EQUTE — Newly released guidelines show that the Federal Trade Commission is taking aim at bloggers’ pocketbooks, threatening $11,000 in fines per fraudulent post.

The guys over at WebProNews have a good write up of the new rules.

The FTC language is quite straightforward though, any connection between an advertiser and a publisher must be divulged.

The revised Guides also add new examples to illustrate the long standing principle that “material connections” (sometimes payments or free products) between advertisers and endorsers — connections that consumers would not expect — must be disclosed. These examples address what constitutes an endorsement when the message is conveyed by bloggers or other “word-of-mouth” marketers.

Further tweaking the guidelines, the FTC also makes a point to say old tricks to bypass rules will no longer apply.

In contrast to the 1980 version of the Guides — which allowed advertisers to describe unusual results in a testimonial as long as they included a disclaimer such as “results not typical” — the revised Guides no longer contain this safe harbor.

Since the FTC has brought no case against anyone thus far, it remains to be seen just how strict these rules are. For even the most prodigious floggers, this might only mean a few tweaks to their disclaimer.

How it affects big-name blogs, however, could be more interesting. What seem to be paid posts have been popping up with more frequency across the blogosphere as the recession has advertisers looking to reach farther on the cheap. If these big blogs are forced to divulge payments, free gifts or other perks to their readers, these paid posts could change drastically. Advertisers are less likely to jump on board the blogger’s credibility train, and bloggers will be less likely to trade that credibility for cash and gifts.

Overall though, this could be a good step for everyone and another baby step toward making bloggers reliable sources of news that can (and are) competing with the traditional news media.