Survey says bloggers operate informal ethics

A survey of 1000 bloggers by researchers in Singapore suggests that most operate some form of code of conduct.

This reeport from Ars Techia found that

bloggers agreed on the highest ethical priority: proper attribution of information that came from other sites. Personal bloggers(as opposed to news bloggers) appeared to be willing to tell white lies when necessary, as they rated avoiding harm above telling the truth;

Another Downfall Video

This time Iain Dale is told that he has not won the Orwell prize

Welcome Alistair Campbell

Thanks to Chris Paul who brings my attention to Alistair Campbell's brand new contribution to the digital age.

Alistair tells us that

I am a late convert http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifto all this online malarkey but now the conversion has happened, I've decided to make a real go of it.

and adds that

I will blog when I feel like it, vlog at least once a week, give Dave Cameron the odd whack, and hopefully engage in a bit of lively debate. Tories welcome.

Prescott responds to accusations that he is not writing his blog

Ht-Recess Monkey

Commons unhappy with some bloggers

Apparently the authorities in the House of Commons are unhappy about the blogging activities of certain MP's

The BBC reports that

A Labour MP says he has been stripped of a Parliamentary allowance for making fun of other MPs on his blog.
Paul Flynn was told to remove posts including ones calling ex-Labour minister Peter Hain a "shapeshifter" and Lib Dem MP Lembit Opik a "clown".
When Mr Flynn refused he had part of his communications allowance removed.

You can read Paul's blog HERE

Can blogs help to engage the political process?

Labour Home has come in for a fair amount of criticism in recent days.

Suny Hundel who is the power behind Liberal Conspiracy notes that it along with its opposite number Conservative Home suffer from the same problem.The wishes of the party hierarchy to control from the top down.

He points out that a Fabian society debate

today revealed just how resistant the party hierarchy is to letting the grassroots help set the agenda. But that will have to change if Labour is to have a chance of winning the next election

. and adds that

We are now living in an era where people want more accountability and responsiveness from their elected officials. They are put off politics because they find it too Westminster-focused or irrelevant to their lives. They find the whole system difficult to decipher. In other words, they want more control, and want to engage with others who feel the same.

So the solution according to Suny is let blogs create the grassroots delay and if it is correctly it can

new ways of getting involved in the political process.

The blogging scene in Zimbabwe

With the situatio in Zimbabwe far from resolved,here are some blogs from Zimbabwe thanks to BBC newsnight

This is Zimbabwe which says of the delays in announcing the senate results

This is unacceptable! Can’t they at least announce the candidates that they have already sworn in? We know by now that drip-feeding results isn’t an issue for the ZEC so why the wait now?

Enough is enough which is aggregating all the blog comments

Cry beloved Zimbabwe whose latest post speculates

Since 2000, slowly the Zimbabwean cabinet's authority was being superseded by the Joint Operations Command (JOC), which was adapted from the counter-insurgency agency of the old white minority Rhodesian Government. The was led by Mugabe's erosion of confidence in public officials and the encroachment of armed forces in civilian matters. While this served Mugabe's self-preservation needs until March 29 2008, it has already started creating problems for the government in waiting MDC now which will struggle to uproot an entrenched military culture in civilian government.

From the frontline,a former BBC journalist who is

currently on a voyage of rediscovery to southern Africa. Treading lightly, with a warm smile and open heart she is asking everyone she meets about their lives, hopes and dreams.

Or for the government's view you can always try the Herald or its official website