Monday's Class
Monday's class, despite Colin's absence, was wonderful. The casual group discussion allowed me to get to know the people of the class, not just the blogs of the class, which was a pleasant experience. Everyone was really engaged in the conversation and each person offered a unique perspective.
We dug into some interesting stuff about ethics in blogging, including the negative aspects to the anarchic internet "frontier land." While it's exciting to explore this generally lawless territory, there is both offensive and frightening material open for all eyes. Kristen, for instance, mentioned a particularly disturbing blog about abortion. And Kirsten, in her blog, addressed the issue of using full names when making threatening or disparaging remarks in blogs. The problem is, it's very hard to decided what, if anything, to do about such things.
It was great to bounce ideas around in class about possible accreditation for blogs/bloggers, guidelines about using full names, guidelines similar to or different from journalism guidelines and -- if we were to establish such guidelines -- how they might change in a political/journalistic blog vs. a personal blog.
Still, for me, the bottom line is that, for right now, the unrestricted nature of the internet prevents us from developing serious guidelines for everyone. And isn't some (or much) of the appeal of the internet and of blogging its freedom, its spontaneity, its anything-can-happen quality?
Either way, Monday's class was "good times."
We dug into some interesting stuff about ethics in blogging, including the negative aspects to the anarchic internet "frontier land." While it's exciting to explore this generally lawless territory, there is both offensive and frightening material open for all eyes. Kristen, for instance, mentioned a particularly disturbing blog about abortion. And Kirsten, in her blog, addressed the issue of using full names when making threatening or disparaging remarks in blogs. The problem is, it's very hard to decided what, if anything, to do about such things.
It was great to bounce ideas around in class about possible accreditation for blogs/bloggers, guidelines about using full names, guidelines similar to or different from journalism guidelines and -- if we were to establish such guidelines -- how they might change in a political/journalistic blog vs. a personal blog.
Still, for me, the bottom line is that, for right now, the unrestricted nature of the internet prevents us from developing serious guidelines for everyone. And isn't some (or much) of the appeal of the internet and of blogging its freedom, its spontaneity, its anything-can-happen quality?
Either way, Monday's class was "good times."
