Web Of Blogging Legalities

In reading from the book "writing for digital media", the author teaches us that there are some easy ways to legally protect yourself when publishing writing material (like our blogs) online.  In addition, there are some legalities that are a bit more cumbersome and complicated but necessary to learn.

Complicated legalities include the many Privacy legislations and laws that have been enacted to protect against privacy issues in traditional publications and online publications. 

There are also many mandates that protect citizens, both private and public, from libel.  Libel and Privacy issues are two problems that are hard to manage legally and the growing number of professional and non-professional writers (like bloggers) on the internet are only making it harder to oversee and manage.

Online privacy issues include access to and selling of personal records/information, surveillance, file-sharing, and computer cookies.  As web writers (bloggers), we need to be sure that the way we gather information for anything we write does not fall afoul of the laws that protect against these issues.

Some of these laws and legislations include:

• The Freedom of Information Act
• The Electronic Freedom of Information Act
• Open Government Act
• The Electronic Communication Privacy Act

Another interesting thing I read was that almost anything written is automatically copyrighted to the original author.  Only the author has the right to alter, publish, copy, etc their written work.  So plagiarism is not only wrong, it is illegal. Who knew?

Libel is another issue that we as bloggers must guard against.  If I were to publish a writing about a person/organization, I have to make sure that I do not write something I can be sued for.

I learned that libel only occurs when information printed is untrue.  So if I am writing about a person/organization, I have to do my due diligence to make sure that it is true.

Getting at least three documented sources, doing real research and homework, and giving the person/organization I am writing about a chance to respond or defend themselves are ways to legally keep me from being sued for libel or defamation.

In the end, the most surprising thing of note in my reading of the book was that anyone, professional writers and non-professionals (like bloggers), can be sued for libel/defamation and that ignorance of the law is no defense. Who knew?