Inhabitat’s Jill Fehrenbacher and her cross-country editors are hosting Adobe Connect Pro-powered webinars around green architecture and design in Boston, Chicago, and San Francisco. The Green Talks speaker series features conversations with civil and sustainability leaders discussing their expert ideas for improving cities.

The next Green Talks webinar is coming up tomorrow (Wednesday) about the current state of sustainability in San Francisco will feature Mayor Gavin Newsom in conversation with Fehrenbacher and Inhabitat Managing Editor Mike Chino.

Register now!

Check out the new Brown Edition of popurls – delivered by UPS.

This is a new UPS Sponsored section of popurls that curates the best business content from all over the web.

We’ve also created original videos featuring some of our star authors — Anita Campbell from Small Business Trends, Matt Marshall from Venture Beat, Mike Masnick from Tech Dirt, and Adam Ostrow from Mashable — working at the whiteboard to bring their content to life.

The videos are launching on a weekly basis through the duration of the campaign, where the authors will write, draw and muse upon various topicss from “How to Launch A  New Product” to how to most productively “Track Trending Topics” online. Here’s the latest from Mashable’s Adam Ostrow. Check it out:

It’s always nice to be recognized in the industry press. Today we made Mediaweek’s annual “hotlist,” a group of 10 media companies recognized for their innovation and industry leadership.

The list also includes the likes of Faceboook, Twitter, Hulu, Wall Street Journal. We’re quite proud to be counted among such great companies. Thanks Mediaweek!!

Coupled with our emergence onto comScore’s top 50 Web properties (top 10 conversational media properties), we’ve had a fun couple of months.

Via Mediaweek:

As the digital industry gets back on its feet after a bruising 2009, expect these 10 leaders on our Digital Hot List, as well as the e-reader purveyors, to lead the way to recovery.

Under fire from nervous bloggers everywhere, the FTC has clarified its earlier statements regarding the new FTC guidelines. It now says it won’t be targeting bloggers, but advertisers.

Let’s be clear: FM advertisers have NOTHING to worry about. FM does not do pay-per-tweet, pay-per-post, or anything of the sort. And all of FM’s work meets these three golden rules: It’s authentic, it’s transparent (this is where the FTC comes in) and it adds value. See here for more thoughts on the FTC guidelines.

Via The Wall Street Journal:

In an attempt to clarify misconceptions that the FTC now will be mining the blogosphere for unsavory endorsements, Engle said the FTC’s focus has always been on “bad actor” advertisers.

“If a marketing company is paying people per blog or per tweet and not disclosing that in a large marketing scheme, then we can bring an investigation and that can lead to a lawsuit against the company,” Engle said.

Boing Boing’s Xeni Jardin made an appearance on MSNBC’s Rachel Maddow Show regarding a kerfuffle over a ridiculously photoshopped Ralph Lauren ad.

Yet another example of how Boing Boing, among other FMers, often plays influencer to the mainstream media. Check it out:

On Monday, the Federal Trade Commission rolled out an update to its “Guides Concerning the Use of Endorsements and Testimonials in Advertising.” See some of the news coverage here, here and here. The official FTC announcement is here.
The last time the guidelines were updated was 1980. That’s WAY before blogs, social networks, Twitter et al. Heck, the term Internet had barely been coined and the media infrastructure we enjoy today was just a dream (if that).
So now the FTC has updated its guides to include the likes of celebrity endorsers, bloggers and Twitter users. What’s the news? In essence, the FTC now requires that material relationships be disclosed. If a blogger is paid by a marketer or gets free products for reviews, he or she must disclose it.
At FM, we applaud the spirit of the new FTC guidelines. While some see this as government overreach (a legitimate concern), we feel that it’s a good baseline position for all media to adopt.
At FM, transparency and authenticity are basic, foundational principles in everything we do and, in this sense, I’m proud to say we were WAY ahead of the game. See here for FM’s Mores – originally drafted in 2005 and revised in 2007.
Transparency and authenticity are good for the entire media ecosystem because they 1) protect the credibility of media creators, 2) create a quality media experience for the end-user and 3) offer a safe, effective advertising environment for the marketer. If the FTC’s new guidelines help bring more folks onboard with these foundational principles, more power to them!

Prior to joining Federated Media as the Southwest Sales Director, Jamie was at Yahoo! for the past 3 years working primarily as the sales lead for Yahoo! Movies within the Entertainment Group. At Yahoo!, Jamie worked closely with advertising partners in the Entertainment category and over 100 key accounts across the country. Jamie’s previous positions have been spread out over entertainment and media companies such as Fox’s FX Network, WB, Hallmark Channel, as well as Movieline Magazine and the Los Angeles Times. Jamie lives in Marina Del Rey with her husband, 7 month old daughter Amelie and her dog Bagel. Welcome, Jamie!