Now, I know we hear a LOT about intellectual property law and all that sort of thing. It hits the papers, it hits the news media, it’s all over the place. Pirates this, thieves that, RIAA, MPAA, so on and so forth on into eternity.

So how do we defend our ideas in a digital age, anyway?

Well, if you catch Seth Godin’s blog, you’ll know his answer, and it’s a pretty good one.

Don’t.

Instead of fighting so hard to keep your ideas YOUR IDEAS, why not hand them out like candy? Become known as the guy with the great ideas–or the gal with the great ideas, depending–and try and make your mark on that? Sure, you can hire lawyers and get all strong-arm and sue-happy over anyone who BREATHES wrong at your idea, but why not be “the guy who came up with it.” instead?

Maybe someone took your ball and ran with it. Great! But it’ll still be YOUR BALL. There’s something to the quality of benevolence, folks, and it’s a concept worth thinking about.

So I was reading over at Seth Godin’s marketing blog–which is awesome, by the way–and back when I was talking about the idea of launching a business blog FOR YOUR CURRENT JOB, he busts out with this:

Offer a small bonus to anyone in the company who starts and runs a blog on any topic. Have them link to your company site, with an explanation that while they work there, they don’t speak for you.

Godin’s advice, which came at almost exactly the same time I was talking about how to convince your boss to pay you to set up a blog at work, is a little more broad than mine was (I figured it’d be better to run a blog about the company and its products and news, not necessarily ANY topic, but still!) but then his advice comes from a little more general purpose on getting the company an overall web strategy by making all the employees web-savvy.  Or at least, sufficiently web-savvy to start their own blog.

So why wouldn’t a company want to take advantage of this sort of concept to get them some publicity too?  No reason I can see.

So if you’ve been thinking about becoming a blogger in your spare time, now may be the best time ever to talk to your boss about it.

Here’s a poser for you folks that’ll get you thinking seriously about what you’re trying to do with your blog by asking: “Who are you trying to be like?”

Most of us didn’t just pick up a keyboard one day and say, hm, this blogging thing looks like it might be a job.  I think I’ll do THAT.  Most of us wanted to do something with our work, to be like somebody else we’d seen.  Maybe you’ve read about Cory Doctorow’s success and wanted to be the next Cory.  Sonia Simone over at Copyblogger wanted to be the next Seth Godin.

Me?  I wanted to be the next Spider Jerusalem, even though the first one never actually technically existed.

But the point of the matter is, are you trying to be like somebody?  If you are, maybe it’s time to rethink the idea.  After all, having role models is a great thing.  Keeping Spider’s example in front of me has often spurred me on to write when I couldn’t bring myself to punch another key.  But I’m no Spider Jerusalem–I am who I am.  And in the end, though I take my cues from others, it’s my own work, my own content, that people come to the blog to read.

It’s great to have a role model–it’s a great place to start–but you’ve got to grow past that model in order to be a truly great blogger.

I got more than a few great ideas lately from Seth Godin, who has a whole series of traffic building advice bits on his website, which you can find here.  There’s two good reasons why I did what I just did, and I’ll explain them now.

1. Citing those who give you ideas gives you credibility.  Back to that big-C word again, but it’s no less important now than it was then.  By talking about the people who tell you what to say, you prove that you have sufficient integrity to give credit where credit is due.  No one’s checking up on you.  No one can even really prove you “stole” an idea–the best they can do is say that “Simpsons did it first”, or something to that effect.  But when you take away the ability in the first place, declare that you got an idea from somewhere, you remove all the doubt.  This isn’t your idea, you’re saying, you’re just expounding on it.  You’re making a valuable contribution to discourse, even if you’re just standing on the shoulders of giants.

2. You might get some link love back.  Seth further goes on to say, and I agree with him, that when you give links, you should expect links back.  I’m calling you out on this one, Seth–I gave the link love, and now I’m counting on it back.  Remember, links help improve your picture in the blogging realm.  The more links you get, the higher value your blog becomes.

So never be afraid to link to someone else–what you say on your blog is just as valid, even if it isn’t all yours, and when you give link love, you have every right to expect it back.