George Rebane

The Union turned up the screws a mite this morning and threw me off their blog – here is Jeff Pelline’s post.

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Misuse of blogs
10:16, 2008-Feb-8

From the two Jeffs and Tom Harbert, our Web editor: Our blogs are meant to let people comment on issues of the day. In some cases, we find this mission is being abused, such as posting a blog that only provides a single link to a Web site. This is not the purpose. We’d also like to remind people that our policy for commenting includes that you remain on topic and there are no personal attacks. Here is the full policy: http://www.theunion.com/article/20070308/MISC12/70308006 Thanks for reading The Union.

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(JeffP didn’t have to send me a warning email or comment, but he could have.) I had posted links to the DA office move articles on this blog, and such naked cross-linking from that newspaper is considered detrimental to The Union’s survival.  This, of course, is counter to the entire direction and momentum of today’s internet communications.  As the readers of RR know, I cross-link to The Union at every opportunity to provide my readers complete and easy access to references and source materials.  A prime reason to not comment on controversial issues on the newspaper’s blog is that their text editing and HTML software is next to brain-dead, and besides one can not tell which entries are allowed to live for how long.  Witness the recent removal of the comment about a meeting to discuss the paper’s editor that is to be held this Sunday.  You can still see it on RR here.

I am saddened that The Union will not join the growing web of information and comment that the internet enables through bloggers like me (and NC Media Watch, Light on Nevada County, NC Focus, …) and other special information sites like YubaNet.com and NC Voices.  I will continue to lobby Jeff Ackerman to abandon this paranoid and insular policy to become the county’s sole legitimate source of online information.  I believe the newspaper can have a new and productive life open up when it accepts the realities of 21st century connectivity and communication.

I also wonder if there is a compromise policy that allows cross-linking between the newspaper and other local information sites that does not pose the threat I apparently did.  I will go on cross-linking to The Union so that my readers can continue to easily surf the web.  On the web Rebane’s Ruminations claims to be neither The Final Destination nor the Burning Bush of Goodness and Light; it is simply meant to be an informative and, hopefully, enjoyable waypoint on the Reader’s daily online experience.