My son is 9. He invents new ways to augment the assault capabilities of his Nerf dart gun. This enterprise often involves trip wires and remote triggering mechanisms, as well as machine gun hide build-outs from his bunk bed ladder. Sometimes his ideas overshadow his ability to fashion a working prototype. He gets frustrated.

At least he was never shot down (forgive the pun) by the makers of his Nerf launcher. I’m not sure any number of “Edison didn’t always get it right the first time” speeches would fix the type of hurt like that levied on 8-year-old Harry Windsor, who sent an inspired crayon rendering of a new airplane design to Boeing Corporation, replete with firing capabilities.

Boeing responded with a form letter explaining why the company will not accept unsolicited design submissions. Windsor’s dad, a savvy new media-embracing ad man, responded the way the company should have – with a human touch, and a healthy dose of Twitter shame.

Boeing did acknowledge – through their own fledgling social media presence – that their human touch could itself use a little engineering.

Read the story from yesterday’s New York Times.

Is Twitter the cure for the common scrooge? What do you think?

Jack Shafer has a problem. In his post earlier this week for Slate, Shafer takes issue with the FTC’s new disclosure rules for bloggers, calling them “preposterous.” Simply stated, if a blogger is writing about a product or service he or she has received free of charge, that arrangement now needs to be clearly identified to the audience. The presumption, of course, is that a blogger’s review could possibly be swayed by the free schwag.

In editorial circles, it’s called payola. And in ethical editorial circles, it’s not tolerated. So why does Shafer have a problem?

He seems pretty blown away by the prospective fines. Yes, $11,000 is a lot. He also doesn’t like the scope of the rules, which he says are vague. But why not err on the side of caution? There are other reasons to do so, aside from fear of prosecution.

I’ve already seen the more sophisticated bloggers embrace the practice of disclosure as a matter of course.

I have a modest background in print publishing, where certain principles became second nature and have spilled over into my somewhat amateurish first foray into blogging. These include disclosure, and asking reprinting permission even when a Creative Commons license is available on the site. Aside from the legal implications now at issue, such practices go a long way in establishing credibility, which is a most valuable asset in social media. They also reinforce online relationships, without which social media would simply be “media.”

It’s really too bad the FTC had to step in on this frontier that many consider the last bastion of freedom of speech. It’s true you can’t believe everything you read and consumers need to practice their measure of due diligence. However, trade is trade – online and off – and the standard for each arena should be, well, standard.

Do you, like Shafer, feel this is just another “mad power grab” by a federal agency? Please share your comments.