12 Important U.S. Laws Every Blogger Needs to Know

Thanks to C. David Gammel, whose High Context Consulting blog is a must-read for association communicators and Web folks, for pointing to this useful post about the legalities of running a blog. The post covers

1. dos and don'ts of paid blog posts (you should disclose them)
2. whether deep linking is legal (it is, as long as it doesn't violate copyright)
3. using images and thumbnails (make sure you don't use images without permission)
4. laws protecting you from stolen content
5. domain name trademark issues
6. handling private data about your readers
7. ownership and rights to user-generated content
8. your responsibility in monitoring comments
9. basic blog-related tax laws
10. limited liability laws and incorporating
11. laws about spam and unsolicited emails
12. bloggers and journalism shield laws