Articles Tagged with Comments

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News from Oregon Legal Research Central:

1) We now have a Tag Cloud at the blog (right side, scroll down). Let me know if it works for you or if there is another way you like to find subject-specific blog posts, which leads to the second change ….

2) We’ve also changed the Comment functionality so people can Comment without having to log in. Yay! I hadn’t realized that logging in was necessary and once I found out I went to our fab-host, Justia, to fix the problem. They did so promptly!  (And thank you also to our reader who emailed us directly when she realized the log-in/privacy problem – and the disincentive to Commenting it presented.)

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I was working on a blog post featuring studies that show the flow of tax dollars from taxpayers, to federal general funds pools, and then back to the states (and then presumably back to taxpayers), when I ran across a blogger’s instructions to readers who Comment. The instructions are worth quoting, and worth reading.

From Barry Ritholtz at Think Tank (scroll down to the post’s Comments section to see these instructions):

Comments
Please use the comments to demonstrate your own ignorance, unfamiliarity with empirical data, ability to repeat discredited memes, and lack of respect for scientific knowledge. Also, be sure to create straw men and argue against things I have neither said nor even implied. Any irrelevancies you can mention will also be appreciated. Lastly, kindly forgo all civility in your discourse . . . you are, after all, anonymous.
” [Link to blog post and instructions to Comment writers.]

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My roommate is a high-strung moron.”   This was the first line of a letter to The Ethicist” column, in the New York Times Magazine, September 18, 2011, and it reminded me that I wanted to blog about “Comments” policies.
This “my roommate is a moron” type of statement, and its close cousins (e.g. “my fat, ugly, stupid friend, sister, brother, mother,” etc.), will be familiar to anyone who writes online and allows Comments.  Comments can be useful, informative, responsive, educational, helpful, and thoughtful.  However, they generally are not.  I’m not sure why and won’t waste time wondering why not.
For practical purposes, though, it’s useful for blogs and websites to have a Comment Policy so readers and Commenters are forewarned about why they may see the Comments they do see and why their own Comments might not see the light of day.
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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.

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I’ve been talking a lot lately with others about public sector blogging and I thought it might be useful to start posting about the issue.

(And, some of the best, and most productive, discussions I’ve had have been with the people at the Multnomah County Library who drafted these: a) Social Software Policy for Multnomah County Library Users and b) Blog Comment Guidelines)

Blogging issues that arise in the Public Sector World include technological, budget, practical, policy, politics, and literary ones, and, of course, legal questions and puzzles. I’m sure there are others, but one has to start somewhere.

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I found this post about blog bullying (inter alia) interesting, primarily because it addresses some tough issues that need to be discussed among bloggers, who are becoming better and better at their craft: A Kierkegaardian Leap of Faith in Social Media: Does a Critical Remark About Opinions Expressed By a Commenter or Blogger On Another Blog Constitute Bullying (posted 8/18/08 on the Law Librarian blog).

I am often asked by new (and potentially new) bloggers to talk about blogging and this is a useful blog post to have them read before (homework!) we have that Talking Seriously About Blogging meeting. Most of what I talk, and am asked, about during these meetings are those Blog Housekeeping issues (hosting, domains, design, layout, etc.).

But there are also Blog Ethics, Blog Etiquette, Blog Protocol, and related issues that are equally important. For the sake of brevity, and the What Were You Thinking?! factor that is sometimes forgotten, I will call these the Grown-up Blogger Issues, for those of us who blog seriously or simply with an eye to staying on the side of the angels.

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As one of a small, but growing, number of Oregon legal bloggers (aka blawgers), I’m asked often to talk about blogging. (I’ve posted some of what I say here and here and here and here.)

It occurred to me that I haven’t blogged for the New Blawger about blog Comments (though I do talk about Comments when I talk to lawyers and librarians about blawging).

So, here goes:

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