My goal is to persuade commercial Internet search service providers not to display ads that are inappropriate for young children. Attempting to influence individual advertisers would not be practical.

However, on November 18th, 1995, about two weeks after the "Sex Skill" ad was discontinued, I did email a complaint to the HomeArts Company, owner of Redbook magazine.

Ten days after receiving my email, six days after visiting my Web pages as indicated by my access statistics program, and one day after being called by a reporter for a major Internet magazine, HomeArts responded with the email message below.

This email message is published with full permission from the HomeArts Company, as indicated in the email message which follows it.

From: ha@hearst.com
Date: Tue, 28 Nov 95 16:05:36 EST
To: hopper@cybercom.net (Jim Hopper)
Subject: Re: (HA) The ad you ran, "The Sex Skill Men Really Love"

Dear Mr. Hopper,

I have received your inquiry about our HomeArts advertisement on the
Lycos search engine.

HomeArts does not intend to promote mature themes to young audiences.
We began our advertising with Lycos under the assumption that this
service would provide a good way to reach a wide base of Internet
users. We were not aware that this "wide-base" could include younger
people on school assignments. When we realized the mismatch, we
withdrew the advertisement and replaced it with more
family-oriented promotions. Such considerations will be a key
component of our advertising decisions in the future.

I'd also offer that the Internet is a new medium and we, like everyone
else, are still learning how to properly target our messages.
Your input helped this process along. Thank you.

Sincerely,

Brian J. Sroub
VP, Marketing

From: ha@hearst.com
Date: Wed, 06 Dec 95 14:57:45 EST
To: hopper@cybercom.net (Jim Hopper)
Subject: Re: Your email message

Mr. Hopper,

Thank you for your response and interest in this issue. Please feel
free to post the text of our dialogue to date. We hope that such
discussions are helpful in finding a common set of understandings
regarding internet protocal.

Best regards,

Brian Sroub

Back to the Redbook ad

To an emailed categorical denial of error from the CEO of Lycos

To Editorial Standards: Contents

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