They aren't all ads, because the situation gets really muddy. If a website talks about an upcoming movie is that an ad? What if they were shown the movie before its release?
It's not all that muddy under normal circumstances - if there are payments to the producers then it's an ad. There is the problem in extremis though - a person gets a cameo on a show and then uses that to sell other products and in return helps out the producer in some non-obvious way.
It's an issue but I'd be happy with a 90% solution over a 0% solution.
Ok but what if you're allowed to watch the movie/game/etc. for free before general release? That might not seem like payment, after all it's just necessary to allow the review to happen. But what if review sites that give a few bad reviews are denied this access? And no one wants to read reviews after release?
In the end, on paper, the studio has no editorial oversight, but in practice you need to give them good reviews (essentially, adverts) if your business is to survive.
Would they get to watch it for free if they release their review months after the movie is released? If no, then it’s an ad, with just a very low price.
It's an ad if and only if it is mixed into an article that is not about the movie. If I click a link that says that the article behind it is about the movie, it's not an ad. If I click on a link to a comparison of PC networking equipment, then it's an ad because a movie is not PC networking equipment.
This doesn't mean the movie article (or indeed the hardware comparison) can't be sponsored. It just means the ad shouldn't be able to be shoved in your face unsolicited.
Ok, so you have a review article about PC networking equipment, sponsored by Cisco. That's an ad for you.
Now you go to the homepage of the site that wrote that review. They link to that review from their home page. Is that an ad? Probably, because it could contain an ad-like image as its banner (showing Cisco equipment) and maybe even a slightly ad-ish title ("Cisco outperforms other networking equipment in our recent review of x articles").
So, is another page, that links to that page also an ad? Because maybe the homepage that runs Cisco-sponsored reviews might also have a cisco-sponsored banner. And even if not, maybe over time they become associated as "the thing that reviews things were cisco always wins"...
Oh, and what if it wasn't a sponsorship. What if instead Cisco just gave them the hardware to test at a discount? Or for free? Would you not write a slightly more favourable review for nvidia if they gifted you their top-tier GPU? What if instead of gifting you the GPU, they just give it to you at a discount? Or earlier than normal customers? Or they just have nvidia-stickers for your kids in the box?
Ads are an extremly slipperly slope, they're part of human nature; everyone I ever met is trying to tell me about (=market) themselves, their beliefs, their current hobbies, that new burger place down the road, ....
Well most hollywood movie productions are just 1h30 ads nowadays. You can usually see ton of product placement with closeup on logos and products that do not make any sense for the storytelling.
