FTC cracking down on blogger payola

[thekitchensink]

ssj12 said:

thekitchensink said:

Zlejedi said:
This has potential to be serious dent in freedom of speech and promoting more politicall correctness.

Not really--all it does is make sure that a critic actually backs up his statements.  That said, if it cleans up their mouths on the way, I'm all for it.

It is actually a little bit of both. It makes critics back up statements but it can have a negative effect on freedom of speech too.

This law made it so I cannot post on my Twitter, "I just saw Movie X, it sucked." I have to give a massive explaination which with Twitter's text limit probably wouldn't allow someone to properly do.

How is this law going to differentiate between a general person, a person being paid off by a company for their statement, and a critic? it can't.

 

 

What you say makes sense, but it seems to only apply to people who may have a conflict of interest.

"The guidelines, expected to be released later this summer, would clarify that the FTC could pursue and penalize bloggers, as well as the companies which compensate them, for any false claims or failure to disclose conflicts of interest, according to The Associate Press."

So, for example, you would be penalized if you neglected to disclose that a big rival movie studio paid you to say 'Movie X sucked', or that your opinion is colored by a general dislike of studio x.

As long as there's no reason to believe you have a conflict of interest, you're in the clear.