Disclosure

Last October, there was a ruling from the FTC that proposed
hefty fines for bloggers who fail to disclose “compensation” for
their reviews. It’s described in indignant detail on the
Teleread blog.

I’ve been ignoring that ruling. It certainly doesn’t apply
directly to me. I’m not organized enough to ask for free copies
of the books and DVD’s I review, and I certainly don’t have any
other direct compensation for what I do on this blog.

I don’t know how to explain my relationship with Google Adsense
in terms that won’t violate my agreement with them, but I found a
place to point
to that does.

When I link to products on Amazon.com, I allegedly get a cut if
you order them. But I really don’t think I’ve been telling you to
order the products unless I really like them, and I certainly
haven’t been telling anyone to get books or movies there unless
that’s really the way they like buying books and movies.

It’s been a long time since I actually got a check from either
of these programs.

I personally get almost all the movies I watch from Netflix. When I buy ebooks,
I get them from Fictionwise, which has a
much more enlightened policy on DRM than does Amazon, and a
discount structure that allows you to at least pretend you’re
getting a lot of free books. I get most of my hard copy books
from the library; if I think I really want to own a dead tree
copy, I either go to a bricks and mortar bookstore or order
online, often used.

Lots of the other things I buy I haven’t gotten from Amazon,
either, even if I pointed to the picture that Amazon keeps
online for us.