Blogging Etiquette

In my previous post, I mentioned about state of the blogosphere and bloggers are now blogging even more compared to last time. Some blogs about political issues, some blogs about food and places and some blogs for fun. Have you ever think of what you wrote in your blog may bring you some hard time? A Malaysian political blogger was arrested for posting anti-government comment on his website (Walker, 2008).

Raja Petra Kamarudin is a well-known political blogger and also the editor of Malaysia Today (Walker, 2008). He was arrested under Internal Security Act (ISA), an act that detains citizens who are considered as a threat to the country indefinitely without any trial. The reason behind his detainment was due to his hate incitement on Islam in his articles. Another similar incident, a 34-year-old woman was arrested for blogging about police (DarkGovernement, 2009). She was accused of intending to harass a police officer.

As a blogger, we wouldn't want to be arrested just because of what we posted on our blogs. In order to avoid the problem, we should be aware of and practice blogging etiquette. Tan (2007) pointed some tips for bloggers and also readers of blogs. 

For bloggers;-

• always keep in mind that our blogs are published and accessible to anyone, though it may be personal one.
• never steal other people's contents just to maintain your blog.
• always return credit to if you are using other people's contents or images.
• think twice before you reply comments especially when you are riled by commenters.

(For more blogging etiquette by Tan, please click here)

*******************************************************************************************************

References

DarkGovernemnt 2009, 'Women Arrested For Blogging About Police', 20 August, viewed 12 November 2010, from <http://www.darkgovernment.com/news/woman-arrested-for-blogging-about-police/>

Tan, Z.M 2007, 'Blogging etiquette: for bloggers and readers', suite101, viewed 12 November 2010, from <http://www.suite101.com/content/blogging-etiquette-a22222>

Walker, R 2008, 'Malaysian blogger arrested for posting anti-government comments', Guardian, 12 September, viewed 12 November 2010, from <http://www.guardian.co.uk/world/2008/sep/12/malaysia.pressandpublishing>