Lies, Truth, and Ethics on the Internet

There was a time when I'd use the Internet to check e.mail, shop, and work.  When I discovered online writing as a spare-time activity, I began spending more and time online.  I kept to myself, minded my business, and pretty much had no real human contact over the Internet.  As with so many free-time endeavors, though, I began participating more and more on some writing sites.

To this day, I'm still not much of a socializer online.  (I've written about what a social-networking loser I am.)  Still, after a few years of online writing I'm no longer in quite the same kind of "isolation tank" I had been previously.   On the one hand, I've come to enjoy having some interaction with other human beings online.  On the other hand, I've also become acutely aware of the fact that my earlier belief that the Internet was "a pile of crap"  actually, in many ways, underestimated the problem and degree-of-presence of liars, cheats, scammers, and sundry other miscreants on the Internet.  In other words, I've always know it was bad.  I just didn't realize how bad it really is.

For the most part, it doesn't bother me a whole lot.  I generally keep a safe distance from everybody online, and most people seem to similarly keep a safe distance from me.  That's what sensible Internet-using adults do.  Even if it often seems as if lying is pretty much the way everything is done online, I've remained immune to a whole lot of that lying and other manifestations of complete lack of personal (and often business) ethics.  From time to time, and like so many other people, I've fallen for one thing or another and come away feeling pretty much like an idiot for having done so.  When it's happened I usually tell myself I'm "just glad I'm not one of those people" and that I'm glad I have a sense of integrity and ethics.  ("That is, after all, all that matters," I tell myself.)

The problem of such an ethics-challenged Internet is one most of are just kind of used to, tuck in the back of our head when we're online, and don't worry much about.  That back-of-the-mind stuff does, however, have a way of building up and coming out in the form of writing.

This Hub is not what a Hub is supposed to be.  It's long (very long).  I offers no particularly useful information.  For those reasons, I don't expect anyone to read it.  The issue of ethics (and lack of them) on the Internet was just something I wanted to peel from the back walls of my mind and put together in a discussion; mostly, I suppose, because writers are people who don't tend to let discussions go un-written.  Also, I think I needed to sort out all those bits and pieces of information and resentment associated with one kind of lack-of-ethics or another, and just kind of organize them as a way of clearing my head of them.

So that's what here.  Again, I don't expect anyone to want to read anything this long (and this "fuddy duddy"); but if nothing else, I encourage you to scroll down to the Cole Porter video (and if  you can't quite make out the words of this recording of the man who was born in the late 1800's, consider looking up the lyrics online.  Considering today's Internet issues, the lyrics to "Anything Goes" will (if I'm correct) make you smile. 

Over the last several months I've more and more found myself thinking about the whole "Baloney-on-the-Internet Phenomenon". You know - the nuts-and-bolts reality that things on the Internet are very often (VERY often) far from what they seem. I guess that's because I've had more time to be online in recent months, which has meant more time to be looking around for "interesting stuff" (as opposed to limiting my activities to "real" work, some welcome free-time writing, and some popping on and off things like the forum as a way to take a break from all of it).

On the one hand, we all know there's baloney on the Internet. (Heck, there's baloney just about anywhere in life - online or off.) Some it's even acceptable. People do things like set up an impressive and shiny website for their business when, really, they're two guys in a family room with a bunch of UPS- and pizza- boxes around them. Maybe one day people like this will have a business that lives up to its impressive website. The reality is nobody is going to want to do business with an "under-construction" website or one that screams, "Nineteen-year-old Joey's blog that's been up since he was in tenth grade." These two guys aren't really telling the world they're anything other than two buys amidst a bunch of boxes. They're just not telling the world what would serve no purpose in its knowing.

Of course, if they post a picture of a high-rise office building their integrity might become a little more questionable (depending on whether they just let visitors assume what they assume or imply the photo is more than just a photo of a building). They bring things to a different level if they actually say their business is housed in the high-rise. My personal opinion about this kind of thing is that people like these two space-challenged, small-business, owners could be true to their own integrity (if they have any or hope to have any) by not posting such a picture at all. This Hub isn't about business websites, though. It's about honesty and lack of it on the Internet in general. Actually, it's more about how we, as individuals, present what we (as individuals) are online. More specifically, it's about how we, online writers, present ourselves to other human beings (and a lot of us seem to forget there are actually other human beings) on the other side of the screen when we start posting whatever we post online.

Even more to the point, this Hub is about my own realizing that if we spend enough time online, particularly for purposes other than "out-and-out, business-only " purposes (or even as a part of supporting, complementing, or supplementing those out-and-out business purposes), it seems we (at least those of us who care about our own integrity and about other people in general) come to a point where we need to define, for ourselves, some parameters within which we can use good judgment online while also assurring that our integrity and concern for others will remain intact. Perhaps people who post their writing online as writers (rather than just "as socializers" or as something else) have just that much more of a challenge. After all, not everyone specializes in writing non-fiction. Also, much of the time writing is a business. Some people write to market things other than their own writing. Forms of writing, and reasons for it, can be as individual as the faces of the people whose fingers click that keyboard. To make things that much more complicated for writers, many writers write for any number of those individual purposes.

People use pseudonyms to protect their own privacy (or other people in their lives). That's not only reasonable. It's sensible - even moral, considering those "innocents" being protected. Then there are (from what I hear) sites where teens get to create all kinds of fantasy lives for themselves; and, of course, sites like dating sites (never been to, myself) where people create fiction to one degree or another (apparently, not thinking their way through to if/when they actually have to show up somewhere in person). There's pretty much just about any kind of site for any kind of person, and a lot of those sites have members numbering in the thousands and thousands, if not more.

On top of it all, just yesterday the subject of a talk radio program was the fact that, with all that's "out there" on the Internet, there aren't yet laws governing a lot of things. Doing things like using the Internet to air grievances about things like bad customer service or policies at large corporations is a use for the Internet people figured out. Now, large corporations have begun suing people for some of these things (apparently, not necessarily winning but managing to cause posters to lose their homes). It is generally said that truth has always been an "absolute defense" in lawsuits. Not being an attorney, I can't expand on the fact that apparently the Internet has introduced a new brand of "gray area" into the legal mix. This Hub isn't about lawsuits either, though. It's about my own awareness that if I care about my own integrity (online and off), as well as my own business and reputation purposes, I've realized that we know not only have to consider our own standards when it comes to each online .

I suppose it doesn't matter as much for the person who doesn't have to worry about an employer or client (or potential employer or client) seeing what they post online. It probably doesn't matter as much for someone who doesn't have kids (who have friends) old enough to read what they post. I know that as a mother, I imagine my future great-grandchildren finding my virtual paper trail and seeing who, exactly, their great-grandmother was and what life was like when she lived. (Not everyone takes over-thinking Internet matters to this extent, I know. Maybe I can be too much in this way. Then again, some people might have fewer regrets if they worked on their tendency to "under-think" things when it comes to the Internet.)

A particular challenge for me is that fact that I use some of my free-time writing as a way to bridge the gap between "business-related" writing and hobby writing in a way that both meets my urges to write what I want and yet shows a "me" that isn't all that different from the "me" I present in more business-related situations. When I write I don't care if a potential employer or client (or whoever) sees the "real" me I present when I'm not writing for business. I don't mind if someone like that sees some "daisies and puppies" verse I post somewhere on a site where things aren't all about business. In fact, a part of me even wants someone like that to see that I'm more than my resume and a handful of writing samples, each having been written or selected to meet someone else's guidelines. I am, as the song says, what I am ("and what I am needs no excuses"). I've done very little I've ever been ashamed of (and in those instances when I have, I either have a good excuse to go along with it or else wouldn't make it public anyway). In fact, in those instances when I've ever done anything I'd be ashamed of, I'm pretty much SO ashamed of it I can't even bring it up in my own conversations with myself. (Yes, potential employers, I'm admitting in public that I occasionally have a conversation with myself.)

The other part to all this standard setting is that we don't just have to set standards for ourselves (not just as a way of establishing our own level of integrity, but as a way of establishing for ourselves some consistent approach to our "doings" online), we also have to figure out where it we draw the line when it comes to deciding who online we deal with, as well as the extent to which we'll deal with them.

To make all this line-drawing and standard-setting a little trickier, online writing often (needless to say) involves people who enjoy reading and writing fiction. Forum discussions about who uses what kind of screen name or avatar make it clear that a lot of us approach even these seemingly minor matters with completely different thinking. Those of us who don't write fiction often want people to know how careful we about only presenting what we, ourselves, know to be true. One simple example might be this: If I'm writing about something like a coffee maker I just bought and haven't had much luck with, I think I need to be careful about saying "This company makes nothing but crap." Instead, I'm careful to say (essentially), "This one unit that I got has a hotplate that doesn't get very hot." I don't want to presume that I have "inside information" on the overall quality of this company's products. I need to keep in mind that all I really know to be true is that the one machine I got isn't one that works well. (By the way, by way of full disclosure, my real-life coffee maker is one my son gave me years ago, and it has always worked just fine.)

I mentioned establishing that consistent "place" from which I think any of us needs to operate (either as writers, readers, socializers, or consumers-in general; and in terms of standards of honesty, degree to which we'll alter the truth, and area of gray that sometimes is mostly truth but sometimes is more misleading less-than-truths). Maybe other people don't need the level of "feeling organized and grounded" to function online. Call me "a person with OCD", but I can't really think well enough to write if I don't have some "grounded point" from which I'm starting. When it comes to whom I'll pay attention to online, I need that consistent set of my own guidelines as a way of not straying too far off and finding myself in some situation I'd prefer not to be in.

All this wheel-spinning over integrity and truth is something a lot of Internet users wouldn't even understand, because some "online people" are kids, some don't need to worry about what they do online to this extent, some don't care, and some don't seem to realize that other "online people" are actually people at all. As for me, I've lived long enough in a world that didn't have the Internet that who and what I am, as an offline person, isn't something I can easily shake just because I turn on my computer. Nor, for any number of reasons mentioned or not mentioned above, would it work for me to be able do that.

So, with a sensible awareness that, as often as not (maybe more often than not) all is not always what it seems on the Internet; and with my guard sensibly and properly in place; I ask how important truth on the Internet really is anyway; and I ask myself what parameters I've set for myself and others, as far Internet behavior and presentation go. Like most sensible people, I learned long ago that a whole lot of what goes on online isn't anything to take seriously. Forum arguments. Crummy remarks on my writing. They're all either a matter of running into the rare enough jerk, or else running into someone in the real world who is having a particularly bad day. Sometimes, too, they're a matter of someone not meaning anything. Often, they're a matter of people who just enjoy trying to irk others. We all know that.

In fact, we all know that the rest of "all know" that enough that people who want to "get something going" often know they have to take things well beyond the usual level of irksome remarks and posting. This, of course, has the natural consequence of breeding a new level of phonies online (because once people start pushing the Internet envelope they risk having accounts closed). This means that those of us who want others to know that we are real have yet further incentive for establishing and sticking with those guidelines/standards we inevitably seem to set for ourselves and others. Some people see the Internet as nothing more than interactive entertainment, of course, and that's certainly a valid approach to it. There is, I think, though, even some standard by which those who come to the Internet for nothing but their own entertainmen/fun should follow. After all, even when children go out to play with other children, if they don't play nicely they'll eventually find they have no one else to play with. Some kids don't care if none of the other kids like them. Most do, though. As far as I go, I can't say I give too many hoots about who thinks what of me. The thing is, though, I need to keep liking me - and I can't like me if I disregard how I treat others on this virtual playground, workplace, and whatever else this Internet is.

My thing is that I like the fact that I can happily swing on the playground swings for hours; but once there are other other kids on the playground scene, I need to know I'm at least trying to play fairly and trying to be a good friend. Maybe that sounds like I've lived on Sesame Street a few decades too long, but there's a reason Sesame Street tries to teach children some things. Playing fairly and trying to be a good friend aren't things reserved for the preschool set. Speaking of Sesame Street and the like (and this, I know, will seem like I'm "way" over-estimating the importance of any microscopic role I have in the Internet world); once I had children and had to think in terms of being a role model for them, that kind of thinking just kind stuck. I'm often on this Internet playground with other parents' teenagers and young-adult sons or daughters. There's a part of me that just has to behave in a way I'd hope other adults would behave around my own sons and daughter.

I don't over-estimate my own importance on the Internet any more than I over-estimate what I'd look like to someone flying over the Earth and seeing me as one of a zillions "ants". At the same time, there's no denying that the Internet is powerful. It has brought people from around the world together (for good or ill). Again, this seems like over-thinking and over-estimating, but I've often thought about how being in touch with people from countries (particularly countries with a lot of people who don't Americans very well) can mean what I am/do online will show someone else exactly how at least SOME Americans really are (again, for good or ill). In my unimportant and insignificant way, I'm representing whoever and whatever I am as a person - an American, a woman, a middle-aged person, a mother, a writer, a "Yankee" (as someone referred to us NorthEast Americans recently), etc. etc. I don't think it matters much if someone even likes what I represent or am. What matters, I think, is that, at least, what I represent is really how at least some people (of any group/category I'm in) really think/are. Neither Rome nor some ant colonies have been built in that proverbial day.

Speaking of the world and the Internet, it always kind of surprises me to notice that some people seem to think of their Internet "doings" as their own, private, thing that they tuck away when they fold down the cover of their laptop and tuck the laptop away in a bag with all their other "personal" things. It's easy to fall into the thinking that the Internet, which is brought to us through nifty little gadgets with our own nifty little wallpaper and sounds, is a our own little personal thing (like a diary). Yes, there are some similarities with writiing online in an account that has a password and a personalized profile, and one of those little "Dear Diary" books with a look on them. Still, people seem to not notice that there's a huge, huge, difference between what they post online and what they might have otherwise written on those easily shredded paper pages in a "Dear Diary" book or even a Mead notebook. When you write anything online you're putting it out there in the "whole world" (or at least any part of the world that has Internet).

This goes back to thinking about why I want to aim to present the real me (versus lying); and I think about the line in the song, "New York, New York" - "if I can make it there I'll make it anywhere." Believe me, I have absolutely zero delusions of any grandeur; but as a writer, I can't help but think that if I ever really were to "make it" in that Internet world in which thousands and thousands of people are writing I'd want to "make it" based on the real me - not on pretending I'm someone/something I'm not, only to feel like any level of success I'd achieved was as much a bubble waiting to pop as so many other bubbles have shown themselves to be. (See? As much as I care about the whole integrity and self-respect thing, and as much as I want to know I try to be decent to other other people, even I have a certain amount of pure ego.)

HAVING STANDARDS (How, Why and Whether It Matters)

So What Are These Standards That I've Come Up With For My Own Use (and that I don't necessarily think are standards other people should adopt (because, after all, I think we all have to come up with our own, based on our own personalities, principles, and purposes)?

Avatars/Images - Real photos, expressing oneself, or expressing who one wishes he really were

Well, the easiest one to have a standard for is the avatar. To me, the picture someone uses ought to either be a real picture of the person or else an image of something that's unique and that shows a little something about what the person sees as somehow showing some little side to his personality. Basically, I don't think there's anything "wrong" with most selections of image, other than with selecting that old standby, the photo of a pretty model who is neither the writer nor the writer's wife or girlfriend. The way I see it, if I used a photo of a glamorous model I'd be sending the message that I wished I looked like that person, instead of me. If I were a guy and used that kind of image I'd feel like I were telling the world I didn't happen to a have good picture of myself, I couldn't even come up with enough thought to be bothered using an image that I thought showed something about me. Worse, I'd feel like I was just showing how I was like so many other men, not always the best thing for a writer who hopes to show he has the mind to write. In other words, to me, any image will do - as long as it isn't one of those photos of a model everyone knows isn't really either writer or his girlfriend and that pretty much sends the message (accurate or not), "This person either has wishful thinking or a wish to deceive."

Names (One at a time, many at a time, real or pseudonym - I don't think they matter a whole lot.)

Choice of screen name (one's own or a pseudonym): I pretty much thing these are the same as avatars. Any name will do, provided a "little librarian type" (stereotype, I know; please overlook that) doesn't choose a name like, GalactaGirlTripleD. This is the same kind of thing as the model picture is. It's pretty much hoping/trying to deceive readers into thinking the writer is something she/he isn't, and we all know that. When I've had to choose a pseudonym (for practical or security purposes) I've generally gone with a pseudonym that's about as "exciting" as my real name.

Many writing sites advise writers that potential publishers are only interested in a "real sounding" name. For the most part, I've always done "hobby writing" under the same name (and, yes, it's a pen name). My approach is to use a first name that was popular around the time I was born (my attempt to give a rough idea of my true age) and a last name that's similar in "level of interesting" and ethnic origin as my real last name. Using an altered version of my real name is another approach.

Because "hobby writing" often includes writing about personal experience for me, it has just made sense to use a pen name. Using a pen name is something I'm not all that comfortable with, but I'd be a lot more uncomfortable using my real name. In fact, if I were to use that there'd be a lot of writing I just couldn't feel free to write. I've justified the fact that I use a pen name by keeping in mind the line, "a rose by any other name...". Pen name or no pen name, everything else I present online is true. In fact, at this point, I'm so used to writing under a pen name I've discovered it's almost like yet one more version of my real name. (I've had a lot of versions of my real name as a result of hyphenating/not hyphenating when I was married, divorce, and just generally using different versions for one purpose of another.)

I guess my point about names and avatars is that most of either will do, but when it's clear a writer is attempting to be something he isn't (and when it shows in the fact that he's writinig about software under that avatar and name), it's just kind using even something as simple as an avatar and name to be deceptive. If you're THAT dishonest with those two basic little aspects of your profile, who can believe anything else you present/write?

THE MATTER OF FICTION VERSUS NON-FICTION

On Non-Fiction Writers

To me, if I say I've written non-fiction it ought be non-fiction. If the material is about me or my life, I don't think it's necessary or appropriate to share every last personal detail. If I wanted to it would be my business, but I don't think, as long as what I do present is true, not including every last detail about everything dishonest. I'll make no secret about the fact that I'm not including some things. There's a difference, though, between not including all details and lying by omission. We all know what the difference is. If I write my personal divorce experience (for example) and don't post copies of all the court orders, that doesn't mean I've misled readers in any way. On the other hand, if I write about how "Fred", my neighbor, punched me in the nose and let readers think Fred is a horrible person; the picture would be different if what I didn't include was that I stole Fred's elderly mother's pocketbook and wheelchair (which, by the way, I most certainly did not because, of course, there's no real Fred - and that's the truth). The point is that non-fiction should be non-fiction.

One thing that occurs to me about writing a non-fiction story in a way people see as "a well written story" is that, in some ways, being able to write a true story in an interesting way kind of seems like demonstrating that particular kind of writing skill. To be honest, I'm someone who lacks creativity; so if I can write a good true story with a little skill, that's about as entertaining as I'm going to get. I suppose ego and pride make me want readers to know any story I write is true, because while I deserve no credit for creativity, I like to think someone may recognize the kind of skill I may have demonstrated in this kind of scenario.

On Fiction Writers

Then there's the fiction writers. As I said, I have no creativity; so if I were to decide to write fiction tomorrow, I'd have a profile with whatever name I used, include in it that I enjoyed writing fiction (and "here's my work"), and hope that readers would like any skill I seemed to demonstrate in writing my stories. (Here's that ego and pride showing up again. ) I mean, I would want my "accolades" to include things like, "Susie Fictionlady has had fifty million readers who decided to become her fan because she's such an amazing fiction writer." That wouldn't even be all pride and ego, though. Writers generally want whatever recognition/feedback they get to be for what they've actually written. It's just a matter of getting a reading on whether people liked the work.

What we often get on the Internet, though, is "Bree TrueStoryLady" (I'm using Desperate Housewives' first names here, of course; because with the thousands of Hubbers and online writers there are, I want to make it clear any similarities in names don't come from any real-life writing site.); but instead of writing non-fiction, BTSL writes what most of us unaffectionately know as "baloney". Some people would see nothing wrong with this Bree pretending to be "TrueStoryLady" and then writing baloney. After all, she's a fiction writer, and she has much to do on the Internet what she wants to do as anyone else. Heck, if BTSL decides to start a hundred different accounts somewhere, claim to be writing what's true, and instead write fiction; it's her business and the business of anyone who reads her stuff. People reading stuff online need to know, of course, that "nothing on the Internet is real". These are legitimate arguments. Maybe it's not all that big a deal if Bree writes that she's the mother of three kids and planning to have lasagna for dinner. It gets a little more serious, though, if she's written a whopper about something someone reading may actually be experiencing, take very seriously, and be moved by Bree's fiction presented as fact. Maybe Bree actually enjoys making fools of her readers, but there's another aspect to this:

Bree may believe she's "just taking her creativity to a higher level". Here's the thing, though: There is creativity in writing, and there is creativity in theatre. Bree's fiction may well be fine writing (although a good part of the time people who do this don't actually even write very well). In any case, whether or not BTSL's writing is good; the fact that she'd pretending to be someone she isn't is a separate matter. On this matter, it isn't about her writing. It's about her ability to play-act.

Ability to act, like writing, is its own kind of talent/skill. Maybe BTSL, here, is actually quite talented in acting, as well as writing. What I see as the hole in this whole baloney scenario, though, is that acting online isn't a lot different than acting in one's personal life. There's no stage. There was no casting director who selected the actor as being perfect for the role. Acting without a stage isn't exactly a matter of talent. It's a matter of intent to deceive. Even those best at it don't require a lot of talent - just cunning. To me, if I were the one who enjoyed showing off what I thought was my ability to play-act, I'd want to go for some auditions and prove to myself that I wasn't just a "wannabe". One irony is that while BTSL will eventually show herself to really be "Bree FictionLady" (sister of Susie Fiction Lady), Bree will always be watching from te sidelines as her sister is recognized for the talented fiction writer she is. What happens if "Lynette WritesBoth" shows up and has a few accounts under different names but writes fiction under all of them? I suppose that could be compared to what happens when a son or daughter has blue eyes, a mother with blue eyes, and a father with brown eyes. The father had to have that blue recessive gene in spite of having dark brown eyes. The thing is, though, nobody would ever guess the father had that gene for blue eyes. In the case of someone's eye color, it doesn't matter much whether the world can see what hidden eye-color gene any of us may have. Would this "Lynette WritesBoth" character really want, though, for the world to see a wannabee actor without a real stage; while never recognizing or respecting the kind of writing talent she had, simply because the only way real talent can ever really be seen is when it is presented with the kind of truth that can only come from the heart?

So Why Should Anyone Care About Standards Anyway?

In a lot ways, it doesn't really matter who "just fools around" online and who takes things seriously for his own reasons (whether they're personal, business, or both). After all, everyone using the Internet needs to understand that "it's all baloney anyway". One problem, though, is even people who generally understand that can occasionally be made a fool of when the circumstances/situation set them up for it.

One of my Hubs comes to mind, and that's the one on moving on after losing a loved one. People have searched for something on that subject, found my Hub, and written to me to say it was, in some way, helpful to them. Without going into the vast array of types of scenarios that occur and result in making fools out of people; it's pretty clear that if I'd done any misleading or lying in a Hub like that it would be a pretty rotten and immoral thing to do. One might ask what difference it would make if the Hub helped someone feel better, and maybe the reader would be none the wiser. Still, anyone with a conscience would recognize that not being truthful on a Hub like that would be immoral.

Even without trying to imagine all the possible consequences to being deceitful, the fact is any time anyone lies there are any number of potential consequences he may not have imagined.

Laws

As things are now there are very few, if any, laws governing behavior/ethics on the Internet. Like it or not, however, it's only a matter of time before at least some laws are made. In offline life, we have laws governing things like truth in advertising, fair business practices, and defamation. It's unrealistic to think these offline issues won't make their way to the Internet, making clear the need for at least some laws. Cyber-bullying has come under scrutiny in recent months/years. Some Internet behavior may fall under laws that generally apply to all areas of life. Some types of bad behavior is exclusive to the Internet, and that's where the increasing awareness of a need for a new kind of law will eventually impact some things that are done online.

It's said that "there's no delete button on the Internet". One thing the average Internet user may want to keep in mind is that if he sets a few standards/ethics for himself he most likely won't need to worry about having what he does today "come back and bite him" tomorrow.

Something Internet users might like to consider is that having the power of the Internet can also (even to the apparently most powerless in society) mean having a certain degree of responsibility that comes with that power so many seem to take so for granted.

Impact on Writers/Contributors and the Average Internet User in General

With as new as it is, and the technological phenomenon that it is, the Internet is, in its own way, a modern-day, usually non-violent, "Wild West" where there are few rules, anything goes, and it's often every man (or woman or teen) for himself. In many ways, that works well enough and doesn't create problems. In other ways, any time a huge number of people are in an "every man for himself" and "anything goes" environment, that has the potential of causing both relatively minor and very serious problems for innocent people.

Without taking this already long discussion beyond its own scope (which is primarily the behavior of, and impact on, Internet writers), one easy-to-see way in which writers may potentially be impacted by lack of ethics on the Internet is the simple fact that an Internet known as being "all baloney anyway" doesn't lend much credibility to its contributors.

Since Internet-writing first started to become "an issue", we, writers, have it evolve. Just a few years ago there could be a certain amount of embarrassment for a writer to admit his writing was on some Internet sites. After all, anyone could post. There were no standards. Writing sites called 100-word "blurbs" (written in atrocious grammar), "articles".

Soon writing sites began developing standards for contributors. Many began emphasizing quality. Writers contributing good-quality material were rewarded and/or respected a little more. No longer were Internet writing sites quite such dumping grounds as they'd been previously.

With increased standards and time came yet higher standards. More and more writing sites began requiring interested writers to apply and submit writing samples. Incentives to attract better writers have become increasingly common. In short, as writing sites have improved their own reputation and credibility, they've essentially screened out large numbers of the least credible writers while attracting more and more skilled writers who help enhance a site's reputation.

While perhaps the majority of Internet writers remain people who work for such low pay few people would even consider it, even that has continued to evolve over recent years. Better pay rates and other forms of incentives have come with many sites' aims to attract better writers. In other words, when it comes to Internet writing, slowly but surely the whole "credibility picture" is changing.

With the potential of just that little bit more potential to earn a few dollars, however, has also come yet more incentive for people to post yet more baloney on the Internet. Just as we Internet writers have begun to at least not feel embarrassed to admit we write online, and just as many of us have begun to see a little bit more respect for what we do in our spare time (or even in an attempt to carve out a full-time income); it can sometimes seem as if the "baloney level" has reached an all-time high.

Just when so many writing sites, along with so many of their contributors, have managed to raise the overall credibility of this global-scale joint effort; scammers, con artists, and generally less-than-stellar "contributors" have taken any progress in credibility and respect both back to Square One and on to new levels of damage to that progress.

Returning to that example of the Hub about moving on after losing a loved one, the Internet has provided this kind of support to people who otherwise wouldn't have found it before the Internet existed. At the same time, with the degree to which ethics are so often completely absent on the Internet, hopeful users continue to learn that they cannot or should not trust what they find online a good part of the time.

Sure, people will still feel reasonably comfortable trusting information on something like "how to bake a cake" or even "symptoms of depression". What such a low degree of credibility will do, though, is cause people not to "reach out" across the Internet at all, when it comes to a wish/need to "connect with real people". Some would say that's just as well. After all, nobody should be looking for friends on the Internet. The fact is, however, some people don't have family or friends in offline life, and the Internet can provide an important kind of human interaction, particularly when a person is in need of someone who can help him know he's not alone in what he's going through.

When I do my spare-time writing, much of the time it has nothing to do with trying to make money. Neither does it have anything to do with my caring who likes my writing or who thinks what of me. For me, one of the nice things about being able to write online (instead of, say, doing crossword puzzles or watching television in my spare time) is that I can turn my own experiences into something that, if nothing else, may make a person or two see that someone else has gone through what he is going through and understands how he feels.

Turning my personal experience into something that may, in some way, help someone else feel a little better also helps me because "making good use" of bad experience can at least make it seem as if it wasn't all completely "for naught".

It's one thing if the general Internet-using public understands that there will always be a certain amount of baloney on the Internet. It's another, though, if people become so completely cynical about what is true and being shared with the idea of trying to be a human voice in an electronic world that nobody believes anything at all. What good is having an Internet that can let people from around the world communicate with one another if all they communicate are lies, and nobody can believe anything anyone else writes?

As I said before, I don't have any delusions of grandeur. The extent to which anything I've ever written online has ever helped anyone may be limited to about six people over the course of three years, for all I know (and based on some feedback that I happened to believe).

I can't change the whole Internet or all those other users' way of doing things. In fact, I don't care who has standards or who doesn't. What other people do isn't my business. My writing and reputation are my business, though; and what other people try do to me (or others like me) online is my business as well.

No matter how savvy we may think we are, those of us who are reading and writing online are going to run into those people whose only intention it is is to make a fool out of others (for whatever reason they have to want to do that). As in any con-job situation, people engaging in this know what to say to draw in unsuspecting people. There are times I've pretty much assumed someone is "full of baloney" but I've played along for one reason or another. If someone in a forum claims he's trying to lose weight and asks what foods are low in calories, it doesn't really matter if this person really needs the information. Someone else looking for low-calorie foods will find them.

There's a difference between something like that and someone using most people's natural inclination to care or become concerned over situations like domestic violence, children in need, or people suffering with physical or mental health problems. Con artists know how to use this natural human instinct to make fools of people; but even though they're usually discovered sooner or later, there is a price that a lot of honest Internet writers will pay because of such lack of ethics. That price is credibility. That price, however, is also the realization that there's no real point in trying to offer anyone any personal-experience story with any redeeming value; and the realization that nobody should bother reading any personal-experience stories - ever.

Having been momentarily drawn into a recent con-job situation before quickly seeing through it, I decided the other night that I won't be reading anyone's personal-experience writing ever again. That means there will be good writers with good stories who won't be read by people like me. Some people would say it would all be for the best if the Internet evolved to be a matter of nothing but commerce and commerce-related writing. Others would argue that eliminating the use of this powerful tool for sharing good writing and real human experience would also eliminate one of its most valuable uses.

As with any other areas of life, the Internet will always have people with egos, greed, and emotional flaws that make having ethics and integrity something they'll never do. As with other areas of life, though, I don't believe that the majority of people are people who have too little conscience to care at all about their own integrity.

I don't delude myself into thinking the Internet will or can ever be some "Fairy Land of Truth, Honor, Integrity, and Upstanding Business Practices"; but just as everyday users have, in many ways, had their impact on some things that have been "elevated" on writing sites, so, too, can those everyday users have some impact on what is considered a generally accepted, minimal degree of adherence to ethics.

Standards and ethics are something worth thinking about establishing for ourselves, and they're issues worth discussing with others.