Big Brother Watches: FTC Monitors Blogs

Did anyone here honestly think they weren't already doing this? Along with saving phone calls for a week before discarding?

IDK, maybe I read this wrong, but it sounds to me the FTC is just pushing for disclosure.

And I say their right, if the blogger is getting paid off, those who read it should know that so they can take the blog with a grain (or bucket if needed) of salt.

Why don't they start monitoring politicians there the ones taking money from corporations deciding the policies our Country has.

Um sorry that should be common sense. No, the goverment needs to step off. I'm all for this with things like newspaper, and things of that nature. But blogs, and the way they got it worded um no... If you're stupid enough to take anything serious on a blog unless it's a very reputable blog you deserve what you get.

That's like taking wiki serious, and not going back to find actual references.. LOL.. Then again for some reason people do, but again that's their own fault.

Well I am not surprised that you guys are against the FTC doing this. Because honestly Tom's is guilty of doing this very act.

Also I don't see why bloggers are starting to "panic" as you put it which is most likely a dramatic lie itself. So long as they aren't guilty of it they have nothing to fear. The only ones that have reason to panic is those who will sway a review in favor for something in return. Like I highly suspect was the case here http://www.tomshardware.com/review [...] ,2326.html

I don't know if this new act of the FTC will effect you or not as Both tom's sites aren't blogs but one can hope that it will.

Bah

The government and the mainstream-media have been in bed with each other for a very long time, they look out for eachother to ensure their own survival. The MSM was more than willing to trumpet every lie the Bush administration said, quite a few blogs called bullsh1t back then and were ridiculed. ABCNNBS/FauxNewz all but ignored the "election irregularities" of 2000/2004, yet are quick to post all of these Iranian protestors posing for the western media with(oddly enough) signs written in English. Nevermind it would be odd that the west's hero in Iran had 14% of the of the pre-election polls... Bush was unpopular before and after the 2004 election, but somehow he expanded his margin of victory from minus one million to plus 5 million.

Just because someone walks up to you and says, "Product X is really great!" doesn't mean you listen to them. Blogs should be viewed the same way. The person may have had 10 years of experience with Product X or they may have received a free product to say a scripted phrase to the next 20 people they see. You just never know. Why do we need government regulation when a dose of common sense will do?

Here we have the government protecting idiots.

Government, fighting Darwinism over hill over dale over 0010001100101000.

Just stumbled upon this, and what did I find! On one hand NuclearShadow condemns China's censorship, on the other hand he/she advocates that if us citizens shouldn't panic for if we are not guilty then we should nothing to fear about having our blogs monitored by none other than the Big Brother. Do we already have our phones wire tapped and emails scanned and internet searches analyzed by some "overseeing authorities"? And now, he/she said we shouldn't fear this additional aspect of monitoring. What an eye opener!

Yeah, I can see what the FTC is trying to do, but I think it's pointless. People who get buying advice from blogs deserve to be scammed. Smart people would stick with trusted review sites, and even then get second and third opinions depending on how major the purchase is.

Yes but common sense unfortunately is not very common

Maybe now a lot of "bloggers" will stop pretending to like windows vista even though they know the same thing that critics of vista know i.e. HDCP some audio restrictions here and there that anger music professionals and who knows besides m$ what else is buried in there sneaking around? I've always hated how they killed off direct access to hardware in vista just so the music industry will pay them more money not for any real advancement of any kind. Now it can be argued that only paid bloggers defend all of vistas "features" instead of ackowledging the obvious like everyone else.

@kin_07 there is no contradiction in what NuclearShadow says, I can say I disagree with the US Govt. and freely protest if I like, in China I will be beaten and thrown in jail if I do the same.

The wiretapping and email scans however are often done without reason to even think that something is going on. In this case the blog itself which is open to the public could warrant suspicions.

Many doctors do the similar act to what the FTC is trying to stop with the blogs. Many doctors receive gifts from the drug companies to encourage the doctor to prescribe one drug over another. Do you support this? It causes the bribed doctors to prescribe one drug over another even if the one they prescribe is even in their own opinion less likely to be as effective.

It's clear that the FTC in this case wish to protect the consumer and is 100% right on this.

this is f----ing BS , atheletes and musicians have taken "endorsment" checks for years and no one gives a shit , so why teh hell shoyuld teh FTC investigate privately ran blogs ???? just toal bs , If I WAS a blogger I'd blog what ever teh f--k i wanted to blog granted i wouldnt blog any opinion i didnt agree with , but if some one is gona give me freebies to say somethign i'd have said ANY DAMN WAY i'll take it and teh FTC can kiss my ass , i';m sick of teh goverment tryign to piss and shit on every thing they DONT already control.

shiiiiiaaaat using doctors as an example is silly doctors are teh worse examples , hell if the FTC really caared about consumers they would put a STOP to insurance companines owning doctors and then requireing you see THIER doctor , or you can't get covered

this is purely about them conroling something they don't already control

i don't know...but probably this is proposed to collect tax. not sure though, haven't read anything.

Athletes and musicians while they get advertisers they don't really even give their opinions on product being advertised nor do these people claim to have any expertise on such things. Your never going to see Shaq try to sell you a laptop and give you a detailed review. (truthful or not)

But if you take a blog and lets say its about computers and hardware and after it gains popularity advertisers start giving bribes to it to sway reviews in their favor. Lying and tricking consumers into buying a product that they otherwise would have not or even avoiding buying a better product because the blog slanders the competitors product to make their advertiser appear better Do you really think that this acceptable? Why shouldn't they be held by ethical journalism?

How any of you can side with people who are in a trusted position who decide to abuse it by lying to profit is beyond me.

@NuclearShadow you seem to be oh so well informed.....is there ANY evidence to what you are saying?! I mean real evidence by the way, not your opinion, I guess that's why you are so emotional, blogs are the only place you get any attention.

Anyways, all this sounds like to me, is the FTC trying to ensure fair business practices, which I can understand and endorse. It is not like they are wire tapping your phones here, it's the internet they are monitoring, its PUBLIC. The way I see it, this is very similar to the governments laws in place to protect against slander and libel and false advertising.

As to the claims about this site, if you think Tom's is influenced by hardware companies, grow up. Just because they tend to pick X processor company and Y graphics does not mean that they are paid. I have used many combinations of hardware, and guess what, Tom's often is recommending what I have also found to be the best choice. Just because they do not share your OPINION does not make you or them wrong. And frankly, if you don't like what they do here then leave. No one is making you read this site and god knows how many other tech review sites there are.

I'm pretty sure that by this point, everyone is well aware that game "journalism" is rampant with undercover bribes (the recipient doesn't realize it's a bribe, just a gift such as a free game, piece of hardware, etc). You want an example? Gamestop and the Gertsman debacle.

Also, do you really think they'd aim make hard "proof" public? The reason you rarely hear about journalist kickbacks is because they do a damn good job of hiding it. But you do look like a fool when you say there has been no evidence, ever, because it's all over the freaking plays. Go to Gamesradar and read any one of their stories and how honeyglazed they make particular reviews like many, many other sites. Have fun.

Lest we forget Far Cry 2.

That was Gamespot*, my bad.

I don't understand this really.. So people are mad because they believed the internet? And thus the FTC is going to monitor blogs over it? Doesn't that just mean the said person was stupid for not trying to do more research. If 10 people say the same thing its probably true but if 1 person says if I buy a dell over an hp and I get a brick of gold in the process it should leave me to be a little skeptical..

Magic Candy - I was not saying that there is no proof, simply asking for some to be offered. You fulfilled that request, thank you.

And you did only address one third of my post.

You mean people actually lie on their blogs? what about my hot 18yr old blond online gf? Surely i didn't send my nude pics to a stranger posing as a teenager?

Lying on the internet; That's just too much.

It's either this or I guess the gov has to filter all your porn.

Think about it this way... it's giving you the reader more data with which to measure the value of a particular piece of information.

If you're searching for say a new SSD drive and an article on Tom's says "I was so impressed with these new SSD drives that I got 10 of them" then it would probably make you spend more time looking into that brand drive. Now if instead they said "I was so impressed with thes new SSD drives that I got 10 of them... err... well.. I was GIVEN 10 of them by the company that makes them"... it gives you more information regarding the value of that endorsement.

I guess I don't see how that could be a bad thing... unless you believe that all bloggers altruistically disclose such arrangements, you have no way of really knowing if an endorsement is real or financed.

What that means for me is that I don't really value blog posts regarding products, who knows if their valid or not. Toms is better than most because the tech community is quick to jump all over poorly executed or suspect reviews. Even "customer review" sites (like amazon rankings) can be faked by an insistent marketing campaign... though it takes a lot more work.

I guess I think that transparency is good... if someone has been paid to advocate for a product (or as a means to influence their review) then they should throw it out there for us all to see.

Of course the pessimist in me thinks that Politicians should do the same thing... and that will never happen so why should the net be any different.

The consumer beware...
Articles can be bought, reviewers swayed. Even with new laws against it, I doubt things will be as they should.

Besides, before you take anything for granted you should:
-Read information from multiple (and reputable) sources. Perhaps even look at the officially released info from the manufacturer/originating company.
-If reading user created product reviews, read a few pages to get a general consensus. Often the idiots/fanboys/swayed writers stick out like a sore thumb.
-Do not base your decision on what other people have done, think for yourself and weigh the options given to you.
-Realize that be it the internet, a salesman, television, or printed media: Even with all of the above, information still might be incorrect.

Sorry to sound so negative, but it seems like this is how the world seems to work. Best that you take all the precautions you can.

Even store salesmen are not trustworthy!
They could be promoting their own material too; material they earn more on!
Should we sue them?
No!
That would make us no different from them!

I think it's the responsibility of each individual to seek for trustworthy info, and learn from that.
There's no possible way you could prevent a salesman, or blogger, to write or say the truth!
It's upto himself to speak the truth, and upto us to make sure our info is trustworthy by looking at various sources.

In a way American news is tainted, Iraqi news of Al Jazeera is tainted, sometimes we even think TomsHardware is when we see so much push for AMD (which I love btw), and so little for intel or NVidia.
Then again there are other sites out there like tomshardware that bring Nvidia to the front (Anandtech).
Who says they have favor for those products? Who says they don't get payed for it?
And if they do get payed, who cares? It's not like I could make any profit out of that..
People that try to gain money out of this in court, should be sued! (like those wanting to sue Toms for promoting ATI/AMD, and when they bought an AMD video card it did not play the framerates shown in the table)... This is just getting too stupid!

I used to review PC games and PC hardware at a newspaper I worked at 10 years ago. Staff wasn't paid extra for the reviews but were allowed to keep those items they did review. We were not allowed to SELL what we kept. I gave most of the PC games away. I still have a bunch of old video cards taking up space in my basement. A lot of 3dFx stuff! Those items that were not reviewed or the reviewers didn't want to keep were auctioned off to readers at the end of the year (along with books, CDs, DVDs, etc.) The money was then donated to a woman's shelter. The item that fetched the most money was a little snow globe from the flick Fargo. It was of the police woman kneeling over the body. Pretty cool! Most newspapers send stuff back like monitors, entire P.C. setups, etc. There's too many PC games, DVD's and CDs to send back.

I totally agree. The FTC has WAY more important things to catch up on to begin monitoring some schmuck who is peddling the latest product review on his Blogger account. Anyone with half a grain of intelligence would take those reviews with a grain of salt anyhow.

Common sense is indeed the ultimate oxymoron.