Blog Ethics & Etiquette – different standards for library bloggers?

Check, check...and check! I am all for the ‘Bloggers' Code’ suggestions that are laid out by Blood, Schneider, and cyberjournalist.net . The one that most struck me (and I am totally guilty of it…I edit my posts all the time without a thought to its impact…I guess I’ll stop that habit!) is Blood’s statement that one should write an entry as though it could not be changed, and that rewrites should not be done (although others seem to think this is okay if you show the editing with cross-outs and amendment notes, etc) and that a post should never be deleted.

For a library, I do think that this 'Bloggers' Code' goes one step further as the blog will represent the branch, and the entire system. In the same way that a newspaper article would get confirmed with a manager or a PR person before it is published (thank you Martha Joyce & LIS506-Management) a blog would need to be cleared as well. It is, after all, an official publication of the library. Because of the frequency of a blog, having each post signed off on could be a time-consuming process that would negate one of the biggest benefits of the blog – how quick & easy it is to publish and update.

Perhaps a better way of dealing with this would be to have a standard set of guidelines drawn up (there may already be policies in place from other publications) so that a true “sign-off” is only required when the blogger has doubts about the content meeting the guidelines. This isn’t a personal blog. It should be treated with the same rules as any other library publication, except perhaps, that the tone may be more casual or chatty.