Still seems like it leaves in a giant loophole for all of those overly-cheery reviews that start with, "This item was provided to me by the manufacturer in exchange for a fair and honest review!"
Still seems like it leaves in a giant loophole for all of those overly-cheery reviews that start with, "This item was provided to me by the manufacturer in exchange for a fair and honest review!"
edit: after RTFM, page 42, coupons are considered valuable:
> For the reasons explained in this section, the Commission is finalizing the definition of “purchase a consumer review” to mean to provide something of value, such as money, gift certificates, products, services, discounts, coupons, contest entries, or another review, in exchange for a consumer review.
I think that document is specifically about taxes and coupons. It is not intended to define "compensation" for every statue in California and certainly not for federally issued rules from the FTC.
Even then, that rule is about whether the coupon issuer is compensated when a coupon is used, NOT about if a customer is compensated if they are given a coupon.