Trunker, I agree with you, that the target is people with corporate sponsorship, like flogs (people actually paid to blog) and people with advertisers who earn money that way.
Unfortunately, people like me, that do not have advertisers (by choice) and do not get paid to do a blog are swept into this same group. I do get free copies from the publishers, but do review honestly and have never been asked to review one way or another by any publisher, nor would the free status influence my reviews. "Any publicity is good publicity" is what publishers tell me.
So I think people getting free laptops and Bahamian vacations and talk about them online should be forthcoming that those things were free, because I don't think people assume they are. But getting into a press showing of a movie, a convention, or a book or comic book? I would always assume the press got those things for free, anyway. I would never guess a film critic PAID to see a movie, so I think there is a line between "luxury items" ...say anything over $40.00... that should be stated, but reviews if items under $40.00 should be the reviewers choice to say or not. I think this because for such (relatively) small scale items there is little likelihood they will get a good review just because the publisher gave it to the reviewer. On the other hand, forcing the reviewer to reveal he got a $2.99 comic book for free makes his review, I think, sound suspect.
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Originally Posted by Kushaba
now that seems kind of stupid. i do oldschool game reviews on youtube. does that mean i have to start saying that i got these games for free? even though the company that made the game has gone out of buissnes and the media for that system is deemed opsoleet?
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Are you getting the titles from a licensor of the titles?
Twitter and Facebook are also supposed to be covered, but I have seen no talk about online videos, or podcasts, so I do not know.