Last weekend, the Call of Duty League Major 4 tournament wrapped in Paris, France. It was OpTic Texas that stood victorious over all comers after one hell of a run, securing the final Major trophy of the year just weeks out from COD Champs.
In the days that have followed the event, a very strange trend has emerged on social media. We’re seeing potentially hundreds of small profiles on TikTok posting the same few clips of the tournament, almost all of which are marked with ad or paid sponsorship disclaimers, giving the impression that Activision is paying for coverage.
Paid Promotion or Mass Bot Activity?
If you head onto TikTok and search ‘Call of Duty League’, you’ll almost certainly see the same few clips recycled by multiple channels, all with a mix of descriptions and ad disclaimers. In the comment sections of these videos, bot activity is running rampant, painting a very confusing picture for anyone scrolling through the feed.
These posts have all the trademarks of bot action, but, for some reason, they almost all have a disclaimer or two typically associated with paid, sponsored content.
Here are a few examples that I grabbed firsthand from TikTok before writing this up:
I scrolled through for a few minutes, seeing a staggering number of clips. It’s seriously bizarre, as there’s no real reason why Activision would pay for coverage from these tiny, bot-powered profiles. If anything, the company would use the bigger creators to boost their traction online and to draw attention to the recent successful Major tournament.
It’s no big secret that there are thousands of big creators with ties to Activision and Call of Duty.
According to TikTok’s rules for paid, promotional content, simply having #ad in the caption isn’t enough when it comes to the Commercial Content Disclosure terms. You need to have the ‘Paid partnership’ label applied, which indicates an official sponsorship. If you are advertising content and it’s not clearly indicated right off the bat, it could infringe on regulatory mandates.
It’s hard to fathom exactly why this trend has emerged, so I’ve reached out to the Call of Duty League to see if they can clear up the situation.
Do you think there’s more to this than meets the eye? Let us know your thoughts on the Insider Gaming Discord server.
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Grant has been gaming for 30+ years and in the industry for 10+. You'll probably find him playing a post-apocalyptic game or an extraction shooter somewhere.
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