There are strict rules applied in India and elsewhere when it comes to financial disclosures regarding Investment advisory services even on Business channels. The disclosure norms were somehow missing in blogosphere but it seems even it will come under jurisdiction looking at the buzz its generating offlate.
In US Federal Trade Commission (FTC) has hinted that it would revise the disclosure rules so as to include bloggers and celebrities under its purview. The revised rule would require bloggers to disclose their relationship with the product companies they are reviewing or reporting about on their blogs or site. The rules also requires celebrities to disclose their relationship with the endorsed brands on social media platforms.
Richard Cleland, Assistant Director of the division of advertising practices, FTC said, “We were looking and seeing the significance of social media marketing in the 21st century and we thought it was time to explain the principles of transparency and truth in advertising and apply them to social media marketing. Which isn’t to say that we saw a huge problem out there that was imperative to address.”
The new rules would apply from December 1 and seems to be a great step looking at the amount of traffic online blogs generate. Many blogs even go on to receive free gifts from companies and sometimes even give biased reviews. The strict approach on them seems correct looking at the enormous percentage of online shoppers taking their financial decisions after reading their news and reviews.
The norms regarding Business blogs are although not specified but needs to be tightened considering many companies now-a-days pay money to find mention online. This sometimes leads to upsurge of false and baked rumors thus increasing company repo and share prices by evil means.
Should India adopt the same approach?
Indian Government in recent times has been very strict on financial disclosures on television and has also laid down the same transparency for telecom plans and TV reality shows. The same approach should be adopted for the blogosphere as it is seriously giving traditional media a run for their money, in terms of awareness and influence. Disclosure should not be a domain only of large blogs with large reach but even scattered blogs should implement it.
India should adopt a guideline asking all bloggers and celebrities using online medium to disclose their relationship with the endorsed companies. This would help in mitigating more transparency and fear among people misusing the Internet power and practising “get-away-with-anything”” approach.
We would like to know from our readers - if these transparency norms introduced in India would boost public confidence in trusting the blogosphere?
Nice article, thanks