dude. all this giveaway stuff is seriously going to give me a TOTAL hernia/stomach ulcer/migraine/leg cramps.
for the record:
i love giveaways. i love hosting giveaways. i love entering giveaways. i love the bloggers who host giveaways. if i enter your giveaway – it is because i love YOU and i love what you are giving away or know someone i could gift it to who would love it just as much as me.
and now for the “holy crap what the heck do i do now????” question:
facebook recently started cracking down on using them as a platform/method of entering or administering giveaways.
(for the full blown technical jargon list of rules click here or you can click here and have someone explain it to you in real life terms)
so you all know i have a shabby apple dress giveaway happening right now and part of their mandatory list of things i must do in order to host one is have you guys “like” their facebook page in order to enter.
in case you didn’t read the articles – the main thing is this is clearly a BIG facebook no-no and can cause facebook to delete my blog page and shabby apples’ blog page as well.
so now i’m trying to figure out if i should remove that as an entry to keep me and shabby apple from getting in trouble. i have an email in to shabby apple for clarification. i don’t know what will happen but i will proceed as fairly as i possibly can to make sure none of the entries are disqualified and that anyone new who enters the contest has the same chance of winning as the others.
i will definitely keep you guys posted! sorry about all this. 🙁
(also – unless shabby apple wises up and changes their methods, which hopefully they will, i will not be hosting any more giveaways for them… which sucks because I LOVE SHABBY APPLE. i’m so conflicted. UGH)
Yikes, Yikes, Yikes. 🙂
I don't get any mixed feelings from your post before, I clearly got that you love giveaways just some of the politics that come with you are disagreed with.
I'm not surprised about the Facebook thing, I had a feeling that would be bound to happen at some point. 🙁 If methods do change for the shabby apple giveaway, let me know! 🙂
Thank goodness there was at least one person who didn't get mixed signals from me! I'm so irritated with FB & shabby apple right now I could scream. Hopefully there will be some sort of resolution and QUICKLY. Surely I am not the first person to point this out to them!
OH wow! I actually didn't know that facebook had rules and guidelines for bloggers running giveaways! That is good to know.
Just curious – how DO you host a giveaway for Shabby Apple?? I've seen several but never knew how people did it.
They contacted me – I'm not sure if there is another way to go about it… But yes, Facebook has very clear cut (if not well publicized) instructions for giveaways and promotions. Evidently they have just recently been cracking down and enforcing the rules… So I don't know how long they have been in effect but now I'm all worried about it! 🙁
This totally freaks me out because I just put up a giveaway from Shabby Apple today too! Please let me know what you find out from Shabby Apple. If my blog got deleted I would DIE!
I will definitely pass along whatever information I get from them. I don't think they will delete your personal blog but they can take your blog facebook page down for being in violation of the TOS. I don't know what I'm going to do! Ack.
I didn't get any giveaway hatred vibes from you either, but this FB thing is news to me, and I have a giveaway right now where the sponsor requested "liking" their page as a mandatory entry too! (Yikes!) I'm going to pretend I don't know for now. Bummer!