As you may have heard, the FTC has been floating some possible updates to their “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising” and the Internet has been buzzing about it for quite awhile. There’s been a lot of undue whining about bloggers being expected to be honest, but the potentially troubling parts of these guidelines speak to what appears to be an FTC belief in some sort of communications caste system, wherein disclosure requirements differ, depending on who you are. Alas, they don’t really define these differences very well. While a great deal of the coverage getting hype seems to involve “mommy bloggers” hyping their sites and being outraged, let’s take a look at the actual language being used in the “material connections” section of these guidelines without getting into individual personalities. (more…)