Press Council handled a complaint concerning VG Partner Studios online article “A Norwegian tsunami.”
The case deals with raskatastrofen in Tafjord in 1934, and is made in collaboration between VG Partner Studio and Nordisk Film Egmont . The latter is the distributor of the hit movie “The wave”, which deals with a fictional raskatastrofe on the West Coast.
Sponsored Content
The case is funded by Nordisk Film, and made by an external company. At the end of the article refer to the movie “The wave” and linked to the purchase of movie tickets.
Paid or sponsored content is and Consumer Gry Nergård says NRK that she fears that sponsored content in the media can be a democratic problem.
The big question for PFU in this specific case was whether it is marked clearly enough for readers that the sponsored case is not standard editorial content, produced by VG journalists.
The petitioner, who is a regular reader, believes the matter differs too little from other matters (see fact box on Code of Ethics 2.6).
Read the full complaint here.
Getting criticism
Secretariat PFU set that VG has behaved reprehensible. A majority of the committee agreed with this, while two of the representatives believe this is one of rigorous assessment.
Criticism from PFU is a mild form of cast else, and it means that editors should publish the Committee’s statement.
Thus, VG field for the second time this year for lack of clarity surrounding the commercial linkages.
committee Henrik Syse says he in such matters rather be too strict than too kind, and believes that it should set clear requirements for labeling so that readers should not have to be in doubt.
He believes that VG should mark clearer, in that top banner – which shows that the issue is sponsored content in cooperation with Nordisk Film – should follow when scroll down in the case. In this way the reader will recall that the content is sponsored.
Committee members Alexandra Beverfjord (NRK) and Tone Jensen (Forward) also believe that labeling could be clearer, but that it was not sufficient for violations of the press en ethical rules. The two shall prepare formulations come in a minority opinion.
Pioneering work
chief editor Torry Pedersen in VG say it is not so interesting that the newspaper was fouled. Photo: Roald, Berit / NTB scanpix
VG chief editor Torry Pedersen says to NRK that the debate adopted the complexity of presentation of paid content, and emphasizes that this is a pioneering work.
– I think we were within the safe but agree in that some things could have been done better from our side, says Pedersen, and emphasizes Syse suggestions as well.
– Hopefully this helps us to adopt this kind of paid communication in Norway, while safeguard the journalistic integrity, he said.
– But it was cast else …?
– It is not so interesting. Fundamental debates that raise the level of knowledge and draws up guidelines is more interesting. Most PFU concerned with is trivial issues, which simultaneously refutation. This is something completely different, and when to do pioneering work, you find yourself on a knife edge, says Pedersen.
In the same PFU meeting were TV2 fields and VG acquitted of two different complaints about the mention of tippetip, Printer Medier24.com.
No comments:
Post a Comment