Facebook Jail: A Lifetime Bid for Our Ad Account

Oh how naive I’ve been by running a few mild advertisements on Facebook. After all Loud News Net isn’t a criminal enterprise (yet). As our fans know, we write stuff about life and the world around us. Little did I know my actions were so appalling to Zuck’s holier-than-thou “community standards” A.I. bots, that our ad account would be given a life sentence in Facebook jail. All appeals DENIED.

Surely, I’m just annoyed and whining over a blatant violation of the standards that are in place to protect everyone. My ads must have been malicious. I mean we wouldn’t want a neofascist gangster to end up in the White House due to something someone read on Facebook.

The Start of Loud News Net

I started Loud News Net back in December of 2019 as a cannabis content and news aggregator. The site didn’t have much original content at the time. In the beginning, we were publishing clips fully attributed and linked to the original authors and publishers.

Facebook ads were familiar to me through some music promotion I had run a few years ago. It was a simple way to reach a lot of people. So as Loud News got underway, I thought Facebook ads would be an efficient way to spread the word.

After all, we aren’t drug dealers. Loud News, much like High Times, Merry Jane, Vice, etc., talks a lot about cannabis. Our ethos is birthed from the authentic culture around the sweet sweet cheeba (and hip hop of course – ☝️❤️!). This doesn’t make us criminals or even offensive for that matter. If there is an issue with our brand or lifestyle, then why are these other pages followed by millions on Facebook allowed to run ads all the time?

Our Crimes Against Facebook Humanity

Prior to getting flagged, detained, and sentenced to Facebook jail, Loud News was able to successfully run some advertisements on Facebook and Instagram. It was great! We promoted the NEWS site and Facebook gladly charged our credit cards hundreds of dollars. Then suddenly, after a quick money grab, Facebook deemed our ads in violation of their overly broad standards and pimp slapped us with a permanent ban of our ad account.

The debauchery of Loud News Net ensues

We placed this ad back in January. I would completely understand if we were banned from Facebook ads for shitty campaign designs. Don Draper would be rolling in his grave. It’s not clear exactly what part of the ad was in violation of Facebook policies. In fact, the article is about the cannabis industry. The same industry any teenager with a Robinhood account can invest in.

Reefer MADNESS!!!

This second ad was submitted minutes after the previous campaign. Once an ad is submitted on Facebook, it goes through a review. Presumably to see if it fits within community standards. This one didn’t meet those standards and was denied. Then the ad account was put in Facebook jail. The. End.

I know what you’re thinking – “You can’t advertise with pictures of the Devil’s lettuce, IDIOT!”. I had thought that too. So I decided to do some quick research on Facebook’s Ad Library. The Ad Library is another Facebook transparency effort installed after Mark Z. jumped on his booster seat and pooped himself in front of congress in 2018. Here’s what we found:

Loud News Net was not the first to run an ad with some sticky-icky in the photo

The Appeal

But why the permanent ban? Why not just a denial of the campaign – much like our friends at Taboola do when something is flagged? They realize that a permanent ban means no more future ad spend from us. Further, if the ad was denied where is the harm? It never reached an audience.

I appealed this heinous ruling on a number of occasions. Pleading for a specific section of the standards that I violated. Facebook refused to elaborate as to why the ad account was placed in jail. Finally, A.I. bots interrupted their plans for world dominance to reply:

Facebook Jail for Life

Regardless of the fascists at Facebook, we’ve been successfully growing our site and social media presence (psst, @loudnewsnet on all platforms) even while in Facebook jail. I’m certain if our ad budget was in the tens of thousands they’d take time to respond appropriately. However, as an independent business we will make due and adapt.

We are truly grateful for all our fans who have supported us these first few months. It’s a learning curve as regulations and policy change with the internet and these social media giants fight to control the narrative. But we’re here and aren’t going anywhere. The bots will not stop us from keeping it Loud!

If anyone else has been unjustly put in Facebook jail, we’d love to hear from you in the comments below or email us here.