Dear Blabby: Blogging Etiquette
For new readers: this is a group blog and many of the authors are new to blogging so I thought I would channel Miss Manners and write a post about the etiquette of blogging.
1. Linking
Remember footnotes and bibliographies? Those are the ways that researchers use to pay homage to the source of information or an idea. On the web, those become links which connect one post to another. When writing a post, it is good manners to link to the source of that information. We are using wordpress, so to do that, highlight the piece of text or image that contains at least part of the idea you are quoting, click the link (is it an image of a chain link in the visual editor? I cannot remember) button and paste the link into the pop-up window. It’s easy! Do it.
2. Images
Some images are so widespread on the web that it is hard to determine whether or not it has a copyright. When you can link to the author of the image, do so! Don’t pretend that images that belong to someone else are your own. Link, link, link. I, for instance, know that people are using images that we took of Iran on their own sites without attribution and it upsets me a bit. Please link to us folks… Don’t just use our images.
3. Quoting: Use Blockquotes: b-quote
Readers need to know whether or not the text is the writers or someone else’s. This is so easy: < blockquote > Text here < /blockquote >(Get rid of the spaces between <> and the beginning and end of the text inside.) In wordpress, highlight the text you are quoting and click on the “ (quotation marks) or b-quote button depending on which interface you use.
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We may need more tips as we go, but this will do as a start.