A Miss Manner's "Fox Paw"...

     Somebody call Miss Emily Post (is she even still alive?)...I've created a major faux pas in the Blogosphere!  I feel as if I may have passed gas in the big blog/journal living room, but I didn't mean to.

     I'm talking about the "Comment" section of BrainCheese.  Many of you leave kindly worded comments almost daily in the Comment Section of this journal, and I DO emphasize "kindly"(Thank you for not being harsh with me...I'm actually very sensitive. LOL).  What I didn't realize until recently is, in the world of the BLOGOSPHERE, I am supposed to KINDLY comment back to you in the comment section...who knew?!?

     I guess I should have figured out this little fact of blogging etiquette sooner.  I often go back and read comments in my favorite MS Bloggers' sites and I have noticed most of you comment BACK about my comments to you (all this commenting talk is giving me a headache...just needed to comment about that).  I just thought you were being "extra nice"...I just thought you were better people than I.  I've only recently learned you are NOT necessarily better "people" than I, but better INFORMED people!  (And we're not going to debate this fact...let me have my grandiose fantasies.)

     I also got an email from someone who said they couldn't leave a comment because they didn't have an AOL account...y'all KNOW how much I love AOL, so I got to checking into this issue in hopes I could once again "take down" the corporate monster (I'm just kidding, Mr. Turner...really!).

     What I have uncovered is you don't have to PAY to have an AOL account (or AOL Internet access either), but you DO have to create an AOL/AIM screen name.  So, what's an AIM screen name you might ask?

     An AIM screen name is a sign in name that lets you chat via the AIM chat service...it's actually free.  It's just like having an MSN Messenger/Hotmail screen name or a Yahoo screen name, neither, of which, does one have to subscribe to...it really is FREE (of course, "free" does not rule out free of corporate or government spying on what you do on the Internet).  I don't know for certain if you also have to download AOL's Instant Messenger software or not to create an AIM screen name...there's always a catch, and that may be the catch to this.

     Here's an excerpt from AOL about commenting in AOL journals:

Comments

Comments are only open to people with an AOL ScreenName.

AOL Journals does have commenting built into it. That’s the good news. Only people with an AOL ScreenName can write comments. That’s the bad news. Now, this doesn’t mean people have to have an AOL account to write comments. The ScreenName service will accept a free AIM account, if that’s what you have. I guess AOL figured these journals would be written by AOL members, for AOL members, so they didn’t need to worry about locking out people on the outside world. A little shortsighted, maybe, but I think we’re at the point where nearly everyone has at least an AIM account, so I don’t think it’s worth making a huge deal over. If you really have to speak your mind, you could always send a private e-mail.

It is a pain, though, if you’re not signed in to the ScreenName service. You can read the journal, and you can read existing comments. But if you try to write one, you’re taken to the ScreenName login page. You have to log in before you get to the comment editing screen. And when you do get to the screen, all you are given is a text box for your comment. There is no place to enter your name. It uses your screen name. There is no place to put in your web site or e-mail addresses. Instead it makes your screen name a link, using the aol:// protocol, which opens up the Buddy Info window for the comment author in the AOL client. Again, if you don’t have AOL, you’re out of luck here. But, if you don’t have AOL, you’re not important to AOL. So you get what you can.

     I think that was actually fairly said by one of the AOL techno-geeks...especially the last two lines!

     So, dear readers and voyeurs, please accept my most humble apologies for my blogging "fox paw"...I will, henceforth, try to do right by you and COMMENT back to you in the COMMENT section of BrainCheese.  And if you'd prefer a more intimate comment or response (ruling out any cybersex, of course), please feel free to email me at BrainCheeseMS@aol.com . (And for those of you who have my super secret Bat Cave email addy, carry on with it's use...at least until I have to report you as SPAM!)

**Humbly bowing to the computer gods...