This morning, the Federal Trade Commission announced that its Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials would be revised in relation to bloggers. The new guidelines (PDF) specified that bloggers making any representation of a product must disclose the material connections they (the presumed endorsers) share with the advertisers. What this means is that, under the new guidelines, a blogger’s positive review of a product may qualify as an “endorsement” and that keeping a product after a review may qualify as “compensation.”
These guidelines, which will be effective as of December 1, 2009, require all bloggers to disclose any tangible connections.
There's more at here at EdRants, including an interview with the FTC's Richard Cleland.
The part that really struck me was where Cleland said that book bloggers would have to send the books back, because keeping them was a form of compensation.
Yeah, that's going to happen. I can see it now.
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