What Do Reuters, WP, NYT, Financial Times Have In Common? They're All Paid For "Sponsored Content" By The Oil Industry

[hatrack]

Ed. - Links at original.

Oil major BP considers deals to place paid-for content in trusted media brands as key to influencing the Washington power players who set U.S. energy policy, according to internal company documents. The communications provide a rare unvarnished glimpse into the strategic value the oil industry places on multi-million-dollar sponsorship deals with outlets such as the Washington Post, The New York Times, Reuters, the Financial Times, and Politico.

They were subpoenaed as part of a Congressional investigation into the fossil fuel industry’s decades of deceptive advertising, “Sponsored content advertising is a powerful way to reach a specific audience focused on specific issues,” BP states in one document. “We use sponsored content as a tool to push our messages directly to Washington, DC, [sic] elites who set and influence energy policy — and can decide whether we keep our license to operate,” it reads.

As the scope of climate accountability begins to extend beyond fossil fuel companies to include their partners in advertising and public relations firms, content created by the in-house advertising studios of major media is coming under growing scrutiny. In December, a joint DeSmog-Drilled investigation and report detailed how brand studios at the Financial Times, Reuters, The New York Times, The Washington Post and other trusted media are creating a wide range of content for the oil and gas industry, ranging from videos and podcasts to sponsored newsletters, advertorials, and events.

BP’s stark acknowledgement of the importance it places on such paid content for shaping policy in the United States, the world’s largest producer of oil and gas, underscores the apparent conflict between media companies’ claims to impartiality, and their willingness to produce paid content promoting the interests of the fossil fuel industry. In April, after climate advocates launched a complaint with UK regulators accusing the Saudi state-owned oil company of greenwashing, the Financial Times and Reuters pulled content sponsored by Saudi Aramco. BP did not immediately respond to a request for comment.

EDIT

https://www.desmog.com/2024/05/15/oil-companies-use-paid-news-media-partnerships-to-protect-social-licence-to-operate-documents-show/

[erronis]

1. Many times when I'm reading an article/opinion piece, I don't realize that it is sponsored content

until I see some fine print somewhere on the page, or the relentless drumming of the talking points make it obvious.

So many medical journals publish articles that are funded by the pharma/medical device communities and the acknowledgement of the connection can be very hard to discern.