I found this great post over on SiteProNews that explores the ethics of search-engine optimisation (SEO), and just who gets to define what is and isn’t acceptable (hint: Google). It really is a great introduction to some of the ethical issues that surround blogging as a medium, and I want to use it as a chance to spring-board a new post series that I will be beginning in the very near future.
The ethics of blogging is something that is of great interest to me. Of course, whilst setting up this site I became very interested in reading up about blogging techniques; along with things such as SEO, writing styles, monetisation strategies, online marketing and everything else I could find that was even slightly relevant to running a successful blog. What I started to see though, was that there were many avenues towards success that just aren’t appropriate for those of us who focus strongly on ethical behaviour. What good would a site on ethics be if it was designed and promoted through unethical, or even ambiguous, means?
Which got me thinking, there must be more people out there who are asking these questions right? I certainly did find many on the various blogging forums, but what I really wanted to find were articles focusing on this topic. Unfortunately, there wasn’t much out there to find. At least not directly dealing with ethical questions and asking what is and isn’t good practice – and, perhaps more importantly, why?
The little I could find otuside of the forums was usually quite out of date, some of it going back even 5 years or more. All of the things these older articles were saying still applies, for sure, but that doesn’t mean that we can’t do with a new updated look at the topic.
Over the next few weeks (and probably longer then that) you can expect to see numerous articles on the subject of ethical blogging. So, whilst I get my head around the idea and start fleshing out something with more detail, please do check out the article at SiteProNews. It is an excellent one and raises some very interesting questions not only about what is and isn’t good SEO practices, but also questioning just who should get to decide on the criteria.
[ad name=”Google Adsense-Link Banner x4″]
