Responsible Blogging : Copyright and Sources Declaration

The blogging world has its own unwritten regulations around ethics and etiquettes that bloggers must follow. Amongst them, citing source and author info is one of the most important laws of blogging which even has legal implications.

Copyright Issue

Copyright is a legal right of an individual who produced the original content; be it an editorial content, an image or a video. Copyright also grants the individual the right to legally distribute that content as per their discretion. Since, a lot of amateur bloggers who are not aware of the implications, tend to use the copyrighted material. It is legally as well as ethically not right to use someone else’s piece without prior information and consent.

Also, if bloggers want to monetize their blogs through Google Adsense, they should always stay away from using copyrighted stuff, because it prohibits content that is subject to copyright and can deactivate your account permanently.

    

Fair Usage

If you find online content which seems worth criticizing, commenting, reporting or worth research, then you should always seek permission to do so. Also, if you share someone else’s piece on your blog be sure to give them the due credit by mentioning the source and the name of the author.

Linkback Code of Conduct

Since, social media is all about driving engagement, a lot of bloggers share opinions of other bloggers in communities and on their own blogs. It is always suggested that you should give a link back to the original piece and mention the source of inspiration in your blog. It may convince the original content creator in believing your intentions.  

Blogging Ethics

Last but not the least is when you cite and link to another blogger's work in one of your blog posts, be certain to add a value to the information provided by your source rather than simply copying and pasting it.