36 Blog Rules to Keep You in Business

If ou are a corporate blogger or interested in what works in blogsphere, you have Nancy Flynn's excellent book that tells you have far, how much and how deep should you go, and more so what are the boundaries that you should be aware. [Info courtesy: Microsoft Momentum, June 2007: 7]

BLOG RULES: A Business Guide to Managing Policy, Public Relations, and Legal Issues by Nancy Flynn (AMACOM Books, 2006)
Here are some rules to keep you and your business in business and out of court.
Blog Rule #1: The blog is an electronic communications powerhouse.
Blog Rule #2: Business blogs are not necessary or appropriate for every organization.
Blog Rule #3: Savvy business owners and executives must learn how to strategically and successfully manage the blogosphere today.
Blog Rule #4: It’s the casual, conversational, anything-goes nature of the blog that makes it both so appealing to blog writers and readers.
Blog Rule #5: An organization without an external blog program may risk losing position, market share, reputation, and sales to tech-savvy competitors.
Blog Rule #6: The strategic management of blogs or any other electronic business communications tool begins with the establishment of written rules and policies governing usage and content.
Blog Rule #7: A business blog opens the organization up to potential disasters.
Blog Rule #8: Management, technology, and the legal system have not yet caught up with the potential benefits and risks of business blogging.
Blog Rule #9: Strategic blog management begins with the establishment of a clear objective.
Blog Rule #10: Don’t allow IT (or legal, records management, or human resources) to dictate your business blog program.
Blog Rule #11: Require employees to sign a confidentiality agreement to protect trade secrets and confidential data belonging to the organization, employees, customers, business partners, and other third parties.
Blog Rule #12: Use discipline to maximize employee compliance with blog rules, policies, and procedures. continue reading Blog Rule # 13 - 36

From The Critics
Business Times (New Haven, CT):
Blog Rules is the one guide readers need to help ensure that their organizations are helped and not hindered by this revolutionary tool.
Niche Magazine:
Since the rules about business relationships and blogs can be hazy, Nancy Flynn has written an essential guide..
Library Journal:
Flynn's book... is more strictly for CEOs fearful of blogging. [continue reading these critical notes at bn.com]

Table of Contents (sample, see full list at bn.com)
Ch. 1 Why blog rules? 3
Ch. 2 Blogs pose unprecedented risks to business 13
Ch. 3 Start with a clear objective : why blog? 20
Ch. 4 Proceed with caution : self-assessment for would-be business bloggers 26
Ch. 5 Treat blog posts as business records 39

GANGA: A Journey Down the Ganges River

Om Jaya Ganga Mata: Theme music



PS. This review is not mine.
Jai Ganga Maatey, by Sardar Khushwant Singh
The Ganga is 1,516 miles long from its source at Gangotri to the Bay of Bengal. Many of the world�s rivers are much larger and broader, e.g. the Nile, Amazon, Yangtze and Mississippi are more than twice as long. Many are much larger than the Ganga as well and have steamers plying on them. A few are historic, e.g. the Indus from which India derives its name.

All are loved by people who live along their banks. To the English their biggest river is Father Thames. The Mississippi was immortalised by Paul Robeson singing Ole Man River. But no river in the world has commanded so much worship as the Ganga. She comes from the Milky way through the tresses of Lord Shiva down to the earth. Most Indians revere her as their mother. Even a Muslim like the poet Mohammed Iqbal referred it as the base of Aryan settlement in India:

Ai aab-e-rood-e-Ganga
Voh din hai yaad tujh ko
Utra teyrey kinarey ttha kaarwaan hamaara

(O ye limpid waters of the Ganga
Remember you the day
When our caravan reached your banks
And settled down to stay.)

Even a non-believer like me used to make it a point to go to Hardwar once a year to watch the aarti at sunset at Har-ki-Pauri and join the throng in shouting "Jai Ganga Maatey � Victory to thee Mother Ganga."

There is no logic behind worshiping the Ganga, nor any basis for believing that its waters have healing properties.

Nevertheless, from times immemorial our rulers, including Muslims, get their drinking water from Hardwar.

The same water channelised in canals or taps is not sacred; only that brought from Rishikesh in Hardwar passes the test of sanctity.

It is from that that Kanwarias in their thousands fill their water pots and trudge to distant towns and villages to sell it. People anxious to go to heaven come to die or at least be cremated by the Ganga�s banks. Around Varanasi there is a taxi and rikshaw service to bring corpses from adjacent towns and villages to the Ganga: it is known as the Swarg Mail. Though we worship the Ganga, we rob it by diverting its waters into canals, block its flow by erecting dams, and foul its stream by human excreta and factory effluents. At places you can�t bear the stench it emits. We are that kind of people.

You can read all about it in Ganga by Julvana Grandall Hollick (Random House). He is columnist and TV film producer. He & his wife did the entire length of the river Alpha to Omega. It makes delightfully informative reading. Source: Deccan Chronicle

About the book / author:
Combining travelogue, science, and history, Ganga is a fascinating portrait of a river and a culture. It will show you India as you have never imagined it.

Julian Crandall Hollick is an award-winning producer and writer of radio documentaries. His programs have aired on NPR, the BBC, and CBC in Canada, and his writing has appeared in publications including Smithsonian and The New Republic. Hollick was described by Peter Jennings as “the person who taught me about Islam,” and by countless Indians as “the man who knows more about India than we Indians” (Radio Midday, Mumbai). Island Press"

Energy-saving Google black screen version - Blackle

Due to a demand from energy conscious users, Google have created a new black screen version of their site called Blackle on www.blackle.com. If everybody used it instead of the white version, it is estimated that 750 mega watts/hour per year would be saved.

See also:

Blackle.com: Energy Saving Screen.....Bahhhhhhhhh!!!!

In the spirit of this, CableOrganizer has taken to some additional testing methodologies with regard to the internet. Some of these have some very real world ecological implications. On this occassion, we've taken to getting to the real story behind Blackle.com.

Microsoft surface,Flickr and Blackle