service with same name, see Blogger
(service) . For other uses, see Blog
(disambiguation) .
Not to be confused with .blog .
A blog (a truncation of the expression
" weblog") [1] is a discussion or informational
website published on the World Wide Web
consisting of discrete, often informal diary -style
text entries ("posts"). Posts are typically
displayed in reverse chronological order, so that
the most recent post appears first, at the top of
the web page. Until 2009, blogs were usually the
work of a single individual, [ citation needed]
occasionally of a small group, and often covered
a single subject or topic. In the 2010s, "multi-
author blogs" (MABs) have developed, with posts
written by large numbers of authors and
sometimes professionally edited. MABs from
newspapers , other media outlets, universities,
think tanks , advocacy groups, and similar
institutions account for an increasing quantity of
blog traffic. The rise of Twitter and other
" microblogging" systems helps integrate MABs
and single-author blogs into the news media.
Blog can also be used as a verb, meaning to
maintain or add content to a blog .
The emergence and growth of blogs in the late
1990s coincided with the advent of web
publishing tools that facilitated the posting of
content by non-technical users who did not have
much experience with HTML or computer
programming. Previously, a knowledge of such
technologies as HTML and File Transfer Protocol
had been required to publish content on the
Web, and early Web users therefore tended to be
hackers and computer enthusiasts. In the 2010s,
the majority are interactive Web 2.0 websites,
allowing visitors to leave online comments, and
it is this interactivity that distinguishes them
from other static websites. [2] In that sense,
blogging can be seen as a form of social
networking service . Indeed, bloggers do not only
produce content to post on their blogs, but also
often build social relations with their readers and
other bloggers. [3] However, there are high-
readership blogs which do not allow comments.
Many blogs provide commentary on a particular
subject or topic, ranging from politics to sports.
Others function as more personal online diaries,
and others function more as online brand
advertising of a particular individual or company.
A typical blog combines text, digital images, and
links to other blogs, web pages , and other media
related to its topic. The ability of readers to
leave publicly viewable comments, and interact
with other commenters, is an important
contribution to the popularity of many blogs.
However, blog owners or authors often moderate
and filter online comments to remove hate
speech or other offensive content. Most blogs
are primarily textual, although some focus on art
( art blogs), photographs ( photoblogs), videos
( video blogs or "vlogs"), music ( MP3 blogs), and
audio (podcasts ). In education, blogs can be
used as instructional resources. These blogs are
referred to as edublogs . Microblogging is
another type of blogging, featuring very short
posts.
On 16 February 2011, there were over
156 million public blogs in existence. On 20
February 2014, there were around 172 million
Tumblr [4] and 75.8 million WordPress [5] blogs
in existence worldwide. According to critics and
other bloggers, Blogger is the most popular
blogging service used today. However, Blogger
does not offer public statistics. [6][7] Technorati
lists 1.3 million blogs as of February 22,
2014. [8]
History
Early example of a "diary" style blog
consisting of text and images
transmitted wirelessly in real time from
a wearable computer with head-up
display , 22 February 1995
Main articles: History of blogging and online
diary
The term "weblog" was coined by Jorn Barger [9]
on 17 December 1997. The short form, "blog",
was coined by Peter Merholz, who jokingly broke
the word weblog into the phrase we blog in the
sidebar of his blog Peterme.com in April or May
1999. [10][11][12] Shortly thereafter, Evan
Williams at Pyra Labs used "blog" as both a
noun and verb ("to blog", meaning "to edit one's
weblog or to post to one's weblog") and devised
the term "blogger" in connection with Pyra Labs'
Blogger product, leading to the popularization of
the terms. [13]
Origins
Before blogging became popular, digital
communities took many forms including Usenet ,
commercial online services such as GEnie , Byte
Information Exchange (BIX) and the early
CompuServe, e-mail lists , [14] and Bulletin Board
Systems (BBS). In the 1990s, Internet forum
software created running conversations with
"threads". Threads are topical connections
between messages on a virtual "corkboard ".
From 14 June 1993, Mosaic Communications
Corporation maintained their "What’s New" [15]
list of new websites, updated daily and archived
monthly. The page was accessible by a special
"What's New" button in the Mosaic web browser.
The modern blog evolved from the online diary
where people would keep a running account of
the events in their personal lives. Most such
writers called themselves diarists, journalists, or
journalers. Justin Hall , who began personal
blogging in 1994 while a student at Swarthmore
College, is generally recognized as one of the
earlier bloggers, [16] as is Jerry Pournelle . [17]
Dave Winer's Scripting News is also credited
with being one of the older and longer running
weblogs. [18][19] The Australian Netguide
magazine maintained the Daily Net News[20] on
their web site from 1996. Daily Net News ran
links and daily reviews of new websites, mostly
in Australia.
Another early blog was Wearable Wireless
Webcam, an online shared diary of a person's
personal life combining text, digital video, and
digital pictures transmitted live from a wearable
computer and EyeTap device to a web site in
1994. This practice of semi-automated blogging
with live video together with text was referred to
as sousveillance , and such journals were also
used as evidence in legal matters. Early blogs
were simply manually updated components of
common Websites . However, the evolution of
electronic and software tools to facilitate the
production and maintenance of Web articles
posted in reverse chronological order made the
publishing process feasible to a much larger and
less technical population. Ultimately, this
resulted in the distinct class of online publishing
that produces blogs we recognize today. For
instance, the use of some sort of browser-based
software is now a typical aspect of "blogging".
Blogs can be hosted by dedicated blog hosting
services , on regular web hosting services , or run
using blog software. Some early bloggers, such
as The Misanthropic Bitch, who began in 1997,
actually referred to their online presence as a
zine , before the term blog entered common
usage.
Rise in popularity
After a slow start, blogging rapidly gained in
popularity. Blog usage spread during 1999 and
the years following, being further popularized by
the near-simultaneous arrival of the first hosted
blog tools:
Bruce Ableson launched Open Diary in
October 1998, which soon grew to thousands
of online diaries. Open Diary innovated the
reader comment, becoming the first blog
community where readers could add
comments to other writers' blog entries.
Brad Fitzpatrick started LiveJournal in March
1999.
Andrew Smales created Pitas.com in July
1999 as an easier alternative to maintaining a
"news page" on a Web site, followed by
DiaryLand in September 1999, focusing more
on a personal diary community. [21]
Evan Williams and Meg Hourihan ( Pyra Labs )
launched Blogger.com in August 1999
(purchased by Google in February 2003)
Political impact
On 6 December 2002, Josh Marshall's
talkingpointsmemo.com blog called
attention to U.S. Senator Lott's
comments regarding Senator Thurmond.
Senator Lott was eventually to resign his
Senate leadership position over the
matter.
An early milestone in the rise in importance of
blogs came in 2002, when many bloggers
focused on comments by U.S. Senate Majority
Leader Trent Lott. [22] Senator Lott, at a party
honoring U.S. Senator Strom Thurmond, praised
Senator Thurmond by suggesting that the United
States would have been better off had Thurmond
been elected president. Lott's critics saw these
comments as a tacit approval of racial
segregation , a policy advocated by Thurmond's
1948 presidential campaign . This view was
reinforced by documents and recorded interviews
dug up by bloggers. (See Josh Marshall 's
Talking Points Memo .) Though Lott's comments
were made at a public event attended by the
media, no major media organizations reported
on his controversial comments until after blogs
broke the story. Blogging helped to create a
political crisis that forced Lott to step down as
majority leader.
Similarly, blogs were among the driving forces
behind the "Rathergate" scandal. To wit:
(television journalist) Dan Rather presented
documents (on the CBS show 60 Minutes) that
conflicted with accepted accounts of President
Bush's military service record. Bloggers declared
the documents to be forgeries and presented
evidence and arguments in support of that view.
Consequently, CBS apologized for what it said
were inadequate reporting techniques (see Little
Green Footballs). Many bloggers view this
scandal as the advent of blogs' acceptance by
the mass media, both as a news source and
opinion and as means of applying political
pressure. [ original research? ] The impact of these
stories gave greater credibility to blogs as a
medium of news dissemination. Though often
seen as partisan gossips, [ citation needed ]
bloggers sometimes lead the way in bringing
key information to public light, with mainstream
media having to follow their lead. More often,
however, news blogs tend to react to material
already published by the mainstream media.
Meanwhile, an increasing number of experts
blogged, making blogs a source of in-depth
analysis. [ original research? ]
In Russia, some political bloggers have started
to challenge the dominance of official,
overwhelmingly pro-government media. Bloggers
such as Rustem Adagamov and Alexei Navalny
have many followers and the latter's nickname
for the ruling United Russia party as the "party of
crooks and thieves" has been adopted by anti-
regime protesters. [23] This led to the Wall Street
Journal calling Navalny "the man Vladimir Putin
fears most" in March 2012. [24]
Mainstream popularity
By 2004, the role of blogs became increasingly
mainstream, as political consultants , news
services, and candidates began using them as
tools for outreach and opinion forming. Blogging
was established by politicians and political
candidates to express opinions on war and other
issues and cemented blogs' role as a news
source. (See Howard Dean and Wesley Clark.)
Even politicians not actively campaigning, such
as the UK's Labour Party's MP Tom Watson,
began to blog to bond with constituents. In
January 2005, Fortune magazine listed eight
bloggers whom business people "could not
ignore": Peter Rojas, Xeni Jardin , Ben Trott,
Mena Trott, Jonathan Schwartz, Jason Goldman,
Robert Scoble , and Jason Calacanis . [25]
Israel was among the first national governments
to set up an official blog. [26] Under David
Saranga , the Israeli Ministry of Foreign Affairs
became active in adopting Web 2.0 initiatives,
including an official video blog[26] and a
political blog . [27] The Foreign Ministry also held
a microblogging press conference via Twitter
about its war with Hamas , with Saranga
answering questions from the public in common
text-messaging abbreviations during a live
worldwide press conference . [28] The questions
and answers were later posted on IsraelPolitik ,
the country's official political blog. [29]
The impact of blogging upon the mainstream
media has also been acknowledged by
governments. In 2009, the presence of the
American journalism industry had declined to the
point that several newspaper corporations were
filing for bankruptcy, resulting in less direct
competition between newspapers within the
same circulation area. Discussion emerged as to
whether the newspaper industry would benefit
from a stimulus package by the federal
government. U.S. President Barack Obama
acknowledged the emerging influence of
blogging upon society by saying "if the direction
of the news is all blogosphere, all opinions, with
no serious fact-checking, no serious attempts to
put stories in context, then what you will end up
getting is people shouting at each other across
the void but not a lot of mutual
understanding”. [30] Between 2009 and 2012, an
Orwell Prize for blogging was awarded.
Types
A screenshot from the BlogActive
website.
There are many different types of blogs, differing
not only in the type of content, but also in the
way that content is delivered or written.
Personal blogs
The personal blog is an ongoing online diary
or commentary written by an individual, rather
than a corporation or organization. While the
vast majority of personal blogs attract very
few readers, other than the blogger's
immediate family and friends, a small number
of personal blogs have become popular, to
the point that they have attracted lucrative
advertising sponsorship. A tiny number of
personal bloggers have become famous, both
in the online community and in the real world.
Collaborative blogs or group blogs
A type of weblog in which posts are written
and published by more than one author. The
majority of high-profile collaborative blogs are
based around a single uniting theme, such as
politics, technology or advocacy. In recent
years, the blogosphere has seen the
emergence and growing popularity of more
collaborative efforts, often set up by already
established bloggers wishing to pool time
and resources, both to reduce the pressure of
maintaining a popular website and to attract a
larger readership.
Microblogging
Microblogging is the practice of posting
small pieces of digital content—which could
be text, pictures, links, short videos, or other
media—on the Internet. Microblogging offers
a portable communication mode that feels
organic and spontaneous to many users. It
has captured the public imagination, in part
because the short posts are easy to read on
the go or when waiting. Friends use it to keep
in touch, business associates use it to
coordinate meetings or share useful
resources, and celebrities and politicians (or
their publicists) microblog about concert
dates, lectures, book releases, or tour
schedules. A wide and growing range of add-
on tools enables sophisticated updates and
interaction with other applications. The
resulting profusion of functionality is helping
to define new possibilities for this type of
communication. [31] Examples of these
include Twitter , Facebook , Tumblr and, by far
the largest, WeiBo .
Corporate and organizational blogs
A blog can be private, as in most cases, or it
can be for business or not-for-profit
organization or government purposes. Blogs
used internally, and only available to
employees via an Intranet are called corporate
blogs. Companies use internal corporate
blogs enhance the communication, culture
and employee engagement in a corporation.
Internal corporate blogs can be used to
communicate news about company policies
or procedures, build employee esprit de corps
and improve morale. Companies and other
organizations also use external, publicly
accessible blogs for marketing , branding , or
public relations purposes. Some organizations
have a blog authored by their executive; in
practice, many of these executive blog posts
are penned by a ghostwriter , who makes
posts in the style of the credited author.
Similar blogs for clubs and societies are
called club blogs, group blogs, or by similar
names; typical use is to inform members and
other interested parties of club and member
activities.
Aggregated blogs
Individuals or organization may aggregate
selected feeds on specific topic, product or
service and provide combined view for its
readers. This allows readers to concentrate
on reading instead of searching for quality on-
topic content and managing subscriptions.
Many such aggregation called planets from
name of Planet (software) that perform such
aggregation, hosting sites usually have planet.
subdomain in domain name (like http://
planet.gnome.org/ ).
By genre
Some blogs focus on a particular subject,
such as political blogs, journalism blogs,
health blogs, travel blogs (also known as
travelogs ), gardening blogs, house blogs,
book blogs, [32][33] fashion blogs, beauty
blogs, lifestyle blogs, party blogs, wedding
blogs, photography blogs, project blogs,
psychology blogs, sociology blogs, education
blogs, niche blogs, classical music blogs,
quizzing blogs, legal blogs (often referred to
as a blawgs), or dreamlogs. How-to /Tutorial
blogs are becoming increasing popular. [34]
Two common types of genre blogs are art
blogs and music blogs. A blog featuring
discussions especially about home and family
is not uncommonly called a mom blog and
one made popular is by Erica Diamond who
created Womenonthefence.com which is
syndicated to over two million readers
monthly. [35][36][37][38][39][40] While not a
legitimate type of blog, one used for the sole
purpose of spamming is known as a splog.
By media type
A blog comprising videos is called a vlog ,
one comprising links is called a linklog, a site
containing a portfolio of sketches is called a
sketchblog or one comprising photos is
called a photoblog . Blogs with shorter posts
and mixed media types are called
tumblelogs. Blogs that are written on
typewriters and then scanned are called
typecast or typecast blogs. A rare type of
blog hosted on the Gopher Protocol is known
as a phlog.
By device
A blog can also be defined by which type of
device is used to compose it. A blog written
by a mobile device like a mobile phone or
PDA could be called a moblog . [41] One early
blog was Wearable Wireless Webcam, an
online shared diary of a person's personal life
combining text, video, and pictures
transmitted live from a wearable computer
and EyeTap device to a web site. This
practice of semi-automated blogging with live
video together with text was referred to as
sousveillance. Such journals have been used
as evidence in legal matters. [ citation needed ]
Reverse blog
A reverse blog is composed by its users
rather than a single blogger. This system has
the characteristics of a blog, and the writing
of several authors. These can be written by
several contributing authors on a topic, or
opened up for anyone to write. There is
typically some limit to the number of entries
to keep it from operating like a web
forum . [ citation needed ]
Community and cataloging
An artist's depiction of the
interconnections between blogs and
blog authors in the " blogosphere " in
2007.
Blogosphere
The collective community of all blogs and
blog authors, particularly notable and widely
read blogs, is known as the blogosphere .
Since all blogs are on the internet by
definition, they may be seen as
interconnected and socially networked,
through blogrolls, comments, linkbacks
(refbacks, trackbacks or pingbacks), and
backlinks. Discussions "in the blogosphere"
are occasionally used by the media as a
gauge of public opinion on various issues.
Because new, untapped communities of
bloggers and their readers can emerge in the
space of a few years, Internet marketers pay
close attention to "trends in the
blogosphere". [42]
Blog search engines
Several blog search engines have been used
to search blog contents, such as Bloglines ,
BlogScope , and Technorati . Technorati was
one of the more popular blog search engines,
but the website stopped indexing blogs and
assigning authority scores in May 2014. The
research community is working on going
beyond simple keyword search, by inventing
new ways to navigate through huge amounts
of information present in the blogosphere , as
demonstrated by projects like BlogScope ,
which was shut down in
2012. [ citation needed ]
Blogging communities and directories
Several online communities exist that connect
people to blogs and bloggers to other
bloggers. Some of these communities include
Indiblogger, Blogadda, Blog Chatter,
BlogCatalog and MyBlogLog. [43] Interest-
specific blogging platforms are also available.
For instance, Blogster has a sizable
community of political bloggers among its
members. Global Voices aggregates
international bloggers, "with emphasis on
voices that are not ordinarily heard in
international mainstream media." [44]
Blogging and advertising
It is common for blogs to feature banner
advertisements or promotional content, either
to financially benefit the blogger, support
website hosting costs, or to promote the
blogger's favorite causes or products. The
popularity of blogs has also given rise to
"fake blogs" in which a company will create a
fictional blog as a marketing tool to promote
a product. [45]
As the popularity of blogging continues to rise,
the commercialisation of blogging is rapidly
increasing. Many corporations and companies
collaborate with bloggers to increase advertising
and engage online communities towards their
products. In the book Fans, Bloggers, and
Gamers , Henry Jenkins stated that "Bloggers
take knowledge in their own hands, enabling
successful navigation within and between these
emerging knowledge cultures. One can see such
behaviour as co-optation into commodity culture
insofar as it sometimes collaborates with
corporate interests, but one can also see it as
increasing the diversity of media culture,
providing opportunities for greater inclusiveness,
and making more responsive to consumers." [46]
Popularity
As of 2008, blogging had become such a mania
that a new blog was created every second of
every minute of every hour of every day. [47]
Researchers have actively analyzed the dynamics
of how blogs become popular. There are
essentially two measures of this: popularity
through citations, as well as popularity through
affiliation (i.e., blogroll). The basic conclusion
from studies of the structure of blogs is that
while it takes time for a blog to become popular
through blogrolls, permalinks can boost
popularity more quickly, and are perhaps more
indicative of popularity and authority than
blogrolls, since they denote that people are
actually reading the blog's content and deem it
valuable or noteworthy in specific cases. [48]
The blogdex project was launched by
researchers in the MIT Media Lab to crawl the
Web and gather data from thousands of blogs in
order to investigate their social properties.
Information was gathered by the tool for over
four years, during which it autonomously tracked
the most contagious information spreading in
the blog community, ranking it by recency and
popularity. It can, therefore, [ original research? ] be
considered the first instantiation of a
memetracker. The project was replaced by
tailrank.com which in turn has been replaced by
spinn3r.com.
Blogs are given rankings by Alexa Internet (web
hits of Alexa Toolbar users), and formerly by
blog search engine Technorati based on the
number of incoming links (Technorati stopped
doing this in 2014). In August 2006, Technorati
found that the most linked-to blog on the
internet was that of Chinese actress Xu
Jinglei. [49] Chinese media Xinhua reported that
this blog received more than 50 million page
views, claiming it to be the most popular blog in
the world. [50] Technorati rated Boing Boing to
be the most-read group-written blog. [49]
Blurring with the mass media
Many bloggers, particularly those engaged in
participatory journalism, are amateur journalists,
and thus they differentiate themselves from the
professional reporters and editors who work in
mainstream media organizations. Other bloggers
are media professionals who are publishing
online, rather than via a TV station or newspaper,
either as an add-on to a traditional media
presence (e.g., hosting a radio show or writing a
column in a paper newspaper), or as their sole
journalistic output. Some institutions and
organizations see blogging as a means of
"getting around the filter" of media " gatekeepers"
and pushing their messages directly to the
public. Many mainstream journalists, meanwhile,
write their own blogs—well over 300, according
to CyberJournalist.net's J-blog
list. [ citation needed] The first known use of a
blog on a news site was in August 1998, when
Jonathan Dube of The Charlotte Observer
published one chronicling Hurricane Bonnie . [51]
Some bloggers have moved over to other media.
The following bloggers (and others) have
appeared on radio and television: Duncan Black
(known widely by his pseudonym, Atrios), Glenn
Reynolds (Instapundit ), Markos Moulitsas Zúniga
( Daily Kos), Alex Steffen ( Worldchanging ), Ana
Marie Cox (Wonkette), Nate Silver
( FiveThirtyEight.com ), and Ezra Klein (Ezra Klein
blog in The American Prospect, now in the
Washington Post ). In counterpoint, Hugh Hewitt
exemplifies a mass media personality who has
moved in the other direction, adding to his reach
in "old media" by being an influential blogger.
Similarly, it was Emergency Preparedness and
Safety Tips On Air and Online blog articles that
captured Surgeon General of the United States
Richard Carmona's attention and earned his
kudos for the associated broadcasts by talk
show host Lisa Tolliver and Westchester
Emergency Volunteer Reserves- Medical Reserve
Corps Director Marianne Partridge. [52][53][54]
[55]
Blogs have also had an influence on minority
languages , bringing together scattered speakers
and learners; this is particularly so with blogs in
Gaelic languages . Minority language publishing
(which may lack economic feasibility) can find
its audience through inexpensive blogging. There
are examples of bloggers who have published
books based on their blogs, e.g., Salam Pax ,
Ellen Simonetti , Jessica Cutler , ScrappleFace.
Blog-based books have been given the name
blook. A prize for the best blog-based book was
initiated in 2005, [56] the Lulu Blooker Prize . [57]
However, success has been elusive offline, with
many of these books not selling as well as their
blogs. The book based on Julie Powell 's blog
"The Julie/Julia Project" was made into the film
Julie & Julia, apparently the first to do so.
Consumer-generated
advertising
Consumer-generated advertising is a relatively
new and controversial development, and it has
created a new model of marketing
communication from businesses to consumers.
Among the various forms of advertising on blog,
the most controversial are the sponsored
posts. [58] These are blog entries or posts and
may be in the form of feedback, reviews,
opinion, videos, etc. and usually contain a link
back to the desired site using a keyword or
several keywords. Blogs have led to some
disintermediation and a breakdown of the
traditional advertising model, where companies
can skip over the advertising agencies
(previously the only interface with the customer)
and contact the customers directly via social
media websites. On the other hand, new
companies specialised in blog advertising have
been established, to take advantage of this new
development as well. However, there are many
people who look negatively on this new
development. Some believe that any form of
commercial activity on blogs will destroy the
blogosphere’s credibility. [59]
Creating a blog
To create a blog, one can use popular blogging
platforms like Wordpress and Blogger , both of
which have free plans.
Legal and social consequences
Blogging can result in a range of legal liabilities
and other unforeseen consequences. [60]
Defamation or liability
Several cases have been brought before the
national courts against bloggers concerning
issues of defamation or liability . U.S. payouts
related to blogging totaled $17.4 million by
2009; in some cases these have been covered
by umbrella insurance . [61] The courts have
returned with mixed verdicts. Internet Service
Providers (ISPs), in general, are immune from
liability for information that originates with third
parties (U.S. Communications Decency Act and
the EU Directive 2000/31/EC). In Doe v. Cahill ,
the Delaware Supreme Court held that stringent
standards had to be met to unmask the
anonymous bloggers, and also took the unusual
step of dismissing the libel case itself (as
unfounded under American libel law) rather than
referring it back to the trial court for
reconsideration. [62] In a bizarre twist, the Cahills
were able to obtain the identity of John Doe, who
turned out to be the person they suspected: the
town's mayor, Councilman Cahill's political rival.
The Cahills amended their original complaint,
and the mayor settled the case rather than going
to trial.
In January 2007, two prominent Malaysian
political bloggers, Jeff Ooi and Ahirudin Attan ,
were sued by a pro-government newspaper, The
New Straits Times Press (Malaysia) Berhad,
Kalimullah bin Masheerul Hassan, Hishamuddin
bin Aun and Brenden John a/l John Pereira over
an alleged defamation. The plaintiff was
supported by the Malaysian government. [63]
Following the suit, the Malaysian government
proposed to "register" all bloggers in Malaysia in
order to better control parties against their
interest. [64] This is the first such legal case
against bloggers in the country. In the United
States, blogger Aaron Wall was sued by Traffic
Power for defamation and publication of trade
secrets in 2005. [65] According to Wired
magazine, Traffic Power had been "banned from
Google for allegedly rigging search engine
results." [66] Wall and other "white hat " search
engine optimization consultants had exposed
Traffic Power in what they claim was an effort to
protect the public. The case was dismissed for
lack of personal jurisdiction, and Traffic Power
failed to appeal within the allowed time. [67]
In 2009, NDTV issued a legal notice to Indian
blogger Kunte for a blog post criticizing their
coverage of the Mumbai attacks . [68] The
blogger unconditionally withdrew his post, which
resulted in several Indian bloggers criticizing
NDTV for trying to silence critics. [69]
Employment
Employees who blog about elements of their
place of employment can begin to affect the
reputation of their employer, either in a positive
way, if the employee is praising the employer
and its workplaces, or in a negative way, if the
blogger is making negative comments about the
company or its practices.
In general, attempts by employee bloggers to
protect themselves by maintaining anonymity
have proved ineffective. [70] In 2009, a
controversial and landmark decision by The Hon.
Mr Justice Eady refused to grant an order to
protect the anonymity of Richard Horton . Horton
was a police officer in the United Kingdom who
blogged about his job under the name
"NightJack". [71]
Delta Air Lines fired flight attendant Ellen
Simonetti because she posted photographs of
herself in uniform on an airplane and because of
comments posted on her blog "Queen of Sky:
Diary of a Flight Attendant" which the employer
deemed inappropriate. [72][73] This case
highlighted the issue of personal blogging and
freedom of expression versus employer rights
and responsibilities, and so it received wide
media attention. Simonetti took legal action
against the airline for "wrongful termination,
defamation of character and lost future
wages". [74] The suit was postponed while Delta
was in bankruptcy proceedings. [75]
In early 2006, Erik Ringmar, a senior lecturer at
the London School of Economics , was ordered
by the convenor of his department to "take down
and destroy" his blog in which he discussed the
quality of education at the school. [76]
Mark Jen was terminated in 2005 after 10 days
of employment as an assistant product manager
at Google for discussing corporate secrets on
his personal blog, then called 99zeros and
hosted on the Google-owned Blogger
service. [77] He blogged about unreleased
products and company finances a week before
the company's earnings announcement. He was
fired two days after he complied with his
employer's request to remove the sensitive
material from his blog. [78]
In India, blogger Gaurav Sabnis resigned from
IBM after his posts questioned the claims made
by a management school. [79] Jessica Cutler ,
aka "The Washingtonienne", [80] blogged about
her sex life while employed as a congressional
assistant. After the blog was discovered and she
was fired, [81] she wrote a novel based on her
experiences and blog: The Washingtonienne: A
Novel. As of 2006, Cutler is being sued by one
of her former lovers in a case that could
establish the extent to which bloggers are
obligated to protect the privacy of their real life
associates. [82]
Catherine Sanderson, a.k.a. Petite Anglaise, lost
her job in Paris at a British accountancy firm
because of blogging. [83] Although given in the
blog in a fairly anonymous manner, some of the
descriptions of the firm and some of its people
were less than flattering. Sanderson later won a
compensation claim case against the British
firm, however. [84]
On the other hand, Penelope Trunk wrote an
upbeat article in the Boston Globe in 2006,
entitled "Blogs 'essential' to a good career". [85]
She was one of the first journalists to point out
that a large portion of bloggers are professionals
and that a well-written blog can help attract
employers.
Business owners
Business owners who blog about their business
can also run into legal consequences. Mark
Cuban , owner of the Dallas Mavericks , was fined
during the 2006 NBA playoffs for criticizing NBA
officials on the court and in his blog. [86]
Political dangers
See also: Political repression of cyber-
dissidents
Blogging can sometimes have unforeseen
consequences in politically sensitive areas. In
some countries, Internet police or secret police
may monitor blogs and arrest blog authors of
commentators. Blogs can be much harder to
control than broadcast or print media, because a
person can create a blog whose authorship is
hard to trace, by using anonymity technology
such as Tor . As a result, totalitarian and
authoritarian regimes often seek to suppress
blogs and/or to punish those who maintain
them.
In Singapore , two ethnic Chinese individuals were
imprisoned under the country’s anti-sedition law
for posting anti-Muslim remarks in their
blogs. [87] Egyptian blogger Kareem Amer was
charged with insulting the Egyptian president
Hosni Mubarak and an Islamic institution through
his blog. It is the first time in the history of
Egypt that a blogger was prosecuted. After a
brief trial session that took place in Alexandria,
the blogger was found guilty and sentenced to
prison terms of three years for insulting Islam
and inciting sedition, and one year for insulting
Mubarak. [88] Egyptian blogger Abdel Monem
Mahmoud was arrested in April 2007 for anti-
government writings in his blog. [89] Monem is a
member of the then banned Muslim Brotherhood.
After the 2011 Egyptian revolution , the Egyptian
blogger Maikel Nabil Sanad was charged with
insulting the military for an article he wrote on
his personal blog and sentenced to 3 years. [90]
After expressing opinions in his personal blog
about the state of the Sudanese armed forces,
Jan Pronk , United Nations Special Representative
for the Sudan , was given three days notice to
leave Sudan. The Sudanese army had demanded
his deportation. [91][92] In Myanmar , Nay Phone
Latt, a blogger, was sentenced to 20 years in jail
for posting a cartoon critical of head of state
Than Shwe . [93]
Personal safety
See also: Cyberstalking and Internet homicide
One consequence of blogging is the possibility
of online or in-person attacks or threats against
the blogger, sometimes without apparent reason.
In some cases, bloggers have faced
cyberbullying. Kathy Sierra, author of the blog
"Creating Passionate Users", [94] was the target
of threats and misogynistic insults to the point
that she canceled her keynote speech at a
technology conference in San Diego, fearing for
her safety. [95] While a blogger's anonymity is
often tenuous, Internet trolls who would attack a
blogger with threats or insults can be
emboldened by the anonymity of the online
environment, where some users are known only
by a pseudonymous "username" (e.g.,
"Hacker1984"). Sierra and supporters initiated an
online discussion aimed at countering abusive
online behavior[96] and developed a Blogger's
Code of Conduct , which set out a rules for
behaviour in the online space.
Behavior
The Blogger's Code of Conduct is a proposal by
Tim O'Reilly for bloggers to enforce civility on
their blogs by being civil themselves and
moderating comments on their blog. The code
was proposed in 2007 due to threats made to
blogger Kathy Sierra. [97] The idea of the code
was first reported by BBC News, who quoted
O'Reilly saying, "I do think we need some code
of conduct around what is acceptable behaviour,
I would hope that it doesn't come through any
kind of regulation it would come through self-
regulation." [98]
O'Reilly and others came up with a list of seven
proposed ideas: [99][100][101][102]
1. Take responsibility not just for your own
words, but for the comments you allow on your
blog.
2. Label your tolerance level for abusive
comments.
3. Consider eliminating anonymous comments.
4. Ignore the trolls.
5. Take the conversation offline, and talk
directly, or find an intermediary who can do so.
6. If you know someone who is behaving badly,
tell them so.
7. Don't say anything online that you wouldn't
say in person.
These ideas were predictably intensely discussed
on the Web and in the media. While the internet
has continued to grow, with online activity and
discourse only picking up both in positive and
negative ways in terms of blog interaction, the
proposed Code has drawn more widespread
attention to the necessity of monitoring blogging
activity and social norms being as important
online as offline.
See also
Internet portal
Journalism portal
Bitter Lawyer
Blog award
BROG
Chat room
Citizen journalism
Collaborative blog
Comparison of free blog hosting services
Customer engagement
Glossary of blogging
Interactive journalism
Internet think tank
Israblog
List of blogs
List of family-and-homemaking blogs
Mass collaboration
Prison blogs
Sideblog
Social blogging
Webmaster
Web template system
Web traffic
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Further reading
Alavi, Nasrin. We Are Iran: The Persian Blogs,
Soft Skull Press, New York, 2005.
ISBN 1-933368-05-5 .
Bruns, Axel, and Joanne Jacobs, eds. Uses of
Blogs, Peter Lang, New York, 2006.
ISBN 0-8204-8124-6 .
Blood, Rebecca. "Weblogs: A History and
Perspective" . "Rebecca's Pocket".
Kline, David; Burstein, Dan. Blog!: How the
Newest Media Revolution is Changing Politics,
Business, and Culture, Squibnocket Partners,
L.L.C., 2005. ISBN 1-59315-141-1 .
Gorman, Michael. "Revenge of the Blog
People!" . Library Journal .
Heriot, Gail, Are Modern Bloggers Following
in the Footsteps of Publius (and Other
Musings on Blogging by Legal Scholars , 8
Wash. U. L. Rev. 1113 (2006).
Ringmar, Erik. A Blogger's Manifesto: Free
Speech and Censorship in the Age of the
Internet (London: Anthem Press, 2007).
Rosenberg, Scott , Say Everything: how
blogging Began, what it's becoming, and why it
matters , New York : Crown Publishers,
2009. ISBN 978-0-307-45136-1
Weinberger, David (August 31, 2015), "Why
blogging still matters" , Boston Globe
Blog For The BLogger- Launch Your Blog
Today By the Gpatrika [Jan 2018]
External links
Look up blog in Wiktionary, the free dictionary.
Wikiquote has quotations related to: Blogging
Wikimedia Commons has media related to
Blogs .
Computer Law and Security Report Volume 22
Issue 2, Pages 127-136 blogs, Lies and the
Doocing by Sylvia Kierkegaard (2006)
Legal Guide for bloggers by the Electronic
Frontier Foundation
Law Library Legal Blawgs Web Archive from
the U.S. Library of Congress
Content is available under CC BY-SA 3.0
unless otherwise noted.
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