The government is not smart, and the blogosphere is not always pure, no one can deny this. But the FTC is gathering its wits about itself to attempt to clean up the wild west of the blogosphere. With all luck Izea just had to go change their pants. Imagine strict rules on disclosure. Of everything from the smallest trinket to the affiliate link that sells the product you just reviewed.
Different world. Given the usual ineptitude of the government, I expect them to get this wrong. However, it is a decided step in the right direction. The blogosphere, if it is to supplant much of traditional journalism when the newspapers fall, must develop a more unified code of conduct to allow for more credibility to be given to both the authors, but also to the produced content.
We all recall the Arrington disaster recently on the Gillmore Gang. We do not need a repeat of that, but it raises a point: where did you get that gadget? What are the terms of use on it? When are you giving it back? Are you? etc. It’s just too bad that we did not do this ourselves, now Uncle Sam is going to spit in our cornflakes.
