LG Hamburg on Influencer Advertising and “Sponsored Content”

The problem of influencer sneaking advertising

The District Court of Hamburg agrees with the rulings on influencers and sneaky advertising. So far, only the Munich Regional Court has shown a different tendency(there is a summary in this post).

It is interesting that the verdict is NOT about Instagram, but about an interactive magazine for mobile phones. This shows, as I have explained e.g. here and here, that the current case law is by no means limited to a specific social media network.

At the request of a warning association, the court ruled that the start-up that publishes the magazine is prohibited from publishing editorial articles in the course of business without the commercial purpose of presenting these publications.

The case

The magazine published a post as follows:

“Intelligent

Multimedia system

Nothing is better known

than his smartphone! Therefore

multimedia systems are ideal,

who use their own mobile phone, e.g.

via Bluetooth.#perfectmusic”

Or

“Never search your car again. in which

I parked the street again? My app

Tip: Find my car.

Sentences like this are a thing of the past.”

The title of the article was “SPONSORED CONTENT…”. However, other courts have already ruled that this is not sufficient, as you can read in this blog post. Also, or even more so, the hashtag #ad are not enough.

The decision

To that end, the Court stated:

Also the reference “Sponsored Content” does not sufficiently illustrate the commercial advertising character of the post. The term translates as “supported content” and does not make it sufficiently clear that this editorial post is a commercial advertisement. In everyday language, the concept of the sponsor is rather associated with a disinterested support of a project. The term is well known from sport; so the jersey sponsor is someone who supports a sports project or a team and receives an advertising opportunity for the equivalent, for example on the jersey of a team. As a rule, the supporting part predominates; the sponsor hopes that his payment will involve the good image of the supported team. A purchased editorial advertisement is not subject to the concept of “sponsoring”. The Board can also assess this on its own basis. It does not belong to the target group of young women between the ages of 18 and 24; however, this is an understanding of a linguistic term which the members of the Chamber can judge and evaluate from their understanding of the language.

and comes to the conclusion:

In the board’s view, the statement “sponsored content” is not sufficiently clear and meaningful; rather, the statement is intended to disguise the advertising character of the editorial contribution. It is necessary to label with a clearly highlighted term such as ‘display’.

The consequences

All streamers and other influencers should therefore pay attention to the current case law. The claims for damages can otherwise be enormous. This is especially true, as currently only warning clubs are active for the most part. Once the wave of co-advertisers is kicked off and warnings follow, the financial risk is increased once again.

Author: Marian Härtel

Marian Härtel ist Rechtsanwalt und Fachanwalt für IT-Recht mit einer über 25-jährigen Erfahrung als Unternehmer und Berater in den Bereichen Games, E-Sport, Blockchain, SaaS und Künstliche Intelligenz. Seine Beratungsschwerpunkte umfassen neben dem IT-Recht insbesondere das Urheberrecht, Medienrecht sowie Wettbewerbsrecht. Er betreut schwerpunktmäßig Start-ups, Agenturen und Influencer, die er in strategischen Fragen, komplexen Vertragsangelegenheiten sowie bei Investitionsprojekten begleitet. Dabei zeichnet sich seine Beratung durch einen interdisziplinären Ansatz aus, der juristische Expertise und langjährige unternehmerische Erfahrung miteinander verbindet. Ziel seiner Tätigkeit ist stets, Mandanten praxisorientierte Lösungen anzubieten und rechtlich fundierte Unterstützung bei der Umsetzung innovativer Geschäftsmodelle zu gewährleisten.