The blogosphere has been up in arms over the last two weeks, ever since the Federal Trade Commission issued an update to its “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.” In the past, these guidelines have determined the kinds of research claims companies or celebrity endorsers can make about products in advertising. With the recent update, though, the FTC has chosen to extend its reach onto the Internet, applying its regulations to blogs, Facebook pages, even Twitter feeds.…

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This week, the New America Foundation called for government-mandated “Truth-in-Labeling” from the nation’s broadband service providers. They’ve even created a mock-up of what they think such a disclosure form should look like. In addition to fees, service limits, and contract terms, NAF would like the disclosures to include information such as minimum reliability, maximum latency, and a service guarantee.

While it’s true that the actual speed a user experiences is often a fraction of the advertised speed, this isn’t secret knowledge.…

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The long-awaited collaboration of Microsoft and Yahoo on search has the tech business community abuzz. CEI analysts Wayne Crews and Ryan Young made their original statements here. Media outlets immediately took note, as seen in this Investor’s Business Daily story (posted, fitting enough, at Yahoo Finance) from yesterday:

Ryan Young, a fellow of regulatory studies at the Competitive Enterprise Institute, says the deal should be approved.

“It will make Google stay on its toes,” he said. “Bing and Yahoo should improve from the…

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So much for the idyllic “free information” model of the internet. The Federal Trade Commission is drafting new rules that would extend its authority to encompass bloggers who promote products in exchange for compensation or giveaways. The FTC’s new oversight could be quite extensive, even covering the common marketing practice of affiliate links, as the Associated Press reports:

New guidelines, expected to be approved late this summer with possible modifications, would clarify that the agency can go after bloggers — as well as the companies that compensate…

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Back in January I wrote about several advertising industry trade associations coming together to impose self-regulation in an attempt to deter federal regulation of behavioral advertising under the Obama administration. I pointed out that the Federal Trade Commission had advised the advertising industry back in December 2007 that it were pushing the envelope on what the FTC considered to be reasonable behavioral advertising. It seems as though the industry may have viewed this as an idle threat under the Bush administration,…

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Apple's 1984 "Big Brother" ad

An article over at Ad Age brings up an angle on the whole auto industry bailout probably not considered much before.  The fact that a yet-to-be-appointed “car czar” will have control over a multibillion dollar advertising budget for the big three.  Under the guise of “oversight,” this would effectively “Create World’s Most Powerful Marketing Exec[utive].”  

The draft rescue plan for Detroit sent to the White House by Congress yesterday calls for the appointment of a “car czar”…

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The Yahoo-Google ad deal looks like it’s dead.  The deal announced in June, would have allowed Google ads to appear on Yahoo search results.  Yahoo estimated an $800 million profit during the frist year of the Google ad partnership and would have allowed Yahoo to continue its transion from search to content provider, making it a much more competitive company.

What has likely killed the deal?  As stated in a Reuters article:

The two Internet companies have so far failed to reach an…

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The presidential campaign of a certain U.S. senator has just expanded the bounds of the political advertising universe with in-game ads inside popular EA gaming titles.

Racing towards hope?

The ads can be seen in nine popular titles, including “Madden NFL 09,” “Need For Speed: Carbon,” “Burnout Paradise.” I’m assuming this is the first time the campaign has intentionally associated itself with that last phrase.

For U.S. senator Barack Obama, that means being the first presidential candidate to buy ad space inside a…

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As an indicator of how perverse wealth-draining antitrust policy has become, have a look at the “concessions” being squeezed out of Google and Yahoo on their proposed advertising collaboration.

In the communications realm, it used to be that the heavy-metal infrastructure companies were regarded as monopolistic or potentially so. Then, wise regulators feared the Windows desktop surely was an essential facility to which competitors deserved access. Now, “mere” content companies are the monopolies.

Think about it; websites–code!!–are being regarded as something regulators…

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