Comments on: Blogging, ethics, and moolah

By: Wealth Bondage

Wealth Bondage — Thu, 11 Sep 2003 05:11:16 +0000

Weblogs as Texts
“HT” Gary Sauer-Thompson on the theme of Weblogs and Democracy introduces an important framework-changing observation.

By: Wealth Bondage

Wealth Bondage — Thu, 11 Sep 2003 01:15:04 +0000

Weblogs as Texts
“HT” Gary Sauer-Thompson on the theme of Weblogs and Democracy introduces an important framework-changing observation.

By: chutney

chutney — Thu, 13 Mar 2003 21:35:03 +0000

Rebecca, you’ve exemplifed a virtue ethics approach, and I applaud that.

By: chuntey

chuntey — Thu, 13 Mar 2003 21:31:46 +0000

Until the process can be automated, it seems to me like spending a dollar to save a penny. Otherwise, I’d agree that it was a good practice.

By: rebecca blood

rebecca blood — Thu, 13 Mar 2003 21:30:35 +0000

interesting discussion. my proposed set of ethics still reflects my best thinking, so I continue to disagree with the practice of revising and deleting entries once they have been posted. however, I never intended that to apply to errors in spelling and grammar–I meant substantial changes. I always correct misspellings and the like on my own site when I find them.

charly z’s method of revision is completely in the spirit of my proposed guidelines–as described, the reader has all the information they might need, and the integrity of the network is completely protected.

one point which I would like to clarify: my proposed ethics are not intended to “make weblogs more journalism-like”. in fact, in my book I argue at length that weblogs are not a new form of journalism, and shouldn’t even aspire to be so–I think we’re stronger (and important and interesting) as something different, and trying to fit us into a pre-existing mold, to my mind, misses the point.

for that reason, in thinking about ethics for weblogging, I discarded the journalistic standard of accuracy and fairness. that’s unrealistic, and not really in the spirit of what we’re doing. the standard I arrived at was transparency, and I derived each of guideline from that principle.

By: jjg

jjg — Thu, 13 Mar 2003 21:19:28 +0000

But–unless the edits are deceitful–the blogger who edits posts is causing no harm.

My contention is merely that it is the reader, not the writer, who should determine whether an edit causes harm. The writer’s responsibility is to minimize the likelihood of such harm, and adopting a practice of always detailing changes to posts after publication accomplishes that.

By: chutney

chutney — Thu, 13 Mar 2003 20:21:52 +0000

…it is a question of, when forced to choose, whose interests you put first.

I’m still not convinced that I have been forced to choose. I’m still persuaded that honing my craft is in my readers’ interest. And, as an aside, there’s nothing dishonorable about writing a blog in my own interest. We’d be hard pressed to find a blogger who writes solely out of selfless concern for readers. There is no pure altruism.

Could you clarify the relevance of these differences to the discussion at hand?

If we’re going with a rules-based approach then not notifying readers of edits is unethical: it breaks the rules. (In this approach, all wrongs are de facto harms.)

If we’re going with a harm vs. wrong approach, a wrong may occur when you don’t notify about edits. But–unless the edits are deceitful–the blogger who edits posts is causing no harm. If you take the view of “no harm, no foul,” then the blogger hasn’t acted unethically, even though there was a technical wrong. (This approach holds that harms usually require redress while wrongs usually do not. The only clear cases in this approach are when an action is both a harm and a wrong.)

Or you can go with a virtue ethics approach. There are countless lists of virtues, so it helps to begin by asking what the blogger’s own intended virtues are. If the blogger’s virtue is becoming an excellent writer, then there is nothing inherently unethical in making unannounced edits. If the blogger’s virtue is exemplifying something simliar to journalistic ethics, then, yes, making changes is unethical.

And there’s the question of what exactly the reader’s interest is. I don’t buy that the reader is de facto interested in having access to all previous versions of an entry. Why? I am not myself interested in this sort of access at the blogs I read–unless there’s a major correction–and I would hope that my fellow bloggers would not expect something of me that I do not expect of them. (Reciprocity is one of my virtues.) I would suspect any reader who demanded of me a catalog of all versions of all my entries of vice: in this case, pettiness.

But one person’s vice is another’s virtue. What I call pettiness another might call mere propriety or meticulousness. If another blogger called that their virtue and put up an edit catalog, I would be more than happy to support them in that. We can’t expect everyone to name the same virtues and vices as we do. The most we can do is try to make clear what our goals are and work out any conflicts when and if they come up.

By: Charly Z

Charly Z — Thu, 13 Mar 2003 19:46:02 +0000

I'm on a chatty mood today. I'll write about my methods for revising old entries:

I'll fix typos, misspellings and grammatical errors until the entry is as polished as a brass knob.
If I change a whole sentence I document the change. I do that mostly for people who might have read the entry before and now detect some kind of disagreement between their recollection of it and what's in front of their eyes. Also, because I might have changed the whole meaning of the entry with that simple act.
If I have to make a correction, I'll leave my original text (strikeout is verbotten not allowed at my weblog) and just add the correction at the end.
I'll add an update to an entry if the update works to bring closure to the item, not to keep bullding up on it; otherwise, it's material for a whole new entry.

By: jjg

jjg — Thu, 13 Mar 2003 19:36:34 +0000

This is a perfectly acceptable understanding of what ethics is, but there are several different accepted approaches.

Could you clarify the relevance of these differences to the discussion at hand?

Are these two goals mutually exclusive?

Not at all. But it is a question of, when forced to choose, whose interests you put first. A policy of revising after publication without informing your readers of what changes were made puts the writer’s interests before the reader’s, which does a disservice to the collective discourse.

By: chutney

chutney — Thu, 13 Mar 2003 16:13:20 +0000

Ethics, by definition, concern those things we can do, but which are not in the collective interest of society. Publishing online makes you a participant in the public discourse, which in turn carries ethical responsibilities. This is not my definition of ethics. To my understanding, what you have defined is "morality," which is a group of mores accepted by one or another public. Ethics is the reflection on morality using lenses like harm vs. wrong or virtue vs. vice. What is accepted morality may or may not be ethical in the end. Your understanding of ethics seems to be largely Kantian or deontological, which is to say duty-based. This is a perfectly acceptable understanding of what ethics is, but there are several different accepted approaches. How about honoring your readers, and the potential consequences of your writing for them? Are these two goals mutually exclusive? All good writing--and thus the process of writing--is about communication. Honoring the process is honoring your readers. I am interested in creating new publics, not in merely perpetuating the publics that are already there. Creating new publics requires, before all else, the responsible exercise of "ethical imagination." Letting even good lists of "duties" or "rules" call the plays mitigates against that.