Dealing with the Dark Side of the Net

September 8, 2006 at 11:55 am · Filed under Note

We spoke about this in class but I feel compelled to restate it here, just for the record. Your blogs are public. Your work can be seen by anyone on the web.

For this reason, it’s pretty important that we follow some sensible guidelines for putting ourselves “out there”…

  1. Your blogs are really just online extensions of our classroom. Speech that is not appropriate for class is not appropriate for your blog either. While you are strongly encouraged to engage in debate and conversation with other bloggers, we also expect that you will conduct yourself in a manner representative of your school.
  2. Never EVER EVER give out or record personal information on our blog. Your blog exists as a public space on the Internet. Don’t share anything that you don’t want the world to know. For your safety, be careful what you say, too. Don’t give out your last name, your phone number or your home address. This is particularly important to remember if you have a personal online journal or blog elsewhere.
  3. Again, your blog is a public space. And if you put it on the Internet, odds are really good that it will stay on the Internet. Always. That means ten years from now when you are looking for a job, it might be possible for an employer to discover some really hateful or immature things you said when you were younger and more prone to foolish things. Be sure that anything you write you are proud of. It can come back to haunt you if you don’t.
  4. Never link to something you haven’t read. While it isn’t your job to police the Internet, when you link to something, you should make sure it is something that you really want to be associated with. If a link contains material that might be creepy or make some people uncomfortable, you should probably try a different source.

All quite reasonable rules really… (adapted from these)

I know some of you probably also run other blogs or MySpace sites, and I can’t really tell you what to do on those.  For your school one though, it’d be great if you could stick to the guidelines above.  Thanks!  :-)

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