Editorial Housekeeping

It's time for some editorial housekeeping. Last night, I deleted a post by a new user, Hasan Jafri. He had signed up and innocently discovered that users had permission to blog and/or post stories with digg-like voting attached to them. These are two features that can be enabled on the Drupal platform that we use to run this site, but it was not our intention to run TechPresident as an open site where anyone can post at will. (Comments are open and will stay open as long as people behave.)

So, I took the post down (it wasn't a bad one, by the way) and sent Jafri an apologetic email trying to explain. He rightly takes me to task here:

No sooner had I posted my last message than I got a damage control e-mail (note they did not engage me in an open thread) from TechPresident’s edtor Michah Sifry stating “unfortunately, I had to take your post (of the flubbed Romney video) down because we are not an open site.”

Not true. Why else does TechPresident give its members a blog function and a Digg-like form to link and introduce stories? Or at least it did till two hours ago. Sure, you don’t have to be open thread (as this blog is) but in that case you should at least include a note to users saying posts are moderated. Duh!

Three tips since this is obviously a learning curve for these guys (and I still like their site):

1. Fess up when you mess up.
2. Don’t make excuses.
3. NEVER try to control an open thread conversation, especially about a new product, through backdoor e-mails.

Hasan, I'm fessing up. We messed up.

That said, clearly more housekeeping is in order. Right now, TechPresident is a group blog with an invited group of contributors. These are people I know and trust, who bring a range of experience and expertise to the conversation. I've also asked them to follow two primary ground rules for their posts, which they are free to make without requiring advance clearance from me.
1. I've asked them to not use the site to electioneer for or against particular candidates. Yes to telling us why X's web strategy is great; no to telling us why X will be a great president. We all have other sites for that.
2. I've asked them to disclose any relationship with any of the campaigns, either as paid staff or consultants or as unpaid advisors. I've also asked them to make clear in their posts if they have a favorite in the race, even if they're playing no role in the campaign. I have no problem with our bloggers choosing favorites; it's inevitable that will happen. I just don't want it to be hidden. As these disclosures are made, I'm going to add them to our "About" page so we have a running record.

All that said, this episode with Hasan Jafri raises an intriguing question for me. Should TechPresident invite any user to blog? This could conceivably work if every post went into a moderation queue. The upside, no doubt, would be more interesting content. The downside, no doubt, would be more behind-the-scenes work for me and Josh Levy, our associate editor, making sure that people weren't using the site to electioneer.

Right now, I'm inclined to take this approach. If you want to blog here, ask me (micah-at-personaldemocracy-dot-com) and we'll talk offline about it. That's how Raven Brooks' great piece on YouTube and the candidates came our way. We are definitely open to adding more contributors. I'm also reading our comment threads (as well as people talking about this stuff on other blogs) and looking for other people to bring in that way.

But what do you think our editorial policy should be? I'm all ears.