If Emily Posted, a guide to social media netiquette and online ethics, began as my work moved further away from print and into social media. My mantra has always been that rules are made to be broken, but online I found that there weren’t enough rules to begin with. It’s hard for people to know what to do, or how to do it, when so much is undefined.

I’m not the first, and certainly not the last, to have referred to the web as the Wild West. The analogy works. But here’s the thing, the Wild West is not so wild anymore. It hasn’t been for a long time.

History has shown us that civilization can’t sustain itself if it isn’t, well, civilized.

I’m a working writer, editor and photographer, and IEP is based on my experiences both working in print and online for close to fifteen years. Nothing here is to be considered legal advice. IEP is about what it ethical and right, not legalese. It’s about education. Not litigation. It’s about what I learned in school, on the job, what I consult lawyers and experts on, and what I learn from talking to colleagues and friends.

I started IEP for myself, as a blogger trying to bring some order to this tangled web. Except I realized that civilization can only succeed if we work together. I hope you’ll join the conversation each Friday, and please feel free to contact me if you have any questions, ideas or concerns.

I believe that if we want to be taken seriously as bloggers, we must take blogging seriously.

alexandrawrote@gmail.com     @alexandrawrote

All content ©Alex Asher Sears. All Rights Reserved. So, don’t copy, right?