Hey AK, I am responding publicly rather than on fb, since you responded here as well, and I thought others might weigh in on this to give their perspective, not just mine. I know you know of some others who have thought out the (still murky) ethics of MOOC and open edu research, so I won’t refer to any of that, just say my own view,

First, I think writing on your blog is not different from a research paper, in terms of certain things. It has the same issue of “publishing” data or research – and it is data from people’s words that they did not know they were writing for the consumption of a researcher or blogger. They did not mean for it to be used outside the context they wrote it in. The only difference is that on your blog you are not presuming rigor of research or representativeness of data sample, etc.

I suspect you need permission to quote (imagine seeing your own words quoted anonymously out of context, possibly misunderstood?), but paraphrasing on a high level is probably ok since it would be like telling a story of “I heard someone say this and that”. That seems ok to me.

I think just because people who wrote the stuff are anonymous to you, it does not mean you can quote them anonymously, since they did not post in a totally “open” space like an open website.

I hope others will weigh in here as I am def no expert, and as you know our IRB folks are super-strict beyond what makes sense in open education spheres.