Playing catch up after two days on the road, I find that Munir Umrani at The Blogging Journalist highly recommends an article by Jennifer L. Patterson, The Shifting Legal Landscape of Blogging.

"By their nature, blogs may not fit within the private/public framework that the U.S. Supreme Court constructed for defamation law more than 30 years ago. Unlike traditional means of publication and broadcast – newspapers, magazines, television, and radio – blogs can help level the playing field for private and public figures. The distinguishing feature of many blogs is the interactive ability of readers to post comments in response to blog entries. Since anyone can start a blog – or respond to a blog posting with his or her own comment when the blog gives readers that opportunity – the private/public figure distinction may no longer be as meaningful for defamatory blogs. Indeed, both private and public figures have the same means and access, at least on the Internet, to counter false statements."

As the title of the article suggests, this topic is still in a state of flux. We don’t have control over what others say (and never have had it), but do have control over our own response. Equal and ample opportunity to counter with ones own side/opinion.

This will be discussed more in a future Fears of Blogging posting.

This is an article you should read and bookmark. Follow the topic. One way to do that is by subscribing to The Blogging Journalist (feed).

Here are Munir’s thoughts on the article.

Technorati Tags: Defamation, Blog Laws, Business Blogging, Fears of Blogging

Rich Brooks at the Flyte Blog suggest that a few tweaks in your Typepad Page Titles may be beneficial. The experiment starts with his own blog.  I think it’s good advice and may implement this myself.

If you’d like to get these changes, Rich is offering to assist for a small fee. If you take advantage of the offer, make sure you ask for your titles to be links in your Main, Datebased and Category pages. This is also a simple fix:

In your entry-list template, change this:

<h3 class="entry-header"><$MTEntryTitle$></h3>

to this:

<h3 class="entry-header"><a href="<$MTEntryPermalink$>"><$MTEntryTitle$></a></h3>

UPDATE: You’ll need to also change one line of code in your Main Index Template, Datebased Archives and Category Archives – very simple. Change this:

<$MTWeblogIncludeModule module="entry-list"$>

to this…

<$MTInclude module="entry-list"$>

Though I could do this, I’m just one person – Flyte has a team. They look like kids, but I’m sure they have a fine crew.

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Just as I was reading some of the cool sties that Brian Brown has been posting about in the new Pajama Market: Small Business Blogging, Shel Israel mentions that Brian’s looking for small business blogs to write about.

There are several in the Small Biz Blog Examples on the right, and I’ll alert Brian about those. If you’re a blog consultant or publishing a small business blog, let Brian know about it.

Better yet, if you’re considering launching a small business blog, subscribe to the Pajama Market feed and keep up with all the Small Business Blog of the Day postings. I wonder if they get awarded that cool button.

I gather that the focus is on businesses that blog, rather than those blogging as a business – something like Two Maids and a Mop.

Technorati Tags: Small Biz Blog, Business Blogging, Pajama Market, Blog Reviews

From the desk of West Des Moines City Manager Jeff Pomeranz, the WDM Blog extends gratitude to the EMS Public Access Defibrillation program.

I’d like to join Jeff in extending thanks. About a year ago, my mother-in-law passed away. She lived with us for over two years. Five times in that last year, we called on the WDM EMS teams – and each time they seemed to arrive before we got off the line. Each instance we called, they arrived in time. Mom passed away peacefully in her sleep in April last year.

I’d also like to extend thanks to Jeff Pomeranz. It’s great to see a leader step up and engage in a conversation with the community. Here’s the feed to subscribe to Jeff’s blog. Here’s a one-page primer on RSS and feeds.

Technorati Tags: EMS, Jeff Pomeranz, West Des Moines, Iowa, Gratitude