Internet Etiquette: When Posting On A Public Forum Is Not Appropriate

Be VERY Cautious About Posting Assumptions About Other People!

OK … here’s a real life example of what NOT to do via a public forum! Perhaps you are rather new to internet etiquette, like the individual that recently caused me a few days worth of huge irritation and much wasted time due to me having to rectify a “false accusation” pertaining to copyright infringement – I’ll leave it at that to be polite to all concerned.

Before I go any further, I’ll state right here … I was 150% innocent.

Listen up! If you suspect that someone is guilty of copyright infringement; even if you have clear proof that your material is sitting on their site, DO NOT run over to a public forum and post that!

As with other similar situations in life, in a face-to-face situation, we normally don’t announce to the world assumptions that might not be truthful or even correct! If we are considerate human beings, we approach the individual in question, and voice our concerns.

The internet should work the same way (notice I said “should”). Especially so since once you post something on a public forum, invariably there will be many people taking your words as gospel and running to defend you.

Due to someone “assuming” that I owned the website in question, “assuming” that I was using his material without his permission, who hadn’t bothered to do a Google search for “legalities of internet copyright infrigement”, and clearly didn’t do a bit of research to see if he even had a leg to stand on to come after ME … well instead of starting off by contacting me directly – when I am very easily reachable via email or phone (as published on the internet!) – no! He decided to settle things with me publicly – on a public forum no less!

Let the Harrassing and Downright RUDE Emails Begin!!

Without dragging this little teaching (rant) on and on, let’s just say that a number of people who read his unkind and untrue accussations on that forum had the nerve to email me, and yes … even tried to SPAM this blog … saying “how dare you? … BLA BLA BLA …”.

I even emailed back one of the offenders who had gone way overboard in making very rude comments to me in her email. I asked her who did she think she was to make such assumptions, and that I didn’t own the site in question … and so on and so-forth.

Guess what? This individual emailed me back to laugh in my face … telling me “who do you think YOU are?” and again repeating her falsely assumed accusations.

Yes … this guy’s public forum posting rolled into a bit of a mess.

Look, to be honest, I hate giving any more energy to this situation. There are certainly other things in my life, and the lives of those I love and care about, that deserve way more concern than an ill-thought-out forum posting does. But … I feel prompted to put this post on my blog today as obviously, if the guy that falsely accused me publicly did so without doing some necessary research first, or at least giving me the option to explain my side to him privately, well … there are probably a few more of you out there that might do the same, should the situation ever arise.

Just remember … please deal with anything “negative” in a private way first. Get all the facts correct before you dare go public. You might cause larger problems for the other person than what I experienced. And maybe you’ll rile up someone a lot meaner than me!

OH … I must say that I privately emailed this guy and set him straight about “it wasn’t me!”, I asked him to place a PUBLIC retraction of the information on that forum to set the record straight. And you better be assured that I had forwarded all SPAM emails to him, so he could see who was harrassing me. I told him to take care of those people, too.

So everybody, please watch what you say, to whom you say it, how you say it, and with internet forums … watch what you choose to post publicly. Get all the facts straight, first! Even if you are totally correct that the other person is guilty of plagiarism … still and all, do the right thing and discuss it with them privately first.

Here’s a great page of information that you should know about: Copyscape.com-Plagiarism. I encourage you to take a few minutes and familiarize yourself with the information provided here.

Want to find out who owns a website? You need to find out who owns the domain name (called the domain registrant). Find out for free by visiting Better-Whois.com. *Note: a registrant’s name and contact information can be kept private, merely by paying the registrar a nominal yearly surcharge. If you encounter this during your search, then you will have to try to contact the offending individual via other methods, or by contacting the registrar. Refer to the plagiarism information I pointed you to to find out how to proceed.