Steve Ellis : EU law to expose fake blogs and self-serving online reviewers

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EU law to expose fake blogs and self-serving online reviewers

I missed this story in Saturday's Times Online but its subsequently stirred up a few comments at Church of the Customer and Slashdot.

In outline terms, new EU consumer protection laws will prevent companies misrepresenting themselves as consumers. Whether by design or accident is unclear, but it is likely that this law will embrace blog posts, comments and online reviews. Companies (or their agents) creating blogs or masquerading as consumers in posts, comments or reviews will fall foul of the law from December 31st 2007.

Some of the blog feedback is a bit sceptical regarding the feasibility of enforcement and the obvious ways of avoiding detection.

But I think this new EU law is great (and I never thought I'd say that).

It brings clarity to a grey and murky area in our industry. One where ethics are likely to be sidelined by short term expedient and the simple pursuit of cash. Now no-one can be in any doubt about right and wrong. We don't need to defer to codes of ethics or interpretations of good practice. It's now very simple: any company or agency that transgresses will pay the price in the law.

Tags: Times Online, EU, Church of the Customer, SlashDot

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Published 12 Feb 2007 by Steve Ellis
Filed Under: Blogging, Marketing

Comments

	re: said: I wonder how they expect to determine what is a company action and what is a consumer action? For example, if a random Amazon or Wal-Mart employee replies on a blog, who is replying? A "company misrepresenting itself as a consumer"? A "consumer who may or may not have an interest* or inside knowledge"? Something else? *By "an interest" I mean: employee may be directly involved with the topic under discussion and benefit by talking it up; employee may be in an internal competition where the employee benefits by making negative comments; the employee (or former employee) may be disgrunted. February 12, 2007 18:24
	re: EU said: I often wonder when I read reviews online that are either extremely positive or negative whether they were written by inside sources, so I try to pay more attention to general trends in the reviews. While I like the idea of having some clarity in this realm, perhaps some common sense is all that is needed? February 23, 2007 18:25
	re: EU law said: While I support the idea behind the law, there isn't ANY way to enforce it. The only thing a law like this would do is accidentally prosecute the fumbling company every blue moon. For companies who use it as a model of daily business practice, they will be so far ahead of the technology curve that they'll be laughing all the way to the bank. Even if that were not true- most net based laws are simply years behind the latest trend, by the time this gets inked there will be ten new ways that companies will be playing with. February 24, 2007 06:56