Wayne Rooney and Jack Wilshere have been forced delete postings to Twitter after the UK’s Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) found that they had failed to declare their sponsorship by Nike. Both the tweets are hardly current as they were posted in January, emphasising the difficulty of regulating fast-moving social media.
The complaint is the first to be upheld by the ASA since it assumed new powers to regulate social media last year. However, a tweet by Rio Ferdinand who promoted Snickers was found not to be in breach of the code.
Wayne Rooney and Jack Wilshere have been forced delete postings to Twitter after the UK’s Advertising Standards Authority (ASA) found that they had failed to declare their sponsorship by Nike. Both the tweets are hardly current as they were posted in January, emphasising the difficulty of regulating fast-moving social media.
The complaint is the first to be upheld by the ASA since it assumed new powers to regulate social media last year. However, a tweet by Rio Ferdinand who promoted Snickers was found not to be in breach of the code.
Nike argued that both players were well known for being sponsored by Nike and hence their followers would not be misled. However, the ASA ruled that there was nothing obvious in the tweets to indicate they were Nike marketing communications.