By Michael Liedtke, Technology Writer
SAN FRANCISCO (AP) --AT&T, Verizon and several other major advertisers are suspending their marketing campaigns on Google's YouTube site after discovering their brands have been appearing alongside videos promoting terrorism and other unsavory subjects.
The spreading boycott confronts Google with a challenge that threatens to cost it hundreds of millions of dollars.
YouTube's popularity stems from its massive and eclectic library of video, spanning everything from polished TV clips to raw diatribes posted by people bashing homosexuals.
But that diverse selection periodically allows ads to appear next to videos that marketers find distasteful, despite Google's efforts to prevent it from happening.
Google depends largely on automated programs to place ads in YouTube videos because the job is too much for humans to handle on their own. About 400 hours of video is now posted on YouTube each minute.
Earlier this week, Google vowed to step up its efforts to block ads on "hateful, offensive and derogatory" videos.
"We know that this is unacceptable to the advertisers and agencies who put their trust in us," Philipp Schindler, Google's chief business officer, wrote in a Tuesday blog post.
As part of Google's solution to the problem, Schindler promised to hire "significant numbers" of employees to review YouTube videos and flag them as inappropriate for ads. He also predicted YouTube would be able to address advertisers' concerns through Google's recent advancements in artificial intelligence — technology parlance for computers that learn to think like humans.
But that promise so far hasn't appeased AT&T, Verizon Communications and an expanding global list of advertisers that includes Volkswagen, Audi, HSBC Holdings, the Royal Bank of Scotland and L'Oreal.
"We are deeply concerned that our ads may have appeared alongside YouTube content promoting terrorism and hate," AT&T said in a statement. "Until Google can ensure this won't happen again, we are removing our ads from Google's non-search platforms."
By extending its ban to everything beyond Google's search results, AT&T is also effectively pulling its ads from more than two million other websites that depend on Google to deliver ads to their pages.
In its statement, Verizon said it decided to pull ads from YouTube to protect its website while it investigates the "weak links" among its digital advertising partners.
Both AT&T and Verizon may have an ulterior motive to make YouTube look like an untrustworthy spot for marketers because both companies are trying to sell more digital ads in their own networks.
YouTube has become one of the fastest growing parts of Google's ad system, which generated $79 billion in revenue last year. Google doesn't disclose how much of that came from YouTube ads, but the research firm eMarketer estimated that the video site accounted for $5.6 billion that amount. EMarketer projected YouTube's advertising will rise 26 percent this year to $7 billion, but that prediction came before marketers began to suspend their spending.
The YouTube boycott began late last week after an investigation by The Times in London revealed the ads of major brands were appearing in videos delving into contentious themes.
After 20 Years of Acting, Megan Park Finds Her Groove In The Director’s Chair On “My Old Ass”
Megan Park feels a little bad that her movie is making so many people cry. It's not just a single tear either — more like full body sobs.
She didn't set out to make a tearjerker with "My Old Ass," now streaming on Prime Video. She just wanted to tell a story about a young woman in conversation with her older self. The film is quite funny (the dialogue between 18-year-old and almost 40-year-old Elliott happens because of a mushroom trip that includes a Justin Bieber cover), but it packs an emotional punch, too.
Writing, Park said, is often her way of working through things. When she put pen to paper on "My Old Ass," she was a new mom and staying in her childhood bedroom during the pandemic. One night, she and her whole nuclear family slept under the same roof. She didn't know it then, but it would be the last time, and she started wondering what it would be like to have known that.
In the film, older Elliott ( Aubrey Plaza ) advises younger Elliott ( Maisy Stella ) to not be so eager to leave her provincial town, her younger brothers and her parents and to slow down and appreciate things as they are. She also tells her to stay away from a guy named Chad who she meets the next day and discovers that, unfortunately, he's quite cute.
At 38, Park is just getting started as a filmmaker. Her first, "The Fallout," in which Jenna Ortega plays a teen in the aftermath of a school shooting, had one of those pandemic releases that didn't even feel real. But it did get the attention of Margot Robbie 's production company LuckyChap Entertainment, who reached out to Park to see what other ideas she had brewing.
"They were very instrumental in encouraging me to go with it," Park said. "They're just really even-keeled, good people, which makes... Read More