10599314 - Jorja Pidgley

Task One

Legal: to be completely within the confines and safety of the law and rules of a country, to do
activities that follow the law, without obstructing or bending them.

Ethical: following ones own morals, and beliefs, that take into account and avoid disrespecting
the morals and beliefs of the world around them. Ethics in media deals with the specific ethical
principles and standards of the world, through film, TV, theatre, advertisement and the internet.

Regulation: Regulation is the control of mass media by the government. The basic targets of
regulation for the media is the press, radio and television but is not limited to these. The basic
targets of regulation may also include film, recorded music, cable, satellite and the internet.

Legal and Ethical constraints in previous units: During the practicals of various units, for
example Video Production and Animation, we had to consider legalities and the ethics of our
work piece. During our Video Production unit, we had to create and film a Top 5 video
using clips of said Top 5. My partner and I based our Top 5 video on the Top 5 Practical make
up effects in films, and we had to think about the clips we wished to use and the legalities
behind doing so. We had to consider if our sound and video would be seen as copyright or if it
would be okay to use, as long as we claimed there was no copyright intentions.

Task Two

a)

Advertising Standards Authority (ASA): The ASA is a self regulating organisation in the
advertising industry for the UK. The ASA is also a non-statutory organisation, and therefore
cant interpret, interfere or enforce any legislation in the advertising industry. The main role of
the ASA is to regulate the content of advertisements, sales promotions and direct marketing in
the UK by investigating any complaints made about such ads and decide whether the advert
complies with the advertising standards codes.

Committees of Advertising Practice (CAP): CAP is the sister organisation of the ASA. The
CAP is primarily responsible for constantly reviewing and updating the British Code of
Advertising, also known as the CAP Code, through its Code Policy team.

b)

Clearcast: Clearcast screens and approves ads for broadcasting across the UK, checking them
against the BCAP code, allowing them to be aired on the UKs 6 major channels. Clearcast also
helps companies who claim that their product is such and such, and helping them verifying
those claims by making sure they have substantial evidence.

c)
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The Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations is (effectively) the successor to the
Trade Descriptions Act 1968, and is designed to put the Unfair Commercial Practices Directive
into action, as a part of European minimum standards, for consumer protection. I imagine The
Consumer Protection from Unfair Trading Regulations applies to advertising because
advertising sells an idea or a product to consumers, who may or may not be tempted to
invest/purchase.

Task 3

Undertake research into the following legal and ethical aspects of advertising, and
where issues of regulation have been applied. Write approximately 50-100 words for
each of them:

1)

When consumers and the general public see an advertisement, whether it be in a newspaper or
on the internet or even on the tv in between programmes, by law the adverts must be truthful,
and not misleading to the consumers/viewers, and where applicable, the adverts must also be
backed by scientific evidence. An example of an advert that could mislead its consumers are
food adverts, like McDonald's or Burger King. The image of the burger you had seen in the
poster in the window, or on the behind-the-counter menu, is not what you got when you ordered
your food. The burger bun comes back not looking as appealing, and the lettuce and onions and
gherkins also look not as appealing, or like theyve not been freshly prepared, or arent even
fresh at all, and the burger/chicken fillet has either not been cooked enough or has been
overcooked, and then left for atleast an hour and served pre-prepared to customers to reduce
waiting time. Overall, the customers are not satisfied because they didnt get the quality that
they had expected when they ordered their food. This is considered as false advertising in the
eyes of the law.

2)

Pester Power, or as it is also know in the US as The Nag Factor, is a tactic used by a number
of companies that have products that can be aimed towards adults with children, and towards
the children themselves. For example, toys, tech and unhealthy foods. The adverts are played
on several channels during the day, where it is more likely for children to watch during the day,
and are played mainly on kids channels like tiny pop and CITV, which are watched constantly by
children of all ages throughout the day. The child, when they see the advert, will just see
potential fun and see their parents as the source of being able to attain that fun, and so will
pester them about this thing they absolutely must have and yes mum, I will play with it.

3)
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Intellectual property is something unique you have physically created yourself, an idea alone
does not count as intellectual property, for example a book. The ideas you have for the plot of
the novel dont count as being your intellectual property, but the words youve written in that
book are, because you have physically written it. You can protect your creations with the right
type of Intellectual property protection, that helps prevent people stealing the names of your
product, in this example, a book title, and the work you have produced and writing it off as their
own. Copyright, patents, designs and trademarks are all types of intellectual property protection,
and most types of protection you get automatically, others have to be applied for.

4) Use of digital manipulation e.g. Photoshop mostly confined to how advertisers and
product companies use this software to alter body images which often conveys a false sense of
reality. The fashion and beauty industries are among the most notorious for this area.

Digital Manipulation is a big problem in media in todays society, especially concerning body
image for women. Magazines, adverts on the TV, billboards and the especially the internet,
abuse the power of photoshop and influence the minds of women from a very young age. They
tell them they need to look like this highly edited model otherwise they dont fit in; different. They
need to be skinny, a size 6, because size 8 is just too fat, no one likes you, youre unattractive;
ugly. Except Magazines and adverts that use photoshop to alter someones bodily image are
hypocritical. That model isnt a size 6 in person, shes a size 12. Her skin isnt that flawless, she
has blemishes and freckles. Her legs arent that skinny, her thighs touch. Certain rules have
been laid down so that this type of influence on young women is reduced as much as is
possible, and the model has to be recognisable when in person, you cant take her size down
more than one notch, and you cant change her body shape, but producers and editors still do.
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