Oregon Legal Research Blog
Every blogger has a “Comment” policy, written or unwritten. As “public sector” bloggers, we have responsibilities (to readers and employers) beyond our own narrow personal preferences.
I really like the Rules for Commenting that are posted at the Multnomah Law Library’s Social Software Policy for Multnomah County Library Users, and generally adhere to them myself:
Excerpt: “Rules for commenting
Protect your privacy. Do not post personally identifying information. Young people under age 18, especially, should not post information such as last name, school, age, phone number, address.
Posts containing the following are against library rules and will be deleted before posting or removed by library staff:
Copyright violations
Off topic comments
Commercial material/spam
Duplicated posts from the same individual
Obscene posts
Specific and imminent threats
Libelous comments
Images
By choosing to comment you agree to these rules.” … (Link to full Social Software Policy.)
More about Multnomah County Social Media policies in the public library and the public sector:
1) Example of an employee Social Software Policy.
2) Program materials from the excellent “Panic in the Blogosphere: The Library, Social Software and the First Amendment” presented at the Oregon Library Association April 3, 2009, by librarians Cindy Gibbon and Arlene Keller and Multnomah County attorney Bernadette Nunley