FTC demands disclosure on sponsored posts.

Paid to post bloggers aka 'Probloggers' are shaken by the new guidelines by the Federal Trade Commission (FTC) that bloggers who blog for money by writing product reviews should disclose that they are being paid to write reviews.

FTC says in order to protect consumers, they have taken this stand. What is suprising for me is FTC is very well aware of Google tough stand on blogs that get paid to post by stripping off the blogs' page rank that every blogger depends on to get paid blogging assignments.

The blogopshere is yet to react to the FTC guidelines. I know of Internet marketing companies that hire bloggers to write for their clients in their blogs, desists bloggers from disclosing sponsored posts.

I wonder what their stand is going to be!

Read the whole story in Business Week.

If you’re a blogger, this website is for you.

Since I started blogging 14 months ago, I have so far created more than 500 blog posts.

Though I have been extremely cautious about not hurting anyone’s sentiment and beliefs, I actually wanted to know my limitations and rights as a blogger.

Today I came to know about a website named “electronic frontier foundation” whose main objective is to give bloggers a basic road map to the legal issues that may confront as a blogger, to let the bloggers know their rights, and to encourage them to blog freely with the knowledge that their legitimate speech is protected.

This website has all the Legal Guide for Bloggers, a collection of blogger-specific FAQs addressing everything from fair use to defamation law to workplace whistle-blowing.

Browse the website leisurely and share it with others.