According to AdAge, the FTC is mulling plans to monitor bloggers.
You can read the article here:
Bloggers Be Warned: FTC May Monitor What You Say
Supposedly this would only mean that bloggers would have to be identified as “paid endorsers”. Does that mean people who receive free samples of books to review have are “paid”? Will it relate to affiliate links? Will Google’s adsense have to be clearer about saying “PAID ADVERTISING”?
Who knows? As with all such regulation, it’s pushed through without regard to “unintended consequences”.
As part of its review of its advertising guidelines, the FTC is proposing that word-of-mouth marketers and bloggers, as well as people on social-media sites such as Facebook, be held liable for any false statements they make about a product they’re promoting, along with the product’s marketer.
It might not be a bad idea in theory. Unfortunately under this administration with its obviousl bias against business, one wonders what’s really at work with these bureaucrats?
I’m not so worried about bloggers. I’m worried about deadbeat politicians like Chris Dodd who got sweetheart loan deals from Countrywide and Barney Frank getting sexual favors from the people he was “overseeing”. With criminal activity like that going on unpunished in Washington, the Federal government has lost its credibility with the average person when it claims the need to regulate others. As the Man from Nazareth said quoting a popular parable in his day: “Physician, heal thyself”.
FTC to Monitor Bloggers? | Business Idea of the Day on April 14th, 2009 at 6:09 pm
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FTC to Monitor Bloggers? - Business Opportunities Weblog on June 14th, 2011 at 2:25 pm
[...] to Work at Home Chuck, the FTC planning to monitor bloggers: Supposedly this would only mean that bloggers would have to be identified as “paid [...]