Weblogs

They're telling me they included an automatic rerouter so clicking on the old links and booksmarks should bring you right here. Let me know if that ain't so.

Later this morning, my newspaper colleagues will be debuting a redesigned website, which will include a new platform for this blog. If you come here through news-sentinel.com, you should still be able to click in as always. If you've got me bookmarked, you might have to change that, although I think they're going to try to come up with an automatic rerouter. Stay tuned.

A quick introduction to the Stop Online Piracy Act:

I've been moderating blog comments here with a very light touch. But the interactions have gotten so rough that it's obvious a heavier hand is needed. So starting immediately, there will be new guidelines. (And they are on permanently display under the "Commenting guidelines" heading under "Pages.")

I reserve the right to delete comments or block certain commenters based on a failure to follow these guidelines:

1. Stay on topic.

2. Avoid personal attacks and ad hominem arguments.

3. Keep the foul language to a minimum.

We wouldn't know anything about that here, would we?

Come on, guys; could we stick to arguing the issues instead of just hurling vile insults? There's plenty of snark in the blogosphere without us adding to it. I've been leaving the threads alone, even though it got pretty rough on a couple of them. Somebody was bound to go too far, even by today's online standards, and now somebody has. I've removed the comment from Christopher Swing purporting to be a Tweet from Tim Zank's daughter. Even if you're going to taunt each other like kids in the schoolyard, let's not be  dragging any 15-year-old girls into it, OK?

New from the Cato Institute, Libertarianism.org, a resource on the theory and history of liberty. From the opening page introduction:

An interesting phenomenon explored: Why have journalists, who spent so much time and energy bashing blogs, been so taken with Twitter?

I find the question especially interesting because Twitter seems to have all the bad aspects of blogging and none of its strengths. Smith offers two reasons why he tweets so much despite being paid to blog: Twitter is faster and it is now the dominant medium of online political “conversation”.

[. . .]

Beware, anonymous posters:

The Indianapolis Star has asked the Indiana Court of Appeals to decide, possibly for the first time, whether the state's journalism Shield Law and state and U.S. constitutions protect media outlets from being forced to disclose the identities of anonymous posters to their websites.

You've seen people who drive around picking their noses. 'Cause they think they're invisible inside those cars, right? Now we have the whole new group of people (or maybe they're all nose-pickers who have moved up to better things) who think the Internet is like a private little gathering place where you can do anything and nobody will ever know.