heartharmony.com.au

People love to read great content on blogs. I often get emails from people telling me about how much they valued something that I had written, or I go to a networking event and people tell me how much they love reading my blog. This is fantastic – but what would be even more fantastic is to get comments and discussion happening about something I have written on this blog itself.

Every day I delete up to 100 comments that involve the selling of viagra or other pharmaceautical products or sites peddling pictures you wouldn’t want to show your mother through my Akismet filter.

As I morosely trawl through the blog spam folder each night, I wish for real comments and discussion. I crave to read and respond to comments from regular readers, people who may be too shy to normally comment on things, blog lurkers and generally nice people. People like you.

So … I would like to invite you to take a step forward and say g’day.

I would really love to hear what you have to say. Is what I write about useful? Is there a point that I have missed that may help other readers? Is there a different way I could have looked at the issue? Every comment is welcome and useful.

And are there any rules for this blog? Well I think the brilliant social media commentator Laurel Papworth has the best blog rules I have read anywhere – so I have reproduced them in total (with names changed where appropriate) to give you the ground rules for commenting.

1. Thou shalt show each other respect. I don’t care if the other commenter is a moron. Thou wilt not call them a moron.
2. You can however criticise a thought or idea. As in “that is a moronic idea”. Criticise the idea, not the person.
3. Unless it’s someone we all universally hate and revile. The Ruler of the Free World is one such being you can feel free to slam. Criticise the office or position, not the person.
4. Don’t write anything that is defamatory or breaks copyright or is threatening. Firstly cos it breaks Rule One. (show each other respect) and Secondly cos then the policeman will come to my house. In uniform. Looking gorgeous. And how can I concentrate enough to hand him over any details I may have about you? Which I will do so willingly. Unfortunately I won’t have any cos Google doesn’t give me IP addresses etc. So think of me, and don’t do anything illegal.
5. Did I mention that personal attacks are prohibited? This specifically means any comment that is blatantly attacking another person on or off the blog, especially in a personal way.
6. Trolling is prohibited.Trolling is whenever someone is clearly, deliberately posting in a manner for the purpose of angering and/or insulting the other participants of the board. Trolling DOES NOT encourage further discussion in the long run, it only encourages personal attacks (if left unchecked).
7. I think you are getting the picture. Play nicely.
8. Participant shall not post comments containing personal phone numbers or addresses. I choose to show my personal details. Others may or may not. If you accidentally call someone Ingrid instead of say, Heartharmony that’s ok. But inciting people to ring a telephone number to tell that person/company how awful they are? Not allowed.
9. No spurious advertising. Free the Content doesn’t mean Free the Spam. Yes this means you Mr Viagra and Ms Anonymous. Friends can post links to interesting products. That’s called information and the subject matter should be linked to the blog post. Nothing else allowed.
10. No spam.
11. I don’t get paid to write this blog. I don’t take money to write stuff. Sometimes people take me to lunch and I may or may not talk about their cool/uncool site afterwards. Get over it, I need to eat.
12. If you only buy me coffee, you only get a coffees worth of posting.
13. Posting details of bugs and exploits in such a way that others are able to perform said bug or exploit is prohibited. This includes software cracks. Unfortunately.
14. Posting of pornography, racist or otherwise discriminating remarks, threats to cause physical or mental harm, extreme offensive language, material that breaks any law or otherwise totally unacceptable posts or links to pages that contain the aforementioned material may result in me becoming extremely annoyed.
15. My (Heartharmony aka Ingrid Cliff) word is final. This is not a democracy. If I delete a comment don’t keep coming back to repost. My blog my space, my subjects: go pollute your own blog, facebook, twitter, Myspace or whatever. You are free to take the conversation elsewhere. Stick a billboard up with Heartharmony is a Moron on the Harbour Bridge if you must. Just don’t do it here.
16. My word is FINAL. Did I mention that? I did? Good.

I really look forward to reading and responding to your thoughts.

Ingrid Cliff

We put your businses into words

Heart Harmony – Freelance Writer