Ethics Policy for Sharing Content of Mail Exchanges on This Blog

This blog deals with "Peaceful and Amicable Indian Computer Science (CS) & Information Technology (IT) Academic Reform Activism". It is a tightly moderated blog to ensure as high a quality of discussion & debate as I can manage and feel appropriate for this topic. I also try to ensure that the views expressed are peaceful and amicable.

As part of this activity, I have had the privilege of interacting over email, other web contact interfaces (e.g. Indian govt. grievance portal for citizens) and paper mail with some important people in international academia as well as Indian government. I also had the privilege and pleasure of extending my interaction with some friends and colleagues to this particular topic. Initially I was a little casual about sharing views that I received over email with others. Now I have learned that many people, especially, leading lights of the CS & IT fields and government officials, have a genuine concern that their comments may be taken out of context and used for purposes that they do not approve of.

So I felt it is appropriate for me to put out my policy on sharing content of email, other web contact interfaces and paper mail exchanges (referred together as mail below) on this blog.

Firstly, mail exchanges to public offices like government and editorial offices of publications/media are "public" by default unless expressly declared as "private". So I consider it fair and ethical to share such "public" information on this blog if I want to. However, I may choose to not share some or all information about my interaction, say with government and academic regulatory authorities, to ensure that such information does not get "abused" by somebody for purposes that I may not approve of. I would very much like to be a team player working, in some small way, with the government and academic regulatory authorities to help improve Indian CS & IT academics from the viewpoint of students, parents of those students, and employers. I do not have any intention of becoming a "trouble-maker" activist for the hard-pressed government and academic regulatory authorities of India who have the HUGE AND ONEROUS BURDEN of planning and implementing policies for a country of over 1 billion citizens.

I will treat mail exchanges with academics, students, industry colleagues, software users, friends etc. as "private" by default unless expressly declared as "public"/"Open". I will not share any part of the content of such "private" mail from others on this blog without prior permission/approval/OK from them. The content of my "private" mails to them is my intellectual property but, to be on the safe & amicable side, I will typically avoid putting the exact content of my private mails on this blog. Whenever needed, I may suitably edit the "private" mail content that has been composed by me and put it on this blog without having any references to the persons I sent the mail.