Internet etiquette

I'm not yet totally familiar with internet etiquette. I know not to steal other people's work. That's called plagiarizing, kids, and we learned that was bad in college. But what about when you find a recipe you really like and want to repost it? An article you think perfectly articulates your feelings on a subject? A comic strip you laughed so loud at that you almost got fired? These things need to be shared people! The world needs to know!

Links. They're a great way to add a little excitement to your blog. Sort of like Easter Eggs on DVDs, they are sometimes skillfully used to underscore a point, or as an easy way to just point people to the thing about which you are speaking. I believe this is the proper way of pointing people to those aforementioned things. Much less messy than simply posting the URL, or even the bit URL.

But what if you changed a couple things? Mostly (of course), I am relating this to reposting recipes. What if the changes weren't drastic, but enough to make a difference? (Which brings up another point, one about how you know when you've crossed that fine line of a recipe being someone else's that you simply tweaked and when it becomes your own, but I'll save that for another post.) What if enough things were kept the same so the recipe is recognizable but you can't link it exactly because you made changes? I'm just not sure the best way to go about it. I think you're supposed to ask permission in order to post someone else's recipe, even if tweaks were involved. I've seen both things on the blogs I follow. Some people post links, others post things like "adapted from" and then they provide a link to the original recipe, but also print the way they did it underneath.

And links, that's another thing. Can I link to anything around the internet I want? I don't do it in an offensive way (as in, if I said something was stupid and then linked a friend's page or something, inferring I thought they were stupid. That would be mean. And passive aggressive).

So, yeah, is there a handbook for all of this? There should be.

(you'll notice a lack of links in this post. I think I'm link-shy now.)

The phenomenon that is blogging

I recently started using Google Reader (GR). I had a routine before using GR, where I would literally just remember all of the blogs I liked and would check them on a regular (cough, daily) basis. They were mostly of the cooking variety. I think they all were, actually. I loved following those blogs. I got excited each day that my favorite ones updated (it was like Christmas!).

Google Reader opened up a whole new world for me. Not only did I no longer have to actually remember which blogs I followed, I didn't have to check them every single day in order to see when they were updated. GR does this FOR me. It made me feel awfully lazy, to some extent. I mean, come on, it's not like I had to exert that much effort to begin typing the name of a blog I like, since the address was stored in my cache (or whatever). But now I didn't even have to do that! (insert picture of lazy me, leaning back in my chair drinking a can of pop, eating from a large bag of potato chips, clicking at the mouse saying "all right! now I only have to enter ONE url." In a horribly offensive southern accent)

And it opened up a whole new world of following blogs as well. I started adding blogs left and right! I imagine that I went on the internet equivalent of what extremely rich people do.

Every. Time. They. Shop.

My proverbial cart overfloweth. I follow cooking blogs galore, but not just that anymore, oh no, I now follow blogs on writing, film, technology, photography, and news. I follow blogs of people I know and one of a person I don't (which totally makes me feel like a creeper but her posts are so good and heartwarming and it's like a big hug or something to read about her trials and life and everything. It's like a really sappy Halmark movie that you don't really want to like but, gosh darn it, you DO). I also check out what GR thinks I would like on a regular basis. It's not always right, but I usually find something that entertains me, and sometimes, oh those sweet sometimes, something to add to my plethora of reading materials.

I started writing my blog a while ago and I never quite understood how people did it. Seriously, I did not comprehend this whole blogging thing, even as recent as last week. I mean, updating on a regular basis? Keeping up with current events? Dredging up funny/heartwarming/interesting stories from the past? Making everything that comes out the first time you write it actually compelling, every single time? Yeah right, like that could happen. "But it MUST. Because it DOES," I thought. And then promptly concluded I could never be one of "those" writers.

See, I had gotten it into my head somehow that bloggers were all the new generation's Jack Kerouacs. They just wrote, stream of conscious, everyday. They didn't plan. They just wrote, all very flowy and hippy-like. Yep, every blog writer was a hippy in my head. Or, you know, something like that. Which is ridiculous. As I read more and more blogs, I began to surmise that, by golly, these people actually PLANNED what they were going to write, like an essay or a story or something.

That made a lot more sense.

It also gives me hope for my blog. Maybe, just maybe, I can actually get the hang of this blogging thing after all.

Heh.

Fun Run

NBC has officially made it to number one in my book. You know why? Because they finally put The Office online for all to enjoy. So instead of having to scour the internet for a site that has it, or try to find someone that may have TIVOed it, I can watch it whenever I get the chance. Well done, NBC, well done.