Mistakes happen, but even casual online observers seem disappointed that Facebook artificially inflated the average viewing time of video ads on its platform for two years.
The Wall Street Journal reported that the social networking giant only counted video views of more than three seconds, meaning it overestimated viewing time by 60% to 80%. Though the problem has since been fixed, advertisers were reportedly unhappy with the error once they found out via Facebook’s product dashboards or by being contacted with the company.
Not surprisingly, the most vocal reaction to Facebook’s video ad view problem took place on Twitter. Some of it was mild . . .
Things that make you go hmmm #Facebook overestimates video ad views by 60-80% Great article by @VranicaWSJ https://t.co/so4qFRY4xA #social
— Brianna B (@Brianna_Melina) September 23, 2016
Others suggested the mistake marked a sad moment in digital ad metrics.
It's a bummer that Facebook dramatically inflated the numbers behind its video ads.
— Josh Marshall (@joshtpm) September 23, 2016
As with anything Facebook-related, there was also concern about what kind of information Facebook holds in its hands, and how it can affect an entire industry.
Facebook overestimates video view ad metric by 60%-80%….
FOR. TWO. YEARS.
In unrelated news, ad revenue is up.https://t.co/YWKiwDxeyN
— Andrew Grinaker (@206andrew) September 23, 2016
We're hostage to their data as Facebook overestimates video viewing time https://t.co/JEY7vZxgwH
— Nick McElwee (@NickMcElwee) September 23, 2016
More than anything, however, social media users took the ad reporting error as an excuse to poke fun at Facebook for all kinds of other issues:
"You're now friends with …… Send a message to say hello!"
Facebook really overestimates the effort I put into my friendships.
— David Barwise (@djbarwise) September 4, 2016
https://twitter.com/itsdenitra/status/771904308212293632
I believe that @Facebook seriously overestimates how interesting posts truly are from my friends and family. I'd rather see brands.
— Melissa Carrier (@Jemstaa) June 30, 2016
