Google cache of The Atlantic's David Miscavige scientology ad that looked like an article.

The Atlantic Posts Sponsored Article on Scientology, Then Pulls It

Last night The Atlantic posted a sponsored article on Scientology titled “David Miscavige Leads Scientology to Milestone Year.” It was exactly what it sounds like — a celebratory ad for Scientology, complete with overwhelmingly positive comments from readers.

The article was also formatted exactly like any other Atlantic piece — save “sponsor content” written at the top — so people started questioning the ethics of it. And just as soon as people started criticizing the article, the Atlantic yanked the piece (here is a Google cache version of it).

Mediabistro updates the article with the apology from The Atlantic:

UPDATE (12:20 pm):
We just received this official statement from The Atlantic:

We screwed up. It shouldn’t have taken a wave of constructive criticism — but it has — to alert us that we’ve made a mistake, possibly several mistakes. We now realize that as we explored new forms of digital advertising, we failed to update the policies that must govern the decisions we make along the way. It’s safe to say that we are thinking a lot more about these policies after running this ad than we did beforehand. In the meantime, we have decided to withdraw the ad until we figure all of this out. We remain committed to and enthusiastic about innovation in digital advertising, but acknowledge — sheepishly — that we got ahead of ourselves. We are sorry, and we’re working very hard to put things right.

Here's the google cache:

http://webcache.googleusercontent.com/search?q=cache%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.theatlantic.com%2Fsponsored%2Fscientology%2Farchive%2F2013%2F01%2Fdavid-miscavige-leads-scientology-to-milestone-year-%2F266958%2F&oq=cache%3Ahttp%3A%2F%2Fwww.theatlantic.com%2Fsponsored%2Fscientology%2Farchive%2F2013%2F01%2Fdavid-miscavige-leads-scientology-to-milestone-year-%2F266958%2F&sugexp=chrome,mod=16&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8



The title is "David Miscavige Leads Scientology to Milestone Year"

The subtitle:

"Under ecclesiastical leader David Miscavige, the Scientology religion expanded more in 2012 than in any 12 months of its 60-year history."

2012 was a milestone year for Scientology, with the religion expanding to more than 10,000 Churches, Missions and affiliated groups, spanning 167 nations--figures that represent a growth rate 20 times that of a decade ago.

The driving force behind this unparalleled era of growth is David Miscavige, ecclesiastical leader of the Scientology religion. Mr. Miscavige is unrelenting in his work for millions of parishioners and the cities served by Scientology Churches. He has led a renaissance for the religion itself, while driving worldwide programs to serve communities through Church-sponsored social and humanitarian initiatives.

David Miscavige spearheaded a program to build every Church of Scientology into what Scientology Founder L. Ron Hubbard termed "Ideal Organizations" (Ideal Orgs). This new breed of Church is ideal in location, design, quality of religious services and social betterment programs. Each is uniquely configured to accommodate the full array of Scientology services for both parishioners and the surrounding community. Ideal Orgs further house extensive public information multimedia displays that introduce every facet of Dianetics and Scientology, along with libraries, course and seminar rooms for an introduction to and study of Scientology Scripture. Chapels serve to host Sunday Services and other congregational gatherings.

The Atlantic was right on one point. They should have figured out their mistake before all the outcry about an ad that looked like an article. Misleading on purpose.