I Know What You Wrote [in your] Last Entry

Blogging can be a dangerous affair.

A couple of months back, a local medical undergraduate’s blog on certain sensitive issues was grossly misquoted in a national newspaper by a reporter, whose request for an interview was rejected by the former.

The published article put her [and other undergraduates in general] in a particularly unfavorable limelight. She immediately withdrew the links to her archives and penned her outrage at the violation of her rights, both to the relevant papers [her letter was only published after a long time] and in her blog.

Today her personal site/blog is hardly half the hotbed of interesting opinions on issues and events it used to be.

But the possible negative repercussions of posting personal writings online has never hit close to home… until a close friend’s blog was deliberately searched for by someone who was never meant to read it. Unfortunately a similar repeat of the episode happened late last week, only this time it concerned an extremely private blog and an accidental chancing upon it by the most unlikely candidate.

In both cases, relationships between/amongst the relevant parties were bruised. Both blogs are also discontinued.

Blogs can never be completely private. Almost anyone in any place, so as long as he/she has net access, can read it. While utilizing blogs as a conduit to articulate thoughts in black and white, it is imperative to exercise appropriate discretion when penning entries. After all, you hardly know who else might be reading your blog, do you?