influencers

Royal Marine commandos providing security at Wimbledon would like “nothing more than to sort out” disruptive social media influencers at the prestigious tournament, its chief executive has joked.

US Open organisers accredited 100 influencers and content creators for this year’s tournament.

But when a match involving two-time champion Naomi Osaka was disrupted by a group of influencers conducting a photo shoot, it prompted a debate about tennis etiquette.

Richard Atkinson, interim chief executive at the All England Lawn Tennis Club, said Wimbledon did not offer accreditation to influencers and sources have indicated to BBC Sport that is unlikely to change in the near future.

While Atkinson acknowledged that influencers were a “crucial part of the marketing mix” and to ban them from attending the tournament entirely would be “nonsense”, he said any that were brought in by brands would be “tightly chaperoned”.

He also backed the traditional “self-policing” ethos at SW19, whereby fans respect the action.

After the disruption at the US Open, world number four Coco Gauff said it was important to welcome a “new demographic” to the sport, but said: “I think it’s just, follow the etiquette of the sport. That’s all.”

And Wimbledon’s boss made it clear he does not expect to see a repeat at the All England Club.

“We don’t have a category of accredited people called influencers,” Atkinson told a panel at Leaders Week London.

“That said, clearly influencers are a crucial part of building your brand around the world in the third decade of the 21st century.

“What you have to do is keep them under control. One of our big partners, Polo Ralph Lauren, will have their influencer, but they are all tightly chaperoned.”

He said the atmosphere at the US Open is “very New York City”, adding: “It’s dead easy for someone who has just bought a ticket to show up there with their ring lights and literally start broadcasting in the middle of a match.

“If you tried to do that at Wimbledon, I think you’d probably have some Royal Marine Commando…”

He then joked: “We do have military. And they would like nothing more, I suspect, than to sort out some influencer.”

Fans will also not be allowed to bring portable ring lights – a piece of equipment used by content creators – to SW19.

Atkinson did, however, point out that the media landscape has changed, and suggested there is a place for embracing influencers and content creators to ensure Wimbledon remains relevant.

“It’s just a crucial bit of the marketing mix, of course it is,” he said.

“We’re not in the world of newspapers and television anymore, right? The world has changed. But it’s just really important, it’s a bit of a cliched expression, you’ve got to sort it out in a Wimbledon way. But to say “we’re not going to have any influencers at Wimbledon”, it’s obviously nonsense.”

“Our marketing team work meticulously to make sure they are working in a way that is consistent with our Wimbledon brand and keeps that magic that I was referring to earlier.”

Two social media influencers who filed an ethics complaint against Tom Steyer’s California gubernatorial campaign have submitted new complaints to the state’s Fair Political Practices Commission and the Los Angeles Ethics Commission, accusing Nithya Raman’s mayoral campaign of paying influencers without proper disclosure.

Their complaints, it turns out, received a legal assist from the campaign of L.A. Mayor Karen Bass.

The metadata for a draft of their filings last week revealed that they had been created with the help of the law firm used by Bass’ election campaign.

Kaitlyn Hennessy, who filed the complaint with Beatrice Gomberg, acknowledged to The Times that the Bass campaign steered them to the Kaufman Legal Group, which helped prepare the complaint.

Bass’ campaign said it is picking up the tab for the legal work but wasn’t paying Hennessy and Gomberg for their efforts.

The complaint focused on posts by comedian and TV personality Adam Conover and influencer-turned-Raman staffer Eric Cheng, along with a host of so-called “meme” accounts, which repost content created by others, sometimes at the behest of political campaigns.

The Raman campaign said it has done nothing wrong and denied any wrongdoing on behalf of Cheng. Conover also denied any wrongdoing.

The Bass campaign’s decision to cover legal costs for the complaints is unlikely to pose ethics issues, according to legal experts consulted by The Times, provided the payments are reported by the campaign in its disclosure reports, which the campaign said it intends to do.

“As long as a campaign is transparent in reporting its expenditures, there’s nothing inherently wrong for a campaign to have its lawyers file an ethics complaint for the campaign or somebody else with their informed consent,” said Jeffrey Daar, a former president of the L.A. Ethics Commission.

Conover’s posts promoting Raman already attracted scrutiny in ethics complaints filed in May by former L.A. City Council candidate Dylan Kendall. The investigations into those complaints, to the FPPC and L.A. Ethics Commission, are ongoing.

Conover told The Times that payments made by the campaign to a company connected to him were not for his posts but for video work one of his staffers did for Raman’s campaign. They initially were described in Raman’s campaign filings as payments for online ads but later were amended to say they were for video production services.

A spokesperson for Raman’s campaign said Cheng is paid for work he does for the campaign, not for posts on his personal social media account, and that it had gotten guidance from L.A. Ethics Commission staff on Cheng’s disclosure requirements to ensure it was in compliance.

The spokesperson added that Cheng voluntarily posted on his social media account that he would be joining the campaign before his employment began.

The L.A. Ethics Commission and FPPC declined to comment on the status of the complaint or the prior one brought by Kendall.

Jessica Levinson, a professor at Loyola Marymount University’s law school who also previously served as the president of the ethics commission, said that because news of an ethics complaint can have a political impact before its merits have been evaluated, it is important to view filings late in an election cycle with greater scrutiny.

“Whenever I see that there’s an ethics complaint filed this close to the election, I always pause for a minute,” she said.

California is one of the few states in the country that require social media influencers to disclose if they have been paid by a political campaign to create content. L.A. rules are even more strict.

Political groups are required to notify paid creators of the requirement.

New state legislation signed into law last month gives the FPPC the power to refer alleged violators to law enforcement for possible misdemeanor charges, and violations can be penalized with a fine of up to $5,000 per instance. The L.A. Ethics Commission can levy fines of up to $15,000 or three times the amount of money at issue.

There are no such rules for paid social media content sponsored by a federal candidate or political committee.

The FPPC last month concluded its investigation into Steyer’s campaign and found that it had properly followed the rules, but it did say that several social media influencers, including Cheng, the Raman staffer, had not properly disclosed payments from the Steyer campaign.

Hennessy and Gomberg are continuing to investigate improperly disclosed social media posts in races across the country, including the L.A. mayoral race, because of their concerns about the corrosive impact this content can have on the electoral process, Hennessy said.

“It’s really disappointing to me, because you see how this impacts races,” Hennessy said. “When you have this undisclosed content, people don’t understand that what they’re watching is an ad.”

MONTANA Brown has left her fans baffled AGAIN after she fumed over being unable to get her son an EpiPen – despite having no diagnosis for him.

The Love Island star, 31, often ruffles the feathers of fellow parents with her social media videos, and today was no different.

Speaking in her latest TikTok video, Montana began: “Guys, I’m about to have a rant, so beware.

“I went to the GP last week because basically Jude had this really random skin reaction, it was an allergic reaction, but we hadn’t actually given him any food.

“So I was like, This is weird,’ like his eyes were like swelling out of his head. I was like, He’s definitely allergic to something, but not sure what it is because we haven’t given him any food?

“So I went to the GP to basically say, ‘Look, I’ve got a nut allergy. You can see that on my records. I have anaphylaxis, so I’m worried that he’s now developed an allergy to something that I’m not quite sure what it is yet.

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“I’d like to get two kids’ EpiPens so that I can be prepared if he does have a worse reaction to whatever it is. Like in the meantime, like before we figure out, you know, get him allergy tested.”

Continuing her story, the reality star said: “Guess what they said? ‘No’.

“I was like, ‘Why? It’s just so painful.’ Like, I understand that there is a process to these things. But to me, I’m like, what am I going to do with an EpiPen apart from be safe with it?’

“Like, what are the dangers of me having an EpiPen? And I’m like, am I going to have to try and get an EpiPen off the deep dark web?

“Is that what this is coming to? I’m trying to safely protect my child in case he has an anaphylactic shock in my care to buy him enough time to get him to hospital. Like, is it me? Is it me?”

However, fans couldn’t believe what they were hearing, with one said: “They can’t just give you a medication without a diagnosis.”

A second shared: “Are you actually for real?”

A third added: “She’s is honestly on another planet!”

This isn’t the first time Montana has ruffled the feathers of fans.

The mum-of-two recently left her fans fuming after revealing the “privileged” reason why she didn’t plan to send her son to school.

And earlier this year a comment she made about food pouches in stores being “c***” for children left busy mothers who saw them as a convenient option feeling patronised.