Very much agree with Roxanne and what Jay just said. But for many of us blogger-types, it gets sorta murky. For large blogs with multiple staff, or for blogs like in Roxanne's example, where the blogger happens to be a travel blogger on a trip ... that seems fairly clear-cut to me. It's a business, you should disclose stuff.
But not all blogs are that type of blog. My main blog, for example - I started out blogging about stuff I found interesting that was connected with my job, more to remember the cool stuff I found than anything. It's morphed into sort of a part-time job. I get speaking engagements because I blog. Publishers sometimes send me techie books to look at. Etc. I get it - it's a small business, and I make sure to say "hey, they sent me a book" or whatever. But it's been a loooong trip between now and when I started. I know a lot of bloggers that mix business and pleasure, professional interests and family, and well - they're still in that murky middle area where policies like the FTC is going after ... wouldn't even dawn on them. That, plus the fact that there are like a gazillion blogs out there, makes this a hard thing to enforce, I think :-) David Lee King davidleeking.com - blog davidleeking.com/etc - videoblog twitter | skype: davidleeking On Tue, Oct 6, 2009 at 1:54 PM, Jay dedman <[email protected]> wrote: > > What's the difference anyway? We are NOT talking about limiting free > speech > > or regulating independent opinions. This rule is about regulating > COMMERCIAL > > speech or speech that has been influenced by commerce. > > Yep, good points. I originally laid out the fears/anger in the US over > the FTC announcement. As we all know, people in US dont always base > their arguments on facts. There is simply a knee-jerk reaction against > the government getting involved in anything. Hell, poor rural > americans would rather get eaten alive by cancer caused by processed > food and pesticides than have the government offer healthcare. > > As Roxanne says, this rule is aimed at Commercial interactions online. > If it stays like this, it'l be fine...just like the blogosphere is > fine with laws against spam and child porn. > > It's good to show some muscle when the govt does anything. Makes them > think twice. Now go buy some guns: http://www.auctionarms.com/ > > Jay > > > -- > http://ryanishungry.com > http://jaydedman.com > http://twitter.com/jaydedman > 917 371 6790 > > > ------------------------------------ > > Yahoo! Groups Links > > > > [Non-text portions of this message have been removed]
