Who´s responsibility is it?

by t97701103 Mon Mar 29, 2010 10:08 am

Is an advertiser responsible for not misleading consumers with their advertising? Or is it up to consumers to do proper research about a product or service in order to not be misled?

by ChienWei_Lee Mon Mar 29, 2010 10:27 am

I think the advertisers should take the responsibility because it is them providing the misleading info.
However, sometimes it is hard to difine what will mislead the consumers.
So, for a judge who has to define, he/she should have a commonsense as general consumers.

by Eva_Berends Mon Mar 29, 2010 11:29 am

I think this heavily depends on the kind of product. For example, when misleading could result in health problems (products as alcoholic drinks, sigarettes etc) the company should be responsible. However, as mentioned above, it could be hard to define what actually misleads the consumers. But since there will always be consumers who are unable to objectively judge advertisements (due to lack of intelligence or something) I think companies have to take responsibility.

by camille_girard Mon Mar 29, 2010 11:41 am

I also think that advertiser are responsible for misleading consumers especially when it talks about serious product as a loan, insurance, medicine, etc. If the advertiser is doing a customer's oriented approach, he would know that these kind of products are not really understand by consumers. Thus, advertiser know that they can take advantage of the situation to idealize its products even if it is not fair at all. Otherwise, I think governement is also responsabile because they didn't control the ads. I don't think consumers are really responsable for this because everybody don't have access to th me information (I think about old people for example)

by MH_Huang Mon Mar 29, 2010 12:38 pm

The key argument here is "misleading." If advertisers lie, then it is clear cut that it's wrong. Unfortunately, many unethical advertisers try to "frame" their messages in ways that mislead consumers without containing illegal contents.

by t97701103 Mon Mar 29, 2010 2:43 pm

However, as mentioned above, it could be hard to define what actually misleads the consumers. But since there will always be consumers who are unable to objectively judge advertisements (due to lack of intelligence or something) I think companies have to take responsibility.

I agree that it sometimes, as an advertiser, might be hard to know if you mislead people. I do however believe that there are a lot of obvious cases when advertisers for sure know that the content of an ad is misleading. If a consumer do get misled by such an ad, who´s fault is it, the consumer or the advertisers? In case a consumer gets misled due to a lack of intelligence I think you can hardly blame the advertiser can you? Who´s responsibility is it? Icon_smile

by camille_girard Mon Mar 29, 2010 3:43 pm

I disagree with you. I think you can blame the advertiser because it is not just question on people who are not intelligence. It also depends on old people who perhaps don't know how to use internet or people who don't have the same education as you have. When you talk about loan and banking's product, you know as an advertiser that people don't really understand what is it about. So on providing fuzzy information on the product in the ad you has unethic.

by t97701103 Mon Mar 29, 2010 3:49 pm

camille_girard wrote:I disagree with you. I think you can blame the advertiser because it is not just question on people who are not intelligence. It also depends on old people who perhaps don't know how to use internet or people who don't have the same education as you have. When you talk about loan and banking's product, you know as an advertiser that people don't really understand what is it about. So on providing fuzzy information on the product in the ad you has unethic.

Who do you disagree with and with what? If you quote the sentence you disagree with it will be easier to understand your point. Thanks.

by Eva_Berends Mon Mar 29, 2010 7:29 pm

I think she disagreed with you Who´s responsibility is it? Icon_clown

I also do, although I am in favour of taking responsibility for your own choices and actions. However companies should take responsibility in case of health harming product ads, financial products and things like that. I mean you can't blame an 85 year old farmer for agreeing on some kind of stupid 30 year fixed rate mortgage loan with a crazy amount of interest. Well, kind of an exagerated example, but you get my point. I know there is a thin line between wrong or right, but companies shouldn't act unethically.

by Roy Mon Mar 29, 2010 7:56 pm

I think this is an issue about fairness, not responsibility.

If there is no assumption, then I don't think one specific object should be responsible for misleading.

The key assumption may be the information symmetry
or asymmetry. If information symmetry exist between both sides, then it might be a fair game.

Sadly, most consumer are lack of information or professional knowledge to judge.

Though...maybe the government should do something ?

by t97701103 Mon Mar 29, 2010 8:08 pm

But since there will always be consumers who are unable to objectively judge advertisements (due to lack of intelligence or something) I think companies have to take responsibility.

]

In case a consumer gets misled due to a lack of intelligence I think you can hardly blame the advertiser can you?

t97701103

I think she disagreed with you
I also do,

Allright, to start with, I agree with you that there are people that might have a hard time assessing the content of ads, and I also agree with you that advertisers should do all they can to not mislead such people. If there is a serious company behind the advertising they should realise that they have nothing to gain in the long run by deliberatley misleading consumers. Furthermore, since modern marketing is a lot about creating a dialogue with consumers and having a two way communication, I believe companies may have a better chance to prevent undeliberate misleading of consumers.
Regarding the sentence I wrote about not being able to blame advertisers if they mislead people with a lack of intelligence; that was based on the presumption that the advertiser did not deliberatley mislead consumers, which was assumed in your reply. I realise that I did not make that clear in my reply though, and since I wrote about a situation when advertisers deliberatley mislead consumers it of course doesnt make sence, sorry about that Who´s responsibility is it? Icon_smile

by Jamie_Tang Mon Mar 29, 2010 8:47 pm

I think that it is a given that every advertiser will want to try to over exaggerate their product a little to make it more appealing to customers. So I agree with everyone above that says the problem comes down to what exactly is misleading? I think the advertiser is fine if they try to make their product a little more appealing and don't go overboard and tell straight out lies. The same goes for purposely trying to hide the truth or disadvantages of a product from customers, and just flat out fraud. But the customer should also carry some responsibility. If they are putting their money into something important, they should not be so gullible and believe anything they hear. So... I guess both should carry a part of the responsibility.

by YOUNGJIN_KIM Mon Mar 29, 2010 9:06 pm

yeah, I agree that every advertiser try to make exaggerated ad to catch consumer's interests~ so consumers should consider and research more about what they want to buy without just watching ad... but if advertiser do things unethical way which is totally a lies or fake, then it is wrong. In my opinion, both should take the responsibility on reasonable line~!!

by Roy Mon Mar 29, 2010 9:25 pm

I agree with Kim.

The process of transaction comes into being between both sides, not only a unilateral decision.
Advertisers should take some responsibility; meanwhile, consumers
have better be aware of ads. Furthermore, each transaction happens when consumer do make the
decision, why should not take some responsibility?

by Ian Chen Mon Mar 29, 2010 9:44 pm

Is an advertiser responsible for not misleading consumers with their advertising? Or is it up to consumers to do proper research about a product or service in order to not be misled?

Both should be responsible for not to mislead and not to be misled!!!

advertisers do advertising in order to persuade customer to buy products but sometimes too exaggerated. it's an ethical issue for advertisers and also a credit-evaluated situation for customers.

by MaoHung_Wang Mon Mar 29, 2010 10:46 pm

In my opinion, it depends. But in most situation, advertisers should take responsibility.

When we that some one wears a couple of shoes and jumps like flying, most of us know this is the exaggerated performance. But there is some ads encourage you to borrow money from bank, using the money to "live happily". These kind of ads may be legal, but should be blamed.

Overall advertisers get much more information then consumers, so they should take that more responsibility.

by Erin_Lo Mon Mar 29, 2010 11:27 pm

In my point of view, I think both of the advertisers and consumers should take the responsibility. Generally, advertisers should do their best to reveal “all” the advantages and disadvantages of their products, in order to let consumers get the whole picture of the product they are considering to buy. However, this may be difficult for the advertisers to show all of those things in their advertisements, therefore, sometimes consumers may need to do some research about the product by themselves. That is to say, if advertisers try their best to reveal information as much as possible, and consumers do some research before buy products, and those “misleading” problems could be decreased.

by Lin_Chen Mon Mar 29, 2010 11:32 pm

I agree with Eva...it definitely depends on the product. Obviously, if a consumer were to buy medicine or an over-the-counter product, the advertiser has the lawful responsibility to mention all side-effects of the product. Then, it is the consumer's responsibility to look further into the product--i.e. talk to his/her doctor, research other people's experience with the medicine, etc.

by chiaying_lin Mon Mar 29, 2010 11:47 pm

In my opinion, it's mainly ad companies' responsibility to send the correct informations and avoid misleading the audience. But, as we know, all the ad companies want is nothing but maximizing the sale, so it's also quite understandable if they only reveal what they want customer to know.
So a wise and responsible customer will never 100% trust all the ads.

by Frank_Ho Tue Mar 30, 2010 12:45 am

In my opinion, it’s responsibility of every member of the society, but not responsibility of any agent specifically. The problem is structural. We must research it from the view of macro-economy.

by Nemo_Kuo Tue Mar 30, 2010 12:47 am

i think it depands on the advertisement.
If the advertisement is totally clear having a strong powers to impact on costomers' will, the advertisers should be responsible for the misleading situation.
But in another ways, costomers should take responsible for being misled because they made decisions themselves!
No one push them to make their decisions, right?

And i think government is really important when evil ads and ad traps are everywhere.

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