SAN FRANCISCO: Google is testing a way to tie online ads to brick-and-mortar store purchases, a move whetting marketing appetites while fueling privacy worries.
A product called “Google Attribution” was unveiled at a marketing conference this month in San Francisco by the Internet giant. Google has long been able to determine when users click on an ads and make a purchase, but linking online and offline habits takes its analytics a step further.
Google senior vice president Sridhar Ramaswamy, who announced that Attribution is in test mode with a limited number of partners and will be rolled out to more advertisers in coming weeks, touted the tool as being able to answer the long-challenging question of whether marketing campaigns are working.
“Google Attribution makes it possible for every marketer to measure the impact of their marketing across devices and across channels,” Ramaswamy said.
“Data-driven attribution uses machine learning to determine how much credit to assign to each step in the consumer journey — from the first time they engage with your brand for early research down to the final click before purchase.”
Real-world customer e-mail addresses or loyalty plan information can be woven with Google data from services such as AdWords, Google Analytics and DoubleClick Search to provide “a complete view” of marketing performance, according to the company.
Using artificial intelligence, or machine learning, to better analyze and understand consumer behavior to target ads and promote sales was a major theme of the conference.
For several years now, AdWords has enabled advertisers to measure visits to real-world stores stemming from online campaigns, Ramaswamy noted.
“Still, measuring store visits is just one part of the equation,” Ramaswamy said.
“You also need insights into how your online ads drive sales for your business.”
Real-world transactions matched back to Google ads are handed in “a secure and privacy-safe way,” with store sales information reported in aggregated and anonymized forms to protect individual privacy, according to the company.
Tying online activity to offline shopping decisions has been a “holy grail” for advertisers for quite some time, and comes with worrisome privacy implications, according to ACLU senior policy analyst Jay Stanley.
Attribution threatens to intrude on a core tenant of privacy, that people can have dealings with one party not spill over into affairs with other parties they interact with, Stanley contended.
“This is an evolution, not a revolution; another step toward increased monitoring of individuals,” Stanley said.
“Each step raises the question ‘Where does this all stop?’“
Stanley expected Google to be on its best behavior when it came to handling the growing trove of information about users, but that even the best of intentions could crack under the “enormous hydraulic pressure of the profit motive.”
“We have the full fury and genius of the capitalist system being driven toward monitoring people in ever increasing detail and companies are competing to do so,” Stanley said
“It will not stop without some sort of rules in which we as a society express our values through legal protections.”
Google and Facebook dominate the online ad world, and what one does to prove its worth to advertisers is likely to be copied by the other, according to Silicon Valley analyst Rob Enderle of Enderle Group.
Attribution promised to give Google a way to assure advertisers they are getting their money’s worth at the firm’s online venues.
“The big problem is that showing conversion from ad consumption to purchase has been horrible,” Enderle said of online marketing.
“This has been a problem for a long time. Google is trying to make a metric so they get credit for it when you do purchase after viewing an ad.”
Data showing which ads are translating into real sales should mean that the relevance of ads people see online will improve as marketers abandon mis-aimed or ineffectively tailored messages, the analyst reasoned.
“You are going to be hit with ads for things that you might actually want to buy, so you are going to spend a lot more money,” Enderle predicted.
Worries about privacy sparked by linking offline and online activities are a decade or so late, because the time to protest was when collection began of the troves of data about people, the analyst argued.
“There really is no downside to this application,” Enderle said while discussing Google’s marketing metrics move.
“This is the good side of collecting data; it is what else is being done with the data that should be unnerving and that we really don’t know.”
Google linking online and offline worlds in new ad challenge
Google linking online and offline worlds in new ad challenge
Police ban pro-Palestine march near BBC headquarters over ‘disruption’ concerns
- Planned Jan. 18 march was set to pass near a synagogue
- Organizers criticized decision, saying it ‘rejects the implication that our marches are somehow hostile to or a threat to Jewish people’
LONDON: UK police have banned a planned pro-Palestine march from taking place outside the BBC headquarters in London, citing concerns over potential “serious disruption” to a nearby synagogue.
The decision, announced on Friday, prevents the rally — originally scheduled for Saturday, Jan. 18 — from gathering in the area under the Public Order Act.
The Metropolitan Police said that it consulted with local community and business representatives, including members of the synagogue’s congregation located “very close” to the proposed starting point of the march, before making the decision.
The ban follows an earlier request by authorities for the Palestine Solidarity Campaign, or PSC, the march’s organizers, to amend their planned route to avoid disrupting worshippers at the synagogue on Shabbat, the Jewish holy day.
The PSC strongly criticized the move, stating: “The Palestine coalition rejects the implication that our marches are somehow hostile to or a threat to Jewish people.
“The Met police have acknowledged there has not been a single incident of any threat to a synagogue attached to any of the marches.”
In an open letter issued on Friday, more than 150 cross-party MPs, trade union leaders, writers, cultural figures and civil society organizations condemned the police’s actions, accusing them of “misusing public order powers to shield the BBC from democratic scrutiny.”
“The route for the march was confirmed with the Police nearly two months ago and, as agreed with them, was publicly announced on 30 November. This route, beginning at the BBC, has only been used twice in the last 15 months of demonstrations and not since February 2024,” the PSC said in its statement.
“With just over a week to go, the Metropolitan Police is reneging on the agreement and has stated its intention to prevent the protest from going ahead as planned.”
The rally was expected to begin outside the BBC’s headquarters before marching to Whitehall.
Organizers said that the demonstration was intended to protest about the “pro-Israel bias” that they claim dominates the broadcaster’s coverage.
’Real-world harm’ if Meta ends fact-checks, global network warns
- Mark Zuckerberg said earlier this week Meta will loosen content moderation policies in the US, citing bias and excessive censorship
- Announcement sparked international outcry, alarm amid fears of serious consequences
WASHINGTON: There will be “real-world harm” if Meta expands its decision to scrap fact-checking on Facebook and Instagram, a global network warned Thursday while disputing Mark Zuckerberg’s claim such moderation amounts to censorship.
Meta founder and CEO Mark Zuckerberg’s surprise announcement this week to slash content moderation policies in the United States has sparked alarm in countries such as Australia and Brazil.
The tech tycoon said fact-checkers were “too politically biased” and the program had led to “too much censorship.”
But the International Fact-Checking Network, which includes AFP among its dozens of member organizations globally, said the censorship claim was “false.”
“We want to set the record straight, both for today’s context and for the historical record,” said the network.
Facebook pays to use fact checks from around 80 organizations globally on the platform, as well as on WhatsApp and Instagram.
There could be devastating consequences if Meta broadens its policy shift beyond US borders, to programs covering more than 100 countries, the International Fact-Checking Network warned.
“Some of these countries are highly vulnerable to misinformation that spurs political instability, election interference, mob violence and even genocide,” the network said.
“If Meta decides to stop the program worldwide, it is almost certain to result in real-world harm in many places,” it added.
In Geneva Friday, the United Nations rights chief also insisted that regulating harmful content online “is not censorship.”
“Allowing hate speech and harmful content online has real world consequences. Regulating such content is not censorship,” Volker Turk said on X.
AFP currently works in 26 languages with Facebook’s fact-checking scheme.
In that program, content rated “false” is downgraded in news feeds so fewer people will see it and if someone tries to share that post, they are presented with an article explaining why it is misleading.
Supinya Klangnarong, co-founder of Thai fact-checking platform Cofact, said Meta’s decision could have concrete effects offline.
“Understandably this policy from Meta is aimed at US users, but we cannot be certain how it will affect other countries,” she told AFP.
“By allowing the proliferation of hate speech and racist dialogue could be a trigger toward violence.”
Cofact is not an accredited member of the International Fact-Checking Network or of Facebook’s fact-checking scheme.
Meta’s policy overhaul came less than two weeks before US President-elect Donald Trump takes office and it aligns with the Republican Party’s stance.
Trump has been a harsh critic of Meta and Zuckerberg for years, accusing the company of bias against him and threatening to retaliate against the tech billionaire once back in office.
Zuckerberg has been making efforts to reconcile with Trump since his election in November, meeting at his Mar-a-Lago resort in Florida and donating one million dollars to his inauguration fund.
The Meta chief also named Ultimate Fighting Championship (UFC) head Dana White, a close ally of Trump, to the company board.
Angie Drobnic Holan, director of the International Fact-Checking Network, said Tuesday the decision came after “extreme political pressure.”
The move “will hurt social media users who are looking for accurate, reliable information to make decisions about their everyday lives and interactions with friends and family.”
Australia said Meta’s decision was “a very damaging development,” while Brazil warned it was “bad for democracy.”
Meta’s move into fact-checking came in the wake of Trump’s shock election in 2016, which critics said was enabled by rampant disinformation on Facebook and interference by foreign actors, including Russia, on the platform.
Quaker group halts New York Times ads over ‘Gaza genocide’ language dispute
- American Friends Service Committee claims newspaper asked it to replace word ‘genocide’ with ‘war’
- Proposed ad urged US Congress to ‘stop arming Israel’s genocide in Gaza’
LONDON: An American Quaker group has paused its advertisements with the New York Times after the newspaper refused to allow the use of the term “genocide” to describe Israel’s actions in Gaza.
“The refusal of the New York Times to run paid digital ads that call for an end to Israel’s genocide in Gaza is an outrageous attempt to sidestep the truth,” said Joyce Ajlouny, general secretary of the American Friends Service Committee, a Quaker organization that advocates for peace.
“Palestinians and allies have been silenced and marginalized in the media for decades as these institutions choose silence over accountability. It is only by challenging this reality that we can hope to forge a path toward a more just and equitable world.”
The controversy arose after the AFSC submitted an ad with the text: “Tell Congress to stop arming Israel’s genocide in Gaza now! As a Quaker organization, we work for peace. Join us. Tell the president and Congress to stop the killing and starvation in Gaza.”
The New York Times’ advertising team reportedly requested that the AFSC replace the word “genocide” with “war.” When the AFSC refused, the newspaper’s ad acceptability team said that “differing views on the situation” required adherence to “factual accuracy and legal standards” to ensure compliance with its guidelines.
A spokesperson for the New York Times said in response to questions from The Guardian in the UK: “New York Times advertising works with parties submitting proposed ads to ensure they are in compliance with our acceptability guidelines.
“This instance was no different, and is entirely in line with the standards we apply to all ad submissions.”
However, the AFSC strongly criticized the decision, pointing out that many human rights organizations, legal scholars, and even the UN have described Israel’s actions in Gaza as genocide or genocidal acts.
“The suggestion that the New York Times couldn’t run an ad against Israel’s genocide in Gaza because there are ‘differing views’ is absurd,” said Layne Mullett, director of media relations for the AFSC.
“The New York Times advertises a wide variety of products and advocacy messages on which there are differing views. Why is it not acceptable to publicize the meticulously documented atrocities committed by Israel and paid for by the United States?”
The AFSC also pointed to The Washington Post’s recent decision to run an Amnesty International ad that also used the term genocide, questioning why the New York Times applied different standards.
The Quaker group has been involved in humanitarian work in Gaza since 1948 and currently operates in Gaza, Ramallah, and Jerusalem. Since October 2023, the AFSC’s staff in Gaza have provided 1.5 million meals, hygiene kits, and other essential aid to displaced individuals. The organization is also lobbying for a permanent ceasefire, full humanitarian access, the release of captives, and an end to US military funding for Israel.
According to The Guardian, the New York Times has previously run advertisements using the term genocide.
In 2016, it published an ad from the Armenian Educational Foundation thanking Kim Kardashian for opposing denial of the Armenian genocide. In 2008, presidential candidates Barack Obama, Hillary Clinton and John McCain co-signed a letter advertisement in the New York Times calling out the genocide in Sudan’s Darfur.
It also noted that while the New York Times reserves the right to reject ads it deems inaccurate or deceptive, its advertising guidelines state that “advertising space is open to all points of view” and submissions may be subject to fact-checking.
Conde Nast reshapes Arab fashion media with Vogue Arabia and GQ Middle East takeover
- Manuel Arnaut and Amine Jreissati will lead Vogue and GQ respectively
LONDON: Vogue Arabia and GQ Middle East have officially joined Conde Nast’s portfolio of owned operations in Dubai, the media conglomerate announced on Thursday.
The move marks a significant reshuffle in the Arab fashion media landscape, as Conde Nast takes over the licenses from previous publishers Nervora, which launched Vogue Arabia in 2016, and ITP Media, which introduced GQ Middle East in 2018.
As part of the transition, Lebanese fashion designer Amine Jreissati has been appointed head of editorial content for GQ Middle East. Portuguese journalist Manuel Arnaut, who faced criticism for his 2017 appointment to Vogue Arabia due to limited regional experience, will continue to lead the title under the new structure.
“We are fortunate that Manuel and Amine, two incredibly gifted and creative editors, will be leading our titles,” said Anna Wintour, Conde Nast’s chief content officer.
“Their taste, judgment and journalistic experience are a huge benefit and the way they have elevated the contributions of artists and designers in the Middle East to the global stage has been tremendous.”
The acquisition brings Vogue Arabia and GQ Middle East into the same portfolio as Architectural Digest Middle East and Conde Nast Traveller Middle East, both of which became fully owned and operated by Conde Nast in 2023.
Thomas Khoury, Conde Nast’s managing director for the Middle East, oversaw the transition of the two titles, further cementing the company’s commitment to the region’s growing influence in global fashion and media.
New Arab Journalism Award board formed
- Mona Ghanem Al-Marri will lead the board, Dr. Maitha Buhumaid to serve as secretary-general
- Arab News Editor-in-Chief Faisal J. Abbas selected as member
DUBAI: Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al-Maktoum, vice president and prime minister of the UAE and ruler of Dubai, on Thursday approved the newly restructured board of directors for the Arab Journalism Award. The board will be chaired by Mona Ghanem Al-Marri, vice president and managing director of the Dubai Media Council.
The revamped board includes prominent intellectuals, media leaders, and academics from across the Arab world, reflecting a commitment to fostering regional media excellence.
Al-Marri, a key figure in the UAE’s media landscape, is also president of the Dubai Press Club, making her one of the most influential voices in Arab media today.
Dr. Maitha Buhumaid, the Dubai Press Club’s current director, will serve as the award’s governing body’s secretary-general.
Also on the board is Ghassan Charbel, editor-in-chief of Asharq Al-Awsat; Ahmed Al-Muslimani, chairman of Egypt’s National Media Authority; Sultan Al-Nuaimi, author and director general of the Emirates Center for Strategic Studies and Research; and Arab News Editor-in-Chief Faisal J. Abbas.
The AJA is scheduled to be held in May, coinciding with the Arab Media Summit, the largest media thought leadership event in the Middle East, which will run from May 26-28 in Dubai.
