Australian Blogging Conference Highlights

I was one of the lucky attendees who participated in yesterday's first Australian Blogging Conference, spearheaded by QUT's Faculty of Law and Centre of Excellence for Creative Innovations and Industries. Firstly, let me say that is was apparent that a lot of hard work and planning went into the event. Major kudos to Peter Black, the conference's coordinator, and all those involved in making the conference such a success. I gained additional insight into both the practical and personal attributes of blogging by a number of talented bloggers represented here in Australia. Some of the key highlights of the event for me were:

1. Legal Issues and Blogs Session: Many of the top Australian bloggers host their blogs on U.S. supported blogging software/sites to avoid potential legal liabilities that are more prone to occur in Australia due to the lack of provisions protecting them in their country. Apparently copyright laws in Australia are more restrictive than in the United States. It was also brought up that Australia has no concrete provision similar to the 1st Amendment of the United States, which protects all citizens to the freedom of speech and or of the press. Two key legal provisions that AU bloggers should be aware of when dealing with a defamation claim: notice and take down (you are notified about a defaming statement on your blog, and have the opportunity of taking it down to avoid legal course of action) and the provision to make amends with the defamed claimer. The talented faculty at QUT Law's Intellectual Property: Knowledge, Culture and Economy have published a number of helpful reports and papers on the use of electronic content in the digital age, for those looking for information on what is acceptable and unacceptable to copy, embed, download or distribute.
2. Future of Blogging- There was much discussion on whether or not social networking sites (MySpace Facebook) will eventually take over the blogging sphere in their own forums. The general consensus was no, due to the nature of social network sites (communities that are formed and fostered by invitation vs. the open climate of blogging). Some people at the conference commented that Facebook, MySpace, Linked In, etc... were online environments where people are more inclined to post informal tidbits or thoughts on a topic, and to a group of people they feel comfortable with. Whereas bloggers spend more time on their postings, and their content is open for all to view and comment on.
3. Markeing Blitz for Kwoff- One of the final events of the day was on the future of blogging. It was sponsored by Dan Walsh, one of the founders of a new collaborative AUS based web site called Kwoff. Dan is hoping that Kwoff will serve as a Digg like space for Australians, where they can comment and vote on their favorite virtual media based stories of the day. It will be interesting to see how Kwoff develops over the the next several months.