2 June 2010
Dear Gentle Readers (H/T ‘Miss Manners‘),
At CAJ we are not reporters or authors, so most of the work we do here is sourced from other websites or media outlets, or are tips emailed to us from friends and readers. We do a lot of research and fact-checking before anything is published because you don’t need to waste your precious time reading more disinformation. We try to include a variety of viewpoints, and it takes time to research and evaluate it all: the blogsphere is a pretty vast place.
We are only a news aggregate, a micro-mini Drudge Report, if you will. We’re certainly not in competition with the big dogs of the blogsphere, but we honor them and their work. So we would never pass it off as our own. That would be unethical, and we value integrity and character.
We always, ALWAYS source our material and provide links so that you can review the article, photograph, or video at the original site for yourself. That is the right thing to do and, hopefully, it steers traffic to the original sites. Some of those sites receive revenues for every “visitor,” funding which helps them to continue their work.
Whenever someone sends us a lead we always, ALWAYS give them a “hat tip,” the ‘H/T’ notation you see in so many of our entries. It’s right to acknowledge those people or organizations even while protecting their privacy. If they lead us to a story, they should be given credit.
So we would hope that you, our readers, would do the same when using something from Common American Journal in your own emails, blogs, and Facebook pages. At CAJ, we are not paid bloggers or technicians. Our webmaster works for free and all CAJ expenses are paid by us. This is not because we are “martyrs for the cause,” but because this blog is a labor of love for our country and for our valued readers and fellow citizens. We appreciate you making your way to this site to have a look around. But please remember your manners and give us credit–a H/T and a link–if you found that incredible article for your own blog herein.
It’s the right thing to do.
H/T Russ and Mike
