The advertising industry is finally confronting the rotten fruit at the bottom of the digital marketing barrel.

Over the summer, a rash of supply-side platforms updated their policies to address so-called made-for-advertising (MFA) websites after an industry report, conducted by the Association of National Advertisers, found “waste” on such sites to the tune of $20 billion.

According to the report, 23% of the $88 billion spent on programmatic advertising is largely spent on MFA inventory, while these sites represent about 21% of all impressions. The second part of the ANA report is set to be released in late October during the organization’s annual Masters of Marketing conference.

What are MFA sites, exactly?They’re clickbait, created for the purpose of harvesting digital advertising budgets. Ads that run on these sites are viewable and less expensive than those of legitimate publishers (you know, the ones with newsrooms), but most of the traffic is bought, coming from sponsored posts on platforms like Meta or via Taboola chumboxes.

Since the ANA’s June report, SSPs like Pubmatic, Magnite, and OpenX have published statements about MFA inventory. Though there are subtle differences, most of the companies say the same thing—they’ll no longer include MFA inventory in the curated publisher lists they sell to select advertisers, deals that are sometimes referred to as private marketplace, or PMP.

Keep reading here.—RB

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AI image generators (or at least decent ones) are relatively new, leading to gray-area questions from marketers like, “Which pictures can I pull without potential copyright infringement?” or, “Will this robot take my job?”

In what could be an answer to that first question, this week Getty Images unveiled an AI tool that allows customers to create images in a “commercially safe” way. Generative AI by Getty Images, as it’s very literally named, works with Nvidia’s AI technology to create images from Getty’s licensed photo library with no worries about copyright infringement.

“We’re excited to launch a tool that harnesses the power of generative AI to address our customers’ commercial needs while respecting the intellectual property of creators,” Getty Images CEO Craig Peters said in a statement.

Generating revenue: According to Getty, content generated using the new tool will not become available in Getty Image or iStock libraries for other customers to use. Getty contributors will also be compensated when their images are used to train the generator. It’s not clear yet whether contributors will have the option to opt out or limit the tool’s use of their images—something that artists have been fighting for with Adobe Stock’s Firefly AI model.

Are there any limitations? When testing the tool, The Verge found that certain prompts—like President Biden or Andy Warhol—were off limits. Getty told the publication that the tool “doesn’t want to manipulate or recreate real-life events.” Given recent conversations around AI disclosures, The Verge also confirmed that Getty’s tool watermarks content as created with AI.

What’s next? Getty plans to release new features later this year that will allow customers to incorporate their “brand style and language” into AI-generated images.—KH

Fruit of the Loom introduced the “Fruit Guys,” four actors dressed up as an apple, a bunch of red grapes, a bunch of green grapes, and a leafy shrub, in 1975, and the brand mascots would appear in commercials for decades.

Particularly memorable is a 1978 spot featuring the actor Loretta Tupper, then in her seventies, who adoringly holds up a pair of white briefs and says, “Girls, I bought a lot of underwear for my men, and years ago, I picked Fruit of the Loom,” at which point all four of the characters magically appear in her living room.

The characters evolved, reflecting the evolution of television advertising itself, and instead of pitching particular attributes of the brand’s underwear and casual clothing, the characters in the early aughts were featured in a music video spoof reminiscent of Coldplay, moodily singing about underwear.

Then, in 2011, as if they were overripe and fruit flies were hovering over them, the Fruit Guys were tossed on marketing’s compost heap, and Fruit of the Loom stopped featuring them in advertising.

Now they’re back—but with some key updates. First, they’re no longer Fruit Guys: Two of the four characters—the bunches of red and green grapes—are depicted by women. The brand now calls them Fruit People. And rather than being on TV, they’re exclusively on social media—they’ll debut on TikTok before also appearing on Instagram Reels.

Keep reading on Retail Brew.—AAN

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