Viacom To Sponge Away Spongebob Slip

Viacom says it has taken steps to prevent any future host selling in its kids shows.

That was the message to the Children's Advertising Review Unit of the Council of Better
Business Bureaus, which informed the company it had violated advertising self-regs by
advertising a Spongebob Squarepants DVD during an airing of the show on Nickelodeon.

Viacom said it had been human error and apologized. “Nickelodeon will continue to take
great strides to put kids first and sincerely regrets this isolated incident,” the company
said in its statement submitted to CARU.

Caru praised the pledge not to repeat the mistake.

John Eggerton

Contributing editor John Eggerton has been an editor and/or writer on media regulation, legislation and policy for over four decades, including covering the FCC, FTC, Congress, the major media trade associations, and the federal courts. In addition to Multichannel News and Broadcasting + Cable, his work has appeared in Radio World, TV Technology, TV Fax, This Week in Consumer Electronics, Variety and the Encyclopedia Britannica.