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October 8, 2004
Blogging 101 - Modifying Posts
By QBlog in Blogging 101
Most blogs are just personal publications. They don't have an editor. There is no payment for posting. No contract is signed determining the content. A blogger is free to write about whatever he wants (within the law), however he wants without much external interference.
However, no blog is an island. By definition, a blog must have an audience (some larger than others) and that audience has certain expectations (justified or not). One of those primary expectations is that posts do not change, at least not without a warning.
The Rules
How does one modify a blog post? Very carefully.
Blogs aren't perfect. Mistakes are made, misspellings occur, facts turn out to be false, minds are changed. Those are some good reasons to modify a blog post but to maintain credibility, those changes should follow some basic rules. I'm not listing universal rules, just the rules that I follow. You should figure out your own rules for your blog. Think of these as guidelines.
- Denote major updates to a post by the word UPDATE or the phrase New Information. That new information should usually append the post, not replace it.
- Misspellings can almost always be corrected without notice. Really bad misspellings might warrant a funny remark, especially if it was commented on by a reader.
- Rewording portions of a post (for clarity) without notice is acceptable if the overall content remains unchanged.
- Bad grammar can be corrected without a notification.
- If an negligent error is made, admit to that error ASAP and provide a correction.
- Never, ever delete a post. If a post must absolutely be deleted, then it should be followed by a detailed explanation.
Keep in mind that it's your blog and you can do whatever you want to your posts. But if you don't follow some simple rules, you'll lose your credibility and probably your audience as well.
Blogging 101 publishes every Friday and the archives can be found by typing "Blogging 101" into the blog search. Tune in next Friday when Blogging 101 deals with... something. Haven't yet decided what the topic will be.