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EU Bans Sock-Puppet Blogs

Posted by kdawson on from the named-and-shamed dept.

PhilipMarlowe9000 writes in with news of a new EU directive that will take effect in the UK at the end of this year to ban "sock-puppet" reviews or websites, part of an EU-wide overhaul of consumer laws. From the article: "Businesses that write fake blog entries or create whole wesbites purporting to be created by customers will fall foul of a European directive banning them from 'falsely representing oneself as a consumer.' From December 31, when the change becomes law in the UK, they can be named and shamed by trading standards or taken to court. The Times has learnt that the new regulations also will apply to authors who praise their own books under a fake identity on websites such as Amazon."

7 of 393 comments (clear)

  1. Corporate personhood... by RyanFenton · · Score: 5, Interesting

    Are corporations considered legal persons in Europe in general? If not - then good on you, Europe - you have the possibility of standing up to corporations and being legally consistent in cases like this.

    Here, in order to enact a law like that, we'd have to take away the right from everyone, else have it overruled by courts.

    Ryan Fenton

    P.S. Yes, I do want to 'oppress' corporations, whenever they are in contest with the interests of most citizens.

    1. Re:Corporate personhood... by Turn-X+Alphonse · · Score: 2, Interesting

      At what point did ANYONE think it's sane to consider a corporation a person any way?

      I mean do we go "Oh there's that Christian person again" or "there is that Islam person again"? A group of people is a group of people, they are NOT mini parts of 1 entire person.

      --
      I like muppets.
  2. Re:"United States government politics" by Qzukk · · Score: 3, Interesting

    The US recently arrested British citizens for the crime of visiting the US between connecting flights (oh, and having founded and subsequently retired from a money transfer company used by online gambling sites at one time before such a thing was made illegal).

    It might be of interest to Americans to know that should they, or their company, or their former employer (all the way back to that job you worked evenings in high school), or any company that they might own stock in (or hold funds that hold stock in, etc) ever post any kind of positive review of themselves on the internet where it can be read in Europe, then you probably should schedule your flights to make sure none of them stop there.

    So it's still related, even if only on the idea that one of these days some European agency is going to decide to play tit-for-tat for some of the stupid shit America does to them.

    --
    If I have been able to see further than others, it is because I bought a pair of binoculars.
  3. Well. by TheSeer2 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    There also goes any kind of marketing that was actually interesting (ARGs and the like)

  4. Re:Before anyone says anything about free speech by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting
    You said:

    It should have included an exception for [copyright] [...] It did. It's called the Copyright Clause. It's not even an amendment, it's part of the original fucking text.

    To promote the Progress of Science and useful Arts, by securing for limited Times to Authors and Inventors the exclusive Right to their respective Writings and Discoveries. Without the Copyright Clause, the First Amendment would preclude copyrights as abridging the freedom of speech.

    However, what you fail to understand is that outlawing fraud is not the same thing as outlawing speech even though speaking is often the vehicle for fraud.

    It's not illegal to say "Here's a cheque, could you cash it for me? If you could advance me half of it now, that'd be great." It is illegal to do that knowing it's a bad cheque, in order to steal someone's money. It's not illegal to say the words, it's illegal to try to steal someone's money.

    In saying a company can't pretend to be a customer on its blog, again, it's not illegal to say the words. It's illegal to try to steal someone's money. In this case, by lying to them. It's fraud, just like uttering a bad cheque. It's the act, not the speech that is illegal. The speech, without the act, is perfectly legitimate.

    The fact that you can't distinguish between these concepts is irrelevant, but irritating.
  5. Life without astroturfing by rbanffy · · Score: 2, Interesting

    If the idea catches on, Sites like digg.com will have a lot less traffic. ;-)

    http://digg.com/offbeat_news/UK_fake_bloggers_soon _to_be_named_and_shamed

    --
    http://www.dieblinkenlights.com
  6. Re:Tor Network by webbod · · Score: 2, Interesting

    All the work may be wasted, but for the fact that the law will hold the company involved liable, not the people making the claims, see, on this side of the Atlantic laws are written to protect consumers from corporations and not the other way around.

    The law is intended to be Internet proof, if false claims are made then the company involved will have to either refute the claims or prove them at its own expense - kind of a ironic punishment - you exagerate about the desirability of your new product and then you have either carry out a large scale market research project to prove what you've said or you have to issue a public retraction stating that you made a mistake and nobody really likes your stuff after-all.

    Sounds like it was drafted with Steve Jobs and the Mac Cult in mind.