"Mukbang" YouTubers face criticism for hiding paid advertisements

[waves-of-light.livejournal.com]

Famous "mukbang" YouTubers with millions of subscribers have come under fire for hiding the fact that they were being paid to advertise certain products.

Starting Tuesday, a number of YouTubers began issuing apologies admitting that they deliberately or "accidentally" failed to notify viewers about paid advertisements in their videos.

YouTuber "Eat with Boki", better known by her real name, Moon Bo-ki, uploaded an apology to her YouTube community, Tuesday. "I admit and apologize for not mentioning paid promotions in some of my videos." Moon has more than 4.6 million subscribers and hundreds of mukbang videos on her channel.

Tzuyang, another YouTuber with 2.67 million subscribers, uploaded a video Wednesday saying, "I am sorry that I did not fully inform viewers about commercial sponsorship, and promise to notify viewers of all advertisements from now on."

However, as internet users speculated that she could have been involved in tax evasion and fraud, Tzuyang announced plans to quit YouTube the next day.

This was followed by a statement from Yang Pang, an online content creator, who has more than 2.48 million subscribers. With an apology, she immediately added an "includes paid promotion" banner to 20 videos and deleted two from her channel.

Other popular mukbang YouTubers with more than a million subscribers such as Mbro, Fran and Hamzy have also admitted such promotional activities and apologized to subscribers.

But it seems that apologies are not enough for the disappointed subscribers who are expressing their anger through comments. Many have already unsubscribed.

One comment under Yang Pang's apology read, "I feel deceived that you have been lying to your fans. I will never watch your videos again."

The sudden confessions and apologies of YouTubers seem quite timely as the Fair Trade Commission (FTC) has recently announced revised advertising rules for social media, effective Sept. 1.

Under the new guidelines, YouTubers and social media influencers must disclose paid advertisements in an easily visible manner. Ambiguous phrases such as "Thanks to," and "In collaboration with" will be banned.

Lee Eun-hee, a professor of consumer science at Inha University told The Korea Times, "Hiding paid advertisements is obviously a violation of consumer rights. It is important to let the viewers know when they are watching a video based on advertisements."

Also, stricter penalties will be needed for content creators who violate the guidelines. "Other than losing subscribers, there should be more specific punishment measures in order to raise YouTubers' awareness," Lee said.







Omona, do you watch mukbangs? The only one I've really ever watched was Hamzy.




source: The Korea Times

Comments

[alterlife.livejournal.com]

I only watch Peggy Neo. She neva advertises and is always so awkward which is great because so am I

[myrrhcat.livejournal.com]

i like watching korean diet vlogs which often include mukbang elements, it's more fun to watch someone enjoy a small amount of food than shove down a whole bunch of it

i've also watched a few of cheap lazy vegan's mukbang vids, i love that she makes vegan korean food but she kind of... slips into a blaccent(?) a lot and it's rather offputting

[baekpedaling.livejournal.com]

I've really been into Hamzy lately because I like how she shows cooking or buying what she eats. I only just found of who Tzuyang is last month but only watch two of her videos. I've also watched a few of Boki's but I don't like how shs eats sometimes.

I understand people being upset but at the same time these bjs are eating way too much of sometimes really expensive food to be paying for it all out of pocket. Just throw up a "sponsored by" title card and be done with it. Or is even that not allowed?

[sweetestbliss1.livejournal.com]

I've watched a few of that tzuyang girl's videos and that's it. But damn, she quit YouTube? That's pretty intense. She must be in some deep shit

[wafflesnmilk.livejournal.com]

so allegedly for tzuyang in particular she did have undisclosed ads but only earlier on in her YT days and have apologised before and indicated ad where it applies on future video, people did however had a problem with her wording (supported by(x brand) vs paid to promote(x brand) ) which she said she just followed the fellow mukbangers' as a template kinda so it's not as severe as say eat with bokie if everything is to be taken at face value, her apology video has subs up now if you wanna peek!

also maybe because i'm kinda endeared by her being a semi-frequent watcher but I'd say the quitting probably really does have something to do with her not being able to handle the negative attention anymore because she had a bullying rumour controversy before too(that was debunked)

[broadcities.livejournal.com]

i don't watch mukbang videos but good that they've created stricter rules around paid ads in these types of content! i'm always really annoyed when people disclose paid promotions in an ambiguous way.

[wafflesnmilk.livejournal.com]

hongsound (a mukbang YTber) made a video covering the entire issue and while it's not conclusive, i think it's pretty informative haha, i wanted to make a post when this broke out a few days back(before tzuyang even announced she'd quit) but no english media even covered it yet dgfhsj

[pseudo-shigure.livejournal.com]

i dont watch mukbang and i dont understand how some people who's on diet said it helps them through it. like if anything it makes me want to eat even more lol

[imahurricane.livejournal.com]

i watch quite a lot of mukbang but i only subscribe to few cause most of them turn me off with the way they eat (messy/loud chew/don't look appetizing/etc). i didn't know that k-netz find non-disclosed paid ads really upsetting, is it the law there to mention that there's paid promo in their video or what...?

[cosmicdaze.livejournal.com]

at this point i just assume that everything influencers or youtubers post about is a paid advertisement because that's generally the case. i know for a while on instagram there was a big thing about posting the word 'ad' in captions but i feel like companies have found new ways around explicitly saying things are paid promo.