It's official. Everyone now knows the basic etiquette of blogging on community weblogs. "Self-links aren't allowed as the main link in posts, unless there is full disclosure. As a secondary link, or a link in a comment, it's fine. But we don't want to see you linking to your blog right up there on the front page, okay?" is the phrase all good community webloggers are familiar with.And this doesn't mean any extra work for the administrators of the community blog, because it's just etiquette. It's built on trust. But it always helps to mention it somewhere, so members find out about this etiquette sooner rather than later.
I remember recently a blogger by the name of "de-void" repeatedly posted posts with self-links on the front page of UAE Community Weblog. Another member by the name of "flac" left him a comment on his blog (because "de-void" doesn't allow commenting on his community blog posts! You must go to his blog to comment on the post that he posted on the community blog)!!! Can you beleive that?
Here was the comment "flac" left:
"Hello,
You are obviously new to blogging on community weblogs (as are a couple others on the UAE CWB). The standard etiquette is to not post a post that links directly to your own site. Give us something (similar but) different! What you have on your site will be there, too. Because we can see your site by clicking onto your name.
Read up on it."
What did "de-void" do? He didn't do any reading, he didn't even ask around about it. He deleted the message. And the next day he posted on the community blog (again, no commenting available) with another front-page direct link to his own blog.
Posts
22 comments:
zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
and your point is?
Freedom of Speach ?
No, thought not.
Well, my attitude has always been that if people have an unusually interesting or important personal blog post that they want to share/highlight, or something they specifically want feedback on, then it's OK to plug it here. When we started out, a major aim of this community was to help people promote their blogs.
However cross-posting every single entry, especially when it's not even very UAE-relevant, is obviously inappropriate.
the blog runs on things which are from people in uae but surly it isnt a uae news paper... to report which camal fleced its head somewhere in the dust
axonsax -- Freedom of speech? This is just a bedtime story for you then if you don't know what the point is. You're obviously hiding under a rock.
And yes, SD, that's all I'm referring to: are to the bloggers who have the main (and it's usually the only) link as a self-link virtually every post. [It's not cross-posting: that would be a secondary self-link, or a self-link in a comment -- as mentioned in the post.]
And remember, blogs are already promoted in the fact that the name of the poster has a link right there to their own blog!
This is not my personal rule, or necessarily my personal opinion -- it's just the way it is; and I'm just mentioning it.
We could forget about it. Except for the "front page self-linking every single entry" part.
void -- Did "The Gulf News" part make you think of a newspaper? And then you still thought about a newspaper after reading the post? Yeeeesh.
Like I already told you, read up on it -- and you'll find out yourself that a community blog is not a newspaper.
flic is absolutely right. I'm inceasingly turned off by posts that allow comments only on the blogger's personal blog and not the comunity forum. This is not cross-posting. Imagine if all bloggers do that all the time? How much of a "community" blog would be left out?
Agree with flic and bandicoot. I did not know how bad it is untile I came across several posts disabling comments with 'a click here to read more' link to the personal blog.
Unless everyone treats uaecommunity as a platform to advertise their personal blogs and to increase traffic.
I hadn't noticed the comment disabling, and that is not acceptable.
If any future posts here have comments disabled, I will edit them to re-enable posting.
flic nice points but wrong attitude my news part was pointing to secrets fact about things being UAE-relevent, so peace out man and if anything doesnt interest u dont read and dont click
Thanks very much for your words of support, Bandicoot, Woke, and SD!
void-- You still don't seem to get it. Nice argument, but wrong situation. Now you're getting community blogs confused with television channels.
I think it should rather be: if you don't allow comments on your community blog posts, and if you self-link as a main link every post, then you shouldn't post on the community blog.
no buddy u r not getting it ... ur not in white house anymore.. The point about no comments was well taken and so was the other one but u seem to be on some run to outsmart... and even with the posts which were posted with no comments the intention was to centralize the debate on one blog.. we all love uaecommunityblog anyway and ofcourse a ready to support IT...
void-- Uh, take two aspirins and call your doctor in the morning.
peace out man dont try to be blogging worlds UNO
void-- Make that three aspirins.
I apologize to those who clicked on "flic" and were referred back to the uae community. I was unaware that it was an option that you had to "set" manually. I have now set it for any future posts. And yet, some of you had still managed to find me! Thanks. If you'd like to communicate further, you could come see me at my blog.
P.S. And that's a secondary self-link in a comment's section, and full disclosure!
flic - it's a new option I created, by fiddling with the code. Basically whatever your "homepage" link is in Blogger (which may or may not be your blogger blog, or somewhere totally different) gets hyperlinked to your name underneath the post.
For some reason, if you haven't specified a homepage (I hadn't originally) it defaults to UAE comm. Before the change I think it used to go to a Profile page. But this wasn't so helpful for bloggers who don't use Blogspot (and have only signed up to get membership here).
Thanks, SD. I'm set. Cheers!
DG -- Lol. I've never met void before in my life. But I hope you've noticed that he's the "de-void" in my post.
Sorry I'm late to this -- but how does it matter if you link to the comment page on your blog? I mean, if you're still going directly to a comment page specific to the post, what's the big to-doo about?
Okay, I can see people getting miffed if it just linked to someone's front page and it was just some sort of scam to generate traffic, but has anyone actually done that?
I feel bad, I think I'm the first one who turned the comments option off. I thought it was cool -- the idea that if someone was interested in the topic, they might be encouraged to explore my (or anyone else's) blog. I didn't realize people would get all anal compulsive over the proper way to blog (as if such a concept ever existed).
We all need to lighten up. It's just a blog. Nobody needs to get voted off the island because of some arbitrary sense of etiquette.
You can link to whatever you like to, the comment page is fine. I think the only unacceptable practices are (1) disabling comments here, and (2) cross-posting so often that this place becomes a mirror of your blog.
But I'd rather people felt relaxed enough to participate fully. There's no way everyone here gets the chance to read every single entry on every single person's blog, so really juicy/interesting/well-written stuff deserves a bit of extra limelight.
i,bobo -- You said, "...over the proper way to blog (as if such a concept ever existed)."
Please, you must stick to the topic. The topic is not "proper way to blog", but "proper way to blog on a community blog".
And yes, there is such a thing. I'm afraid to say that you need to find out more: and when you do, you'll find out that such a thing does indeed exist!
But I fully and whole-heartily agree with SD when she says, "I'd rather people felt relaxed enough to participate fully."
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