As was mentioned earlier, basic computer literacy is a must
in order for blogs and other Web 2.0 applications to be truly effective. So are
Internet connectivity and access, computer access, and basic reading skills. It
all boils down to skill and availability. Can you get to it and can you use it.
If the answer is no to either question, the idea that blogs can reach out to
everyone around the world falls flat.
How can we
move headfirst into Web 2.0 when some patrons have yet to grasp Web 1.0? How
can people peruse the pages of a blog when they can’t even point and click? Are
blogs only for the educated, the hip, the young? Or can they truly reach
marginalized communities? Can there be a balance?
And say you do
overcome the odds and begin to blog. How do you decide how much of yourself to
share on this highly public forum? The number of bloggers who have been fired
from their jobs due to information found on their personal blogs is staggering,
and many of those dismissals are based on routine gripes with the company or co-workers,
not in-depth exposés of company policy (Valentine, Fleischman, Sprague, and
Goodkin, 2010, p. 106). It’s the permanence of the words, not the attitude
behind them, that makes blogs dangerous, and companies can’t afford to have
their images sullied by disparaging remarks, however spontaneous or trifling
those remarks may be.
Blogs can do
good. But they can also do bad. And they can also do nothing. And those last
two, bad and nothing, those can have dangerous effects. So when we think of the
future of blogging, it’s important to remember to remain objective, to think
critically, and to take a step back and evaluate the blog. When you're blogging, don't (always) believe the hype.
References
Valentine,
S., Fleischman, G.M., Sprague, R., & Godkin, L. (2010). Exploring the ethicality
of firing employees who blog. Human
Resource Management, 49(1), 87-108. doi: 10.1002/hrm.2033
My work has a very strict confidentiality policy and thus we're really not allowed to blog about it. I actually came across a random Livejournal post from forever ago, where my current boss, was actually commenting how the comments, relating to work, were not appropriate. It wasn't my blog, if that's not clear. But it really just goes to prove once it's out there on the Internet, it's really hard to delete it. :)
ReplyDeleteSamantha
Hi, Samantha--
DeleteYour comment is so true. And even if you do manage to delete it, there's no way of knowing who has already saved it somewhere to read later. I wonder how this generation of teens and tweens will adapt to confidentiality policies when they get into the working world? I know a lot of teens are more than willing to put their names, addresses, and phone numbers on social networking sites, so I'm sure they'd also feel tempted to complain about work on those sites in the future.
I almost found myself putting a comment on another classmate blog that was of a personal experience here at work. Then I remembered "This is a public blog, not a message board on blazeview." They are very strict where I work about what is posted publicly and we even signed a document to that effect.
ReplyDeleteAlso, this assignment was the first blog I did. I felt stupid trying to figure out how to work the thing (and I teach computer classes, sad I know). My posts did not actually post, and the blog was just ugly. But, as with everything I took my time and read the instructions (or google it).