YAY! MORONS!

[solarbird]

Interview with Richard Cleland of the FTC regarding new rules requiring individual bloggers - specifically including unpaid bloggers of any kind - include disclosures with reviews of any sort - books, devices, and so on. Book reviews are the big cranky right now, because it's normal for publishers to send out a bunch of copies of any book for review, for free, with no expectation that they be returned. This has been true for decades. I've received an assload of such books and I still have a fair number of them. Newspapers, et al, don't have to disclose that; the FTC is taking the position that bloggers should be treated differently and be subject to disclosure requirements. Even when, say, tweeting a picoreview. No lie. Oh look, I think it's time for a visit by



...yeah, there we are.

Comments

[shadesofmauve]

FAIL. Hurry everyone! We all have to freak out, because what's been going on forever is now going on ON THE INTERNET. I hope publishers throw a righteous tantrum about this; it's so clearly against their interests.

And...doesn't this really apply to all other review sites? Places like anandtech? Considering how many people do reviews for free, a lot of that wealth of information will dry up if people no longer have the incentive of some stuff at the end of the day...if anyone follows the rules, that is. Enforcement of this idiocy'll be a bitch.

[l33tminion]

Did you actually read the text of the new regulation? It's not that bad, and it doesn't prohibit anyone from receiving compensation (including the product in question) for doing reviews.

[shadesofmauve]

Point -- just read it, and the interviewee was definitley making stuff up when he talked about sending things back.

I'm still curious about how they think they'll police the whole internet, though.

[l33tminion]

interviewee was definitley making stuff up when he talked about sending things back

The interviewer asked him how you could get a review product to not count as compensation. He wasn't "making stuff up" so much as getting distracted by largely irrelevant questions.

I'm still curious about how they think they'll police the whole internet, though.

They don't. I don't think they go through print ads or TV ads currently, either. They investigate complaints about deceptive advertising practices.

[rosepurr.livejournal.com]

Jim and I are very not happy about this. We receive and review preview copies of books ALL THE TIME. I seldom disclose that it's a proof copy because I don't really think about it. And the way the reg is written, I'm not even sure if my Good Reads account counts as a blog? Or if I link to my Good Reads account in FB and LJ is it a blog entry then? Dumb.

[l33tminion]

The text of the regulation makes no distinction between any form of media and any other. It only uses the word "blog" in the examples.

How exactly do you think this is going to affect you?

[rosepurr.livejournal.com]

Because we get free books and review them online, either in our Blogs or in a venue like FB or Good Reads. The free books qualify as the receipt of goods and that possibly makes us advertisers under the new reg.

Also, from listening to the news this morning, the FTC is going to be targeting companies that send out products more than bloggers who endorse the products which means that the steady stream of new books I might not have otherwise heard about or read may stop coming free to my house, which sucks.

[l33tminion]

Seriously, read the regulation (p. 75 and examples 7-9 on p. 79-81). (When reading example 7, please note the significant ways it differs from your situation.) This is basic, common-sense stuff.

I expect the only change publishers will make in response to this regulation will be adding a note to review copies along the lines of "if you review this, please say you received a review copy".

[mathmuffin.livejournal.com]

Thank you, l33tminion, for the convenient link to the regulation.

I read the last section, "255.5 Disclosure of material connections," and I agree with l33tminion that the reviewer saying that he or she read a review copy would satisfy the legal requirement of that section. I do not have time this morning to read the other 74 pages of the regulation.

New media will have more trouble with this regulation than traditional media, because the regulation is judging the endorsement against viewer expectations. The viewer expectations are harder to define for new media, so the regulators may insist on more disclosure of connections for new media.

Moreover, as a government employee, I am familiar how vague regulations serve as roadblocks. At work we have a rule against endorsement of commercial products while serving in a government role. Sometimes the people from the legal office give clear guidelines what counts as endorsement, but usually the details are spread by hearsay and people hear multiple versions. A single exaggeration is enough to scare almost everyone off from mentioning a commercial product while on the job. Wanting to suggest a commercial product as a solution to a problem involves looking up the endorsement regulation before putting anything into writing.

Richard Cleland's interview shows that he is clueless about the regulation and his views on it are spreading disinformation. He is going to scare a lot of people away from providing perfectly legal book reviews.

[mojave-wolf.livejournal.com]

as a government employee, I am familiar how vague regulations serve as roadblocks.

Ah, but this comment calls to mind the time I spent studying Food & Drug Law, and how clear and concise and consistent the FDA regs and enforcement were. A model for all. Just to give a counterexample. :-P

[l33tminion]

I do not have time this morning to read the other 74 pages of the regulation.

It's not as long as it seems. The full text of the proposed regulation starts on page 55. Everything before that is discussion about the revision process.

Moreover, as a government employee, I am familiar how vague regulations serve as roadblocks.

The problem with common-sense regulations is that common-sense is vaguely defined. There are clearly a lot of variables the regulation mentions: What are the advertiser's expectations of the reviewer? What are the audience's expectations of the reviewer? How valuable is the compensation (or how significant is the material connection), and how would disclosing that affect audience purchasing decisions? What qualifies as a "reasonable" disclosure? Etc.

The problem with more specific regulation is that then it becomes a morass of loopholes, more useless than no regulation at all. Sometimes you have to rely on selective enforcement on one side and judicial interpretation on the other.

Richard Cleland's interview shows that he is clueless about the regulation and his views on it are spreading disinformation. He is going to scare a lot of people away from providing perfectly legal book reviews.

Yeah. To give Cleland the benefit of the doubt, I don't think he's ignorant about FTC policy. I think he's simply a bad interviewee who gets easily caught up in tangential questions. I was annoyed that the interview doesn't get at the major point of the regulation in question (and the reasons for this revision) at all.

[l33tminion]

As far as I can tell after reading the updated guidelines (the relevant bit (§255.5 Disclosure of material connections) starts on p. 75, examples 7-9 are especially relevant to online media), this isn't a problem. The meat of it:

When there exists a connection between the endorser and the seller of the advertised product that might materially affect the weight or credibility of the endorsement (i.e., the connection is not reasonably expected by the audience), such connection must be fully disclosed.

The actual text of the revised regulation doesn't seem to make any distinction between new and traditional media, except to the extent that affects audience expectations. The enforcement of the policy is directed at the companies, not the endorsers, as before. The effect of the policy will probably be that companies will include "say you got a free copy of this product" in the letter that comes with said product and reviewers will start posts with "we received a copy of [product] from [company]". In other words, it's an incredibly minimal burden on those making a good-faith effort not to mislead their audience, and allows the FTC to go after deceptive astroturf campaigns. That last is a good thing for independent bloggers, having the internet be a free zone for deceptive advertising practices doesn't help anyone's credibility.

::blinks::

[mojave-wolf.livejournal.com]

Yes, this is much stupidity, but I am suddenly wondering how many reviews I will have to start. writing and putting where to get free books, before this moronism causes publishers to stop sending them? I want free graphic novels, too, does the freebie concept in xchange for reviews work w/them, too?

::plans on paying as much personal attention to new rule as I did to speed limits on the interstate back when I was younger::

[l33tminion]

It's an apt comparison, I expect this one will be a case where selective enforcement rules the metaphorical road.