redistributing

reblogging (tumblr)

  • folksonomy: reblog, retumble

  • issues:

    • loss of original attribution
    • difficulty in identifying attribution in a comment tree

retweeting (twitter)

  • folksonomy: RT, retweet, via

  • issues:

    • loss of original attribution
    • misquoting (e.g. prefixing "RT" to a link originally viewed from one source but adding different language so as to misconstrue if the words/viewpoint came from the retweeter or the original source)
    • lack of original opinions/thoughts (redistributing someone else's thoughts as opposed to individual commenting)
    • mis-attribution (e.g. Person B shares thoughts on a link and thanks the original source (Person A), Person C misinterprets the thanks as the thoughts were cut/paste from Person A by Person B and thus retweets the Person B's thoughts as having come from the Person A, who only provided the link, not the thoughts)
    • blurring language (e.g. how "via" in blogging typically meant where the source came from, but not the article - "via" in retweeting can now mean where the source AND the "article" (tweet) came from)

  • suggestions:

    • "c/p" would be a more accurate prefix to a tweet, to indicate when words were directly "cut/paste" from the linked-to source
    • quotation marks

  • suggested reading:

See also: digital etiquette

changed June 29, 2009