Astroturfing in Apple App Store needs to stop says the FTC

Apple has a good thing going with the App Store, the place for iPod Touch, iPhone and iPad applications. Various financial estimates place Apple’s annual profit at more than $ 400 million, and some consider that estimate to be conservative. That doesn’t appear to be enough money for Steve Jobs. He nevertheless refuses to work in the App store making it so things are a bit more honest. There is a lot of Astroturf marketing, meaning application owners give fake reviews to their own products that make the product look great. Knowing which applications are worth your time is much harder. This means it is even more difficult to pick applications. According to the New York Times, the Federal Trade Commission has had to intervene.

FTC wants the Astroturfing case by Reverb Communications to be settled

Reverb Communications, California marketing business, and Tracie Snitker who’s the key executive say it will remove from iTunes all fake apps within the store. Deceptive advertising is what Reverb is being charged for. This is because from November 2008 to May 2009, Reverb had its employees writing reviews for clients which were positive. These reviews were what caused more Astroturf reviewers to pay for the applications. The 60 game production clients of Reverb during that period involved noted software companies Digital Leisure, Harmonix and MTV Games. The FTC made it so the company was forbidden from “making comparable endorsements of any product or service without revealing any relevant connections.” This includes Reverb and even Snitker.

Snitker claims Reverb’s actions were legal

Apparently, Snitker thought Reverb just wanted to get over the legal fight and pay the fees but did nothing wrong. She said this after the FTC and Reverb came to an agreement. The App Store Reviews were under the exact same ruling as the FTC new rules the FTC was not yet enforcing. These rules say that bloggers can’t participate in product endorsement for pay.

Online advertising can be more truthful after the FTC’s actions, says Harvard Law Professor Jonathan Zittrain. “This case sort of shows that what they have in mind is not the individual blogger or Twitterer, but rather a professional endorser. When a client says ‘Where are my good reviews?’ you can say, ‘We can’t do it because it is illegal.’”

Further reading

NY Times

nytimes.com/2010/08/27/technology/27ftc.html?_r=5