know that some of these people are kids. But, it’s pretty messed up when it’s adult men. U literally shame yourselves.

Just because I’m getting old, don’t have my own car, am jobless & live in poverty, and I can’t memorize every name of every single Pokémon ever, or can’t memorize every single PVP Combo or Raid Couter doesn’t mean I’m stupid. I’m not a male player, and I can’t change my gender because I’m a woman -an aging woman! I’m not young. I’m not sexy. And u hate me for some unknown reason. But u really need to check YOURSELF !

This was TOO FAR!

There was NOTHING wrong with my nomination. I looked up so much information about South Field Naval Airbase from multiple sources. I have read through so much archival data. I’m so much more informed about this area than anyone else. But anyone could do this if they just bothered to! Like, JUST READ! I’ve been working on this since 2018! It mattered to me. But also, other people were HAPPY and THANKFUL for the work I did. But I can’t write an encyclopedia as a nomination.

I did a Good thing.

Nobody likes BAD DEEDS nor those whom do them.

If u think that those of u whom all actively decided to attack me using Niantic’s system are people that u could trust, or whether they trust u, think again. They will ALWAYS remember that u all got together to attack my reputation, and it will always be in the back of their mind. Eventually, someone will always either screw u, or it will backfire in some way. Their is no honor among criminals, thieves, gangsters. If they can do it together with you against me, what makes u think at some point they might not do it to you the moment it suits them? Or, they will always assume u did these kinds of things.

Just don’t do it.

You know it’s wrong.

Just stop it, and move on.

You really need to think about what kind of person you really are, what your values are, and what kind of person you are vs what kind of person you SHOULD be.

If u have been putting up a front of who u want people to think u are, and I know you are, then u need to get to the root of why that is.

#niantic wayfarer #wayfarer #pokemon go #bullying #cyberbullying #abuse

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salavante · 5 years

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Aesop 29 or the Helmsman

(I’ve drawn his floating head a lot, so here’s him with his hood up, which I draw less) Also formal apology because I think like maybe no more than four people who follow me play Destiny, so a couple things may sound a little esoteric. I’d suggest checking out the Ishtar Collective (links to offsite) if I refer to something unfamiliar.

Full Name: Aesop-29

Gender and Sexuality: Male and Homosexual.

Pronouns: He/Him.

Ethnicity/Species: Exo, from the little crop of Destiny fancharacters that I have.

Birthplace and Birthdate: Unknown factor. But Aesop was found by his Ghost in the middle of nowhere, in a southwestern state that I have not chosen yet. Arizona, Texas, Colorado and Southern California are all candidates. Aesop has just a little bit of a Texan accent.

Guilty Pleasures: Aesop is trying to learn how to play guitar and is really bad at it, making him very shy and nervous about his attempts. Similarly, Aesop enjoys singing, but usually does it when no one else is around - because no one else has really heard him sing before, it is a well kept secret between him and his Ghost that he’s actually pretty good. I personally like to keep the list of music that he likes to the 50’s-60’s bracket to match the kind of retrofuturistic style that the Golden Age tech in Destiny has. We the viewer read it as being ‘old’, even if it’s much, MUCH older than we realize because the setting is far future. That’s really all that matters, that we recognize it as being antiquated. His favorite of the very small pool of albums he has access to are Marty Robbins’ “Gunfighter Ballads and Trail Songs” and Nancy Sinatra’s “Boots” and “Sugar”. Sojourn teases him about it and has thusly introduced him to the feeling of shame. He also likes drinking alcohol even if it doesn’t actually make him drunk. Sometimes he does it out of spite. Someone you don’t like? Pound his drink right in front of him and walk away.

Phobias: Aesop’s kinda agoraphobic - he feels trapped and panicked in enclosed areas with lots of people, can be overstimulated by large groups of people talking/making a lot of noise. This makes him mostly useless in large-scale conflicts. He has managed to curb some of this by being accompanied by Sojourn or Calico to areas or situations that are high risk (whether that means a combat scenario or just going to The City), but this can get squirrely because Calico doesn’t have a ghost anymore and if killed would die permanently, and Sojourn has a tendency to get worked up in a fight and leave him behind on accident. If everything goes well though, Aesop is perfectly functional fighting in the small group that is his fireteam - himself, Sojourn (exo warlock) and King (human titan). His ghost, Chanticleer, can also sometimes talk him down if he’s starting to spin up into a panic attack. It’s something that he wants to fix, but, existing within the confines of your anxiety is a cold comfort that he indulges in. In general, he’s a very anxious person with a lot of existential dread, but he puts on a clownish, brazen act and hopes people don’t notice.

What They Would Be Famous For: Honestly, probably something very mundane, like breaking a dopey Guinness-style record or something like that. The entire point of Aesop is that he is very average in his skills in a world of blisteringly powerful space wizards and the like. I find his challenges are more about what goals he sets for himself and if those goals conflict with the status quo. Does his worth need be defined by how good he is at killing things vs. is the pursuit of personal wellness and happiness selfish in the context of a world fighting for its survival. Can these things coexist. etc.

What They Would Get Arrested For: Probably something relatively benign done for the sake of pulling a dangerous stunt in the name of fun or looking cool. If he was a regular ass human in a normal modern setting, probably taking a nice vintage car for a joyride.

OC You Ship Them With: Aesop will have a love interest in the comic canon, but I’m gonna keep that under my hat for awhile yet. It’s not Cayde though, Cayde is dad. If Amanda Holliday was a man, he’d be utterly and entirely in love, but, alas. He’s still infatuated with her platonically though, and thinks she has pretty much the coolest job in the world. A promise of visiting her is a good way to entice him into going to The City.

OC Most Likely To Murder Them: When death is not a factor, this becomes less of an issue, hah. Aesop and his bff Sojourn have killed each other a number of times in training, to an almost nonchalant degree. Aesop has also been killed much more in training, by his fireteam’s resident titan, King. Aesop will also find a rival in a local Fallen pike gang, the leader of which has the placeholder name of Easy Rider. I also have a Cabal villain I am throwing around and trying to decide if they’ll stick, but I need to do a lot more work and research on that. They’re my least favorite enemy type mechanically, but I think they could make perfectly acceptable antagonists in a narrative.

Favorite Movie/Book Genre: Aesop does not read. He can, he just doesn’t. I think maybe, MAYBE, someone could get him to read comic books, but those aren’t very sturdy and I feel like the amount of intact physical copies at this point would be almost nothing. The pool of movies and media that he has available to him are very sparse, but he absolutely drowns himself in spaghetti westerns, and would probably also like trashy action movies if they were available to him. I also think he would like Grease, HAHA. It has cars and guys in leather jackets singing in it. He’d also probably like any kind of rustic, western themed musical. And anything with cars in it would have his immediate interest no matter how bad it is, but he’d zone out in any parts he doesn’t like.

Least Favorite Movie/Book Cliche: To be honest I think most of the time, movies are a little too long for him and lose his interest partway through. He has a really short attention span and anything too long, complicated or artsy will lose him and he’ll start being fidgety and chatty and start making his boredom everyone else’s problem. Even if there’s a movie he likes, if there’s a part that’s boring to him, he zones out. He probably watches the same 2-3 movies over and over again, which is fine because his available library of media is probably really small. I like to think that they probably have movies in some kind of archive that they put up publicly in The City every once in awhile, like they have a projector that puts it on the side of a building and people just bring chairs and shit. Aesop has an aforementioned fear of crowds but he probably does some hunter parkour bullshit and perches somewhere at a healthy distance to watch from afar, as long as it’s something he thinks he would like. If he doesn’t he gets up and leaves.

Talents and/or Powers: Aesop seems to have an interest in vehicles, but due to a bet with his mentor, Calico, he has not actually been taught how to drive a Sparrow and so pines for them from afar. As said, he’s learning how to play an instrument, and if we want to be technical, is a Gunslinger speced Hunter with the Golden Gun super. He is very bad at being stealthy, as he is very impatient and is also a little bigger than the average exo. He’s just kinda tall and wide and tends to clunk around. If his Ghost Chanticleer wasn’t as clever as she was, Aesop would probably be perma-dead by now.

Why Someone Might Love Them: He’s kind of a dumbass and a space cadet but has the potential to be very sweet, and the people he cares about, he latches on to really hard. Similarly, when set to a task he cares about, he does not quit. Unfortunately, many of his goals are unresolved, but it does not mean that he will stop trying. If he were to, say, become romantically interested in someone, he would go to great lengths to connect with him, even if it meant doing things Aesop himself may not like. In specific circumstances, Aesop may find that he has a great capacity for nurturing and bringing out the best in other people, a talent Aesop himself undervalues. Though he’s not all that intelligent, Aesop is very reflective and existentially inquisitive, and thinks about a lot of big picture stuff that other people might push aside in an era of crisis. Though he may not understand science or the way the world works in a mechanical sense, he is awed by it, and is a great appreciator of natural beauty. He’d cry at a particularly beautiful sunrise, if he could cry. I’d say he could be described as having a romantic soul.

Why Someone Might Hate Them: To be honest, Aesop has trouble establishing empathy with people he doesn’t know very well, and so is less invested in Earth’s plight than he probably should be (it would not be hard for Dead Orbit to sway him to their views). This makes some people think that he doesn’t take his charge seriously, and they also usually assume that he’s a slacker because he’s plateaued in his abilities so early. Really, Aesop is acutely socially anxious, can have panic attacks in large crowds, and generally prefers to stay away from The City unless he needs to go there, and so has a big emotional disconnect from it. Calico and Chanticleer have tried to get him more accustomed to groups, but has been thusfar mostly unsuccessful. His insecurity and anxiety also cause him to pull odd, dangerous stunts to prove his worth, making him unreliable and impulsive. He can bungle social interactions rather spectacularly, and is easily goaded into doing really stupid shit. Really, he is a person who may just be “too much” for some.

How They Change: Oooooghhh….I can’t talk about this. I forgot how frustrating it is to not be able to talk about things because you’re going to make a comic out of it. Suffice it to say he’s gonna change a lot.

Why You Love Them: I think Aesop encapsulates a lot of anxieties I have post-college. Aesop is a person in transition who is unsure of his future, knowing only that he can’t quit now, because quitting means failure and failure means death. Because he is in transition, he is anxious about forming relationships with people, worried that either he will be left behind by them, or that they won’t like him when he’s “finished” becoming a person. I think he has a complex relationship with his personhood and sense of self. I dunno, I think that’s an interesting anxiety for a protagonist to have. I am also interested to see what Aesop will end up contributing to his society/organization and his interpersonal relationships, and if he’ll be happy with it. I’ve put a lot of work into him, the ‘original Aesop’ I had in mind might as well be a completely different character now. Aesop was originally a little cameo that I did in our TTRPG game, Godslaughter, because my boyfriend had put a dunmer cameo character into our game and I wanted to return the favor. Then he made a sheet for him. Then I decided to keep him around, then I decided to play Destiny 2, then I decided I loved it, lol. There is still a version of Aesop in the TTRPG but he is so incredibly different, they may as well be different characters. We refer to him as “Bad Aesop” but should probably call him something more dignified (we won’t).

#solrika

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anthonykrierion · 6 years

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Facebook and Twitter now let you see anyone's ads: Here's what we found

What has changed

Both Facebook and Twitter have taken steps to let you see the ads any organization is running.

On June 28 Facebook announced that it is making key changes that allow any user to be able to view any ads that are currently active, for any page. Additionally, users can now see any changes that have been made to that page such as page creation date and changes to the page name. The official statement closes with the line “We’ll be adding more Page information in the coming weeks”.

Meanwhile, Twitter unveiled their Ads Transparency Center that was initially announced back in October. Again this gives users and marketers the ability to see any ads currently being run by any page. And while ad targeting isn’t displayed to users, Twitter is letting us see retweets and likes for any given post.

Why has this happened?

This is in response to increasing pressure being put on social networks to be more responsible for the ads served on their platform. One of the issues that drew particular attention to the issue was interference in the US presidential election by Russian companies using bots and adverts on Facebook and Twitter.

Where can you find this information?

For Facebook, just search for any page that you’d like to review, head down to the bottom of the vertical navigation in the left sidebar and you’ll see “Info and ads”. In the middle column of the page, you will now see all active ads for a page (we used our friends over at Moz for our example below). It is important to note that you can’t see historical or paused ads. By using the location drop down located just above the ads, we now have the ability to see which regions a page is targetting.

In some instances, you will see major brands appearing to run no ads at all. Take a look at Coca Cola’s Facebook page. It’s worth checking down in the bottom right, where Facebook is highlighting related pages that are running ad campaigns. To display the ads make sure you select a country from the dropdown menu once you’ve clicked through to the page.

To access this information over on Twitter, head to https://ads.twitter.com/transparency and use the Search advertisers function in the top right.

A good one to get you started is to search for “Facebook” where you’ll see they are currently running ads on Twitter. Weirdly, given the size of the Facebook advertising platform, we don’t see Twitter running ads over on Facebook.

What we found

With the excitement of being able to see ads that are currently live for major brands, political figures, charities and basically anyone, our consulting team couldn’t resist spending an hour digging around social media accounts. Here are some of the more interesting ones that we found:

Political

Our immediate attention was drawn to US politics, and a quick review of the primary accounts linked to Donald Trump. Despite a lack of paid sponsorship on Twitter (here and here), we found the dig into his Facebook page relatively interesting. While we get an insight to his campaign messaging, we would love to have targeting layered over the top of this and to be completely useful and interesting the ability to see past and archived ads.. Maybe this will come soon.

One feature that Facebook is now enforced in the US is political content now has to declare who has paid for the ad alongside archiving ads with political content.For our UK audience here’s what the two major parties have been up to: Labour have been running way more ads (or ad variations) than the Conservatives. As of writing the UK hasn’t implemented the same guidelines as the US yet regarding flagging who has sponsored the posts.

Conservatives Facebook & Twitter

Labour Facebook & Twitter

Technology

We found nothing massively surprising in this vertical. Apple is focusing their advertising heavily on the European and Asian market and during our quick poke around at present doesn’t seem to be running ads from their main Facebook page, instead relying on Twitter for their ads.

Google is currently focusing their ads on promoting their Google Assistant and leveraging celebrity influencers in the campaigns including David Walliams, John Boyega and Katrina Johnson Thompson.

Charities

The final vertical we took a quick peek at was charities. We reviewed two major UK charities MacMillan Cancer (they don’t appear to be running any Twitter ads) and Cancer Research UK (Facebook & Twitter). A few of our team have worked for charities before and have first-hand knowledge of how important paid advertising is. Nothing surprising here either as the main two charities leverage strong emotive storytelling within their awareness and fundraising campaigns.

Retail

Retailers

Each retailer has a different target market and brand image, and so our team found comparing their ads pretty interesting. There seems to be trend or retailers advertising more so on Facebook, probably do to the variety of ad type available compared to those on Twitter.

Topshop

Marks and Spencer

The North Face

Levis

Impacts this might have

Intended impact

The idea behind this change is that the public has more transparency about what adverts an account is putting out, supposedly as a way of giving us more insight into the motivations and tactics of a specific account. The additional information being shared about political advertisers is quite clearly a way to make it harder for them to hide their motivations. That doesn’t just apply to foreign interests, but also to genuine, recognized parties that might not want the general public to know what tactics they are employing.

A key difference between online advertising and advertising in other mediums is it can be a lot harder from the outside to track and prove what is going on, online, particularly as platforms like Facebook allow you to set a limit on how many times an individual will see your ad. A misleading billboard or TV ad can be called out but it can be harder to detect a deceptive or damaging social ad campaign.

This principle doesn’t just apply to political advertisers, while non-political advertisers won’t have the veil pulled back to quite the same extent, the ads and landing pages they are using will become publicly searchable and, as a result, an easier subject of critique.

What our consulting team thinks about these changes

Dominic Woodman - I don’t think this will matter in partisan advertising

For big brands, this is undoubtedly going to give people more accountability. Adidas can’t easily spin up a shell account/page to run Adidas adverts. Seeing it and clicking through to it will immediately raise questions.

Who owns this page? What’s with the questionable targeting/messaging? Oh look, most of the ads are for Adidas.

I’m not optimistic this will make a difference for political advertising however because accountability won’t work in the same way. Hyper-partisan pages which swing to one side or the other, like this defending the confederacy, I can’t imagine being shamed by having to show they’re targeting people with right-wing interests.

And if you were the Trump campaign and wanted to run a bunch of questionable ads and not be accountable? Just spin up a bunch of legitimate sounding political interest groups and have those run one ad at a time. It’ll be just as hard to monitor as it was in the previous election.

Facebook have talked about archiving political ads in their announcement, and while that will continue to shine a light on the unpleasant mess that is current political ads, people already know it (or they don’t care, and this won’t change their minds). The media has been pushing this line hard for months now.

Facebook is making moves to restrict the supply, rather than just monitor. They made an announcement back in April, about their move to restrict who is allowed to run political ads, but it definitely feels more targeted at curbing overseas influence than dealing with hyper-partisan ad targeting and even then the devil is in the details: what will count as an issue ad, how well will they identify people who don’t sign up for this process etc etc.

Currently, I’m still not super positive the changes will have much of an effect on political advertising, but if anyone involved in that industry is reading this, I’d love to hear your take on it. Comment me plz.

Emily Potter - A PR stunt with few real consequences

The social media giants are unquestionably under a lot of pressure to address the public and government bodies' concerns about lack of transparency in advertising and data collection, in addition to the role they have played in the spread of fake news. This new feature just feels to me like a bit of a PR stunt, rather than something adding anything of substantial value.

If Facebook and Twitter were providing the same level of information available on political advertisers for corporate advertising campaigns, then I’d be more inclined to feel something radical was happening. They’d never willingly do that though. These tools are the exact sort of thing that makes it look like they’re making big changes internally, without exposing controversial information that would truly change the landscape.

But more pressing than the public pressure Facebook, Twitter and the likes are under to demonstrate that they are working hard to address these problems, is the threat regulation places to their business models. They’re in an arms race to prove they can regulate themselves before government bodies impose strict regulations on them. Regulations that will inevitably constrict the growth they’ve seen over the past decade.

I’m in agreement that the “Wild West” era of technology and social media corporates is coming to a close, and these last-ditch efforts are not going to stop them from being confronted with the same sorts of regulations imposed on banks and other financial institutions following the 2008 financial crisis.

They’ll survive though. Regulation on financial institutions has increased, but they still find new and innovative ways to increase their profitability. Tech will be no different. But it will be interesting to see how it all shakes out.

Tim Allen - This creates a good opportunity for marketers to research competitors better

My immediate reaction to this news was positive. From an agency perspective and for anyone out there doing competitor research we are no longer locked into waiting to see ads to understand what our competitors are doing. I now have a wealth of new information and inspiration which can be applied to ads for both my clients and for Distilled.

The cynic in me feels that we either won’t have this tool very long, or it will quickly be abused, most likely the latter will cause the former to happen. But for now we should bask in the new insights we can get into our competitors and take the opportunity to look at what incredibly well-known brands, publishers and individuals are doing with their paid budget.

Robin Lord - This is one of the nice things I’m sure we can’t have

Facebook and Twitter are under a lot of pressure for ads on their platforms to be more accountable. As US Congress considers how to regulate the platforms, it’s understandable that the platforms want to show visible signs that they are breaking down barriers and letting us see how we’re being targeted politically or otherwise.

The problem is, the current climate is largely a response to people using the platform in unexpected ways. Facebook’s main defense during the Cambridge Analytica scandal was they didn’t realise the data was being used that way and - let’s be fair - not many accurately predicted the effectiveness of ad-based election interference.

There are some really nice aspects of these information centres, for instance, the Facebook active ad list tells you if the page name has been changed - which is some protection against pages getting approved for political ads, then changing its face regularly to send polarising ads in different directions. Opening up this data might allow for policing through transparency. However, it also offers a few opportunities for bad actors, a few that come to mind, from least problematic to most:

Reverse-engineering competitor conversion funnels by tracking adverts and landing pages

Scraping competitors ad copy to quickly generate competing ads

Creating a load of accounts to repeatedly report competitor ads (now those ads are much easier to find)

Grabbing competitors’ active social tracking codes and landing pages by following the ads, then using them to send realistic-looking fake traffic and conversions - more effectively throwing off their spend

Targeting the same demographics as a political party and sending more extreme versions of the same messages to polarise their supporter-base.

This might be a good way for the platforms to show willing but allowing unfettered access to this data may not be the clean fix it seems to be. Where we see a page that doesn’t seem to have any ads running - is that insight into a current lack of activity, or a sign that already some of the bigger brands in competitive industries have turned off ads until they can find a better way to cloak against competitors?

To paraphrase the Princess Bride - never go in against marketers when data is on the line.

What have you found?

As a community we are all naturally curious, so we encourage you to start scouring Facebook and Twitter and look for those interesting stories. When you find them feel free to give us a shout in the comments below or reach out to any of the contributors to this post over on Twitter (Robin Lord, Emily Potter, Dominic Woodman, Will Critchlow and Tim Allen)

Facebook and Twitter now let you see anyone's ads: Here's what we found was originally posted by Video And Blog Marketing

#Video And Blog Marketing

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