Can I just point out that Lisbon Treaty has nothing to do with “England” our country is the United Kingdom

Great stuff as usual. Especially the document and posts by John Stackhouse, and John Frye’s “Narrative Intelligence” and …
I think the FTC rules include free books, coffee, coffee makers, … anything you “endorse” and didn’t buy or borrow through a normal route. It is in essence a COI (conflict of interest) statement. In science these days Journals require COI statements – so articles will either say no conflict or list a conflict (i.e. Prof. X consults for drug company Y or some such).

Karen Armstrong was on Tavis Smiley last night. Interesting interview…
Liked the idea of linking doctrine to practice…
http://video.pbs.org/video/1290691699/program/1127859226

It’s all to the best to disclose everything, even a review copy of a book, imho. No normal person will hold that against anybody and yet it keeps information clean and aboveboard. The last newspaper I worked for wouldn’t allow journalists to accept so much as 25? lanyard and that made me feel comfortable working there, though it could confuse people on the outside. Would that Congress had such rules and such a culture!! Any move in the direction of discouraging gifts and/or making them transparent is sorely needed!

On the “conservative” Bible translation, my first thought was: Why not use the KJV? Second, what do Bible scholars who know the original languages think of these translation choices, such as using volunteer instead of comrade?
I imagine this translation project is “payback” for many translations trying to be inclusive and that bothers me, because I think we forget that it can be numbing and soul-destroying not to have your full humanity reflected in the foundational text of your religion. Though inclusive translations have been ridiculed in petty ways, the underlying impulse is good-hearted, for lack of a better term, and I don’t quite get that impression from this new translation project, which to me sounds–”again”– like “payback time.” And it does hurt that when women and minorities have struggled to be part of a faith tradition that can seem to relegate them to second class citizenship and enforce and uphold their subordinate status, that respecting them (us) would be something to fight against. I think that at a time when we need to be pulling together as Christians, these project simply pull us apart.

Scot,
Thanks for the shout out about “narrative intelligence.” I appreciate your affirmation in the meanderings. Coming to G.R. any time in the near future?

John, we’re coming to GR in December to speak at Mars Hill.

So Scot and anyone else in the know,
Does this FCC ruling mean we bloggers and book reviewers need to acknowledge, via a disclaimer or something, every time we review a book that was provided to us as a “review copy”, free of charge?
And, is that retroactive? Do we need to go back and add a disclaimer to every book review article we’ve ever done?
Curious for some further details, thanks.

Amen to Diane’s concerns about the “project”. The tone seems to be set when the 1st 3 of their “ten guidelines”, are “against”, “not”, and “not” (along with their assessment that “there is no fully conservative translation of the Bible which satisfies” them).
Their main (Conservatpedia) page seems to focus much more on ideology – especially what they are against (anti-evolution, anti-media, anti-global warming concerns, anti-Obama) – than the Bible. Perhaps their time would be better spent considering the question “how, then are we to live out the Bible today?”. (Now where have we heard THAT before?)

The FTC is back peddling and apologizing for the confusion. New rule isn’t aimed at bloggers — http://bit.ly/2JbZTG

Brad, thanks for this, but I have to say I don’t think that article clarifies much. I spoke with a lawyer who told me he thinks the issue has to do more with celebrities pitching a product, getting paid handsomely for it, and not saying they were paid to pitch the product.

Re: The Conservative Bible Project. I was struck by this quote referencing Andy Schlafly, founder of Conservapedia, who apparently is also spearheading this project:
“He (Schlafly) also admitted in that same interview to not having read the Bible in Greek or Aramaic, yet still insisted that the original text was conservative, and that each of the English ‘translations get increasingly liberal.’”
Here’s a link. Scot, wasn’t it you who said (when we were discussing the TNIV) that a person who doesn’t know the original languages has no right to comment on whether a particular translation is good or not?

Mark, indeed I did.

Scot, the FTC thing is primarily aimed at sites that endorse and/or provide ratings of products or services in return for undisclosed fees. It’s not primarily about celebrities per se, but would include “popular” or “celebrity” bloggers. It’s mostly about “product rating” sites where the ratings really are paid advertisements rather than objective ratings. It’s probably safe to say that it won’t be applied strictly to the practice of reviewing books that have been received as free review copies, as that would impact print media as well as blogs and other electronic media. However, if a blog or website regularly receives free book review copies, it might be good to include a link somewhere on the site to a brief policy statement about how those copies are used.
Re: the John Stackhouse piece — I like Stackhouse, but personally I don’t see the point in such definitions. Read his definition of “Biblicist,” for example — does that really describe what Stackhouse himself and most of his colleagues at Regent College would say about the Bible, or does it require heaps of explanatory notes to make its intended meaning plain? Trying to define what is basically a “sensibility” with reference to these kinds of contained criteria seems like chasing the wind.

wait…was i supposed to pay you for the dust jacket endorsement you gave my book?