Blogging to Ruin Reputations

Recently a friend of mine emailed me a link to a blog on blogger.com (owned by Google) and said I had to go look. I clicked the link and took a look. I immediately had a bad feeling after reading only a couple of entries. The blog was full of nasty snide remarks and negativity about other people's horses. But being busy and not having much time I clicked off and replied to my friend's email that the blog gave me a bad taste in my mouth and left it at that. Because I do not want to in anyway boost this blog's hits I will not reveal the link.

A week later a dear friend of mine was a target of this bloggers wrath. This blogger scours websites and online photo hosting sites looking for pictures of other people's horses to critique and posts them on her blog. She claims her blog is "educational". My friend's horse was a rescue horse that she had taken in to rehabilitate and care for. The pictures the blogger used were the initial pictures of the horse when my friend first got her home. The picture the blogger used also had my friend's young daughter in them. So this blogger posted pictures that she had no rights to (copyright or any other right) and went on to post nasty comments about the condition and conformation of the young horse. My friend posted on the blog and explained that the horse was a rescue and that is why she is so thin in the pictures and asked that the blogger please remove her pictures from her blog.

The blogger promptly refused to remove the pictures and went on to spew more venom about my friend's character, her horse knowledge etc. After being so shocked and appalled by what I was reading I posted on the comments section of the blog. I wrote that the blogger was infringing on my friend's copyrights to pictures by posting pictures she didn't own and did not have permission to use. Her reply was that number one no one would spend the time or money to sue her and number two, she is anonymous so cannot be found to sue. She also said that Google.com would protect her hidden identity should anyone try to find her. She then went to say that her blog was educating people on horse conformation and what "not to breed". She also stated that she feels she has the right to use any picture she finds on the Internet as it is "public domain". I did try to explain the difference between "public domain" and copyright infringement. I also informed her that I had never heard of using nasty remarks and insulting other people's character to be educational tool. I also told her that I myself am very interested in horse conformation which is why I wrote a book on the subject. The message was lost in all the venom spewing from her and the other people that subscribe to her blog. It was almost like watching a mob mentality to see the horrible comments that were being posted one after another. She was asked several times again to please remove the pictures from her blog especially since they pictured my friend's young daughter. She steadfastly refused to take them down which in my opinion would have been the right thing to do if she really wanted her blog to be educational verses inflammatory.

My friend was so upset and distraught for days. She contacted Google.com but did not receive an answer as of the writing of this article. I sent my friend a "copyright infringement cease and desist letter" to fill out and send to the blogger. But since the blogger hides behind her blog my friend is having trouble finding a mailing address. If this person truly felt she was putting out content that was educational and valuable why would she feel the need to hide behind a fake name?

In reading this blog this blogger has posts by people begging her to critique their horses to which she replies she doesn't have time. She doesn't have time? But she has time to scour the Internet and steal pictures and then critique those horses without their owners consent or knowledge. I guess its just not nearly as much fun to make horrible remarks if the owner gives you permission.

This is just one small illustration of what blogging can do to a person's reputation. I have also seen school kids, especially high school age, get their reputations ruined by blogger's on sites such as Myspace.com. I have talked to school administrator's that insist the worst thing that happened on the Internet was Myspace.com and all the trouble blog's on there cause that spill over into the school day. My children's school now checks posts on Myspace.com weekly just to head off impending problems. I have to feel that the school administrator's time could be much better spent if they didn't have to police Myspace.com looking for fights that could cause problems at school. My children's principal went as far to say that Myspace.com should be illegal for anyone under the age of 18 or still in high school. That is how much impact these blog's can have.

I am all for freedom of speech but somewhere we have to be able to police ourselves and not allow blog's to ruin peoples reputation for other people's entertainment. I personally feel that sites such as Google.com and Myspace.com are going to have to start policing their blog's more stringently and start terminating accounts that are set up only to ruin people's reputations. I feel especially strongly about this pertaining to school age children. There is enough stress in being a teenager without the worry of what other kid's are posting about you on Myspace.com or other blogging sites.