Social Media Matters Krish Kandiah
Blogging like any communication is something that can be done well or badly. I have some values that drive my blog that I seek to uphold as best I can.
I blog because I want to be part of a conversation
- I am not trying to write the last word on a subject – just how I see things from my personal perspective. I do not blog on behalf of the organisations I work with: Evangelical Alliance, Spring Harvest et al. I will write comment and ask questions – this is not intended to be negative but inquisitive. When ever I can I try to contact the people I am engaging with in private dialogue before posting – ( for live blogs this is not possible).
I blog because I care about Truth, Unity and Grace
I want to be accurate in what I blog. If you think I have unfairly caricatured someone, or misrepresented what they have said or done. I am very open to your comments and will review and edit as appropriate what i have written. I am not asking you to agree with what i have written but I do want to be fair. I believe in unity but not uniformity. I think the word of God is the authoritative and neither i nor anyone else is infallible. So we need eachother to spot eachother’s blindspots.
In 2008 I was part of a small group of bloggers who tried to formulate the blogging commandments. It was kind of tongue in cheek, but I aim to abide by them. Forgive me when I have failed to do so.
The commandments are intended to cause bloggers to consider the social impact of their blogging.
1. You shall not put your blog before your integrity.
2. You shall not make an idol of your blog.
3. You shall not misuse your screen name by using your anonymity to sin.
4. Remember the Sabbath day by taking one day off a week from your blog.
5. Honour your fellow-bloggers above yourselves and do not give undue significance to their mistakes.
6. You shall not murder someone else’s honour, reputation or feelings.
7. You shall not use the web to commit or permit adultery in your mind.
8. You shall not steal another person’s content.
9. You shall not give false testimony against your fellow-blogger.
10. You shall not covet your neighbour’s blog ranking. Be content with your own content.
I’m the opposite of that, preacherssa2z – i tend to write quite polished blogs. I don’t correct posts but i welcome debate on comment boards.
Do you not worry about the fact that when things are in print then they’re solid and way more difficult to retract or amend? I guess it comes down to a personality thing – integrity looks different for each of us.
I like this as a set of commandments/guidelines. Especially the ones about a blogging Sabbath and not coveting your neighbour’s blog ranking.
thanks for your comment “worshipmusicshouldsounlikethis” -
For me blogging is a ‘ragged’ form of writing. I don’t finesse things on the blog in the way that I would for publication. A blog is a place for half-formed thoughts on the sway to a cogent argument. It is a place for thoughts to be challenged & questions asked. I rarely edit a blog post for this reason. If I could have said it better today…I will write a follow-up post tomorrow rather than editing today’s.
thank you, Krish. Another insightful and well communicated argument.
I’ve been wrestling with the nature of blogging for some weeks now and, only today, have had a conversation with someone about why one blogs. I read yesterday, in Michael Frost’s book ‘Exiles’, “…It’s either the most astonishing universal display of narcissism or the most liberating opportunity for the ordinary and the everyday to be celebrated. On one level it looks like the liberation of the ordinary, but at another level it’s an expression of hyper-reality: it looks like we’re meeting people via the Web, but really we’re meeting only the acceptable persona that they want displayed to the world… At its best, a blog is a medium for self-expression, a way to publish your ideas aside from the slow and cumbersome nature of traditional publishing. At its worst, a blog can be self-entertainment, irresponsible and unaccountable. Self tailored entertainment is the new craze amongst postmodern people who are anxious to make their mark on the media. Media hungry, narcissistic people are starring via reality TV and the Web, reflecting back images of themselves.” Add to that an episode of ‘House’ Season 6 entitled ‘Private Lives’ which focusses around an avid blogger who claims to be completely honest and vulnerable online whilst her real life relationships fall apart due to honesty issues. Then follow that up with an interview with Simon Pegg in the Radio Times where he admits to using Twitter as a creative enterprise and “is quite a good way to seem as if you’re giving something of yourself away – but in actual fact you’re not.”
What would your response be to all of this? In an age where people are looking for authenticity and honesty in community whilst knowing that reality TV is not not real and social networking involves wearing masks, how do we live counter culturally and use tools such as blogs, Twitter, Facebook, etc. to subvert this ‘hyper-reality’?