Just thought I'd give those of you haven't heard the news a heads up. The FTC has just made our lives a little more complicated by changing its policy on endoursement to include new media1. Some of the new ideas include counting books received from publishers as compensation, which will have to be included in your income taxes unless returned to the publisher2. The law will be enforced starting Dec1. If you have anyquestions you'd like to ask the bigwigs about this, head on over to Sarah's {random} Musings, she'll calling them up on Monday to see if they can't shin some light on the subject.
Here's a link to an article at MSNBC that explains it better than I ever could, and one for an interview with one of the bigshots at the FTC.
The main issue seems to be disclosing where you got the books. My question is: Does the IMM meme count as disclosure? Also, I do this for fun, not to make money! Why do they have to complicate my life by bringing income taxes into the equation?
Let me know what y'all think of this change in policy,
Zombie Girrrl
footnotes__________________________________________________
1 FYI: We're the new media.
2 You read right, they want us to return the books after we review them.
7 comments:
The change in disclosing that the items came from the publisher/author for review doesn't bother me. I say where the books came from anyways.
I went to the IRS' website and it doesn't state anything. I am willing to bet that the ones that they would be cracking down on, are the bloggers who receive computers, cars, tvs, the big dogs.
Items under valued under a specific amount are usually not countable. ARCs have NO value whatsoever.
I will talk to my accounting law instructor for more specifics as he up to date on all the new laws and I am just a newbie.
Are you kidding me? This is ridiculous. You're right, we do this for fun. It's not a money maker. I'm so disgusted with govt. Let's give losing companies billions of dollars and stick it to regular guys like us because we read books? Don't get me started! Excuse me while I go scream in my pillow.
Oh yeah I read about this too. And Daaamn what is happening tot the world?!!?
Come pick up your award! http://lafemmereaders.blogspot.com/2009/10/dragons-loyalty-award.html
You usually have to make so much in crafts before you have to declare it as income, this may be the same. However, as you said... ARCs really have no monetary value and are used to give away, so I'm not sure how it would work.
Yeah, I'm betting it'll have a value minimum on it...so maybe if you could actually make money on all the reviews you did...??? who knows, there's no way they could really enforce it anyway! Thanks for bringing this up, though, it's good to know what's going on!
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