It’s OK to hate Taylor, or to think that Seth only told you he liked Allison so that you would tell Courtney, or to wish that your mom would disappear.

Teenagers have a right to gripe. But they should do it in their personal journals, not online for the world to see, says award-winning writer Meg Cabot.

The author of “The Princess Diaries” has teamed up with the American Library Association to hold events across the country for young people who want to learn more about airing their thoughts in writing the traditional way: with a pen.

The lack of privacy among teenagers online is a growing area of concern, and experts say there’s a fine line between healthy expression and TMI (too much information). They say posting thoughts online can leave teens overexposed to potential bullies, college admissions officers, predators – or just offended friends and loved ones.

At the “Teen Journal Writing Workshops,” participants can decorate their own journals and learn about writing in them from a best-seller who uses her own teenage diaries as material for her books.

“We’re saying, ‘Why don’t we go back to keeping regular, old-fashioned journals where it is OK to vent, but it doesn’t hurt anybody, because nobody else is reading it but you?”‘ says Cabot, whose latest book in the Princess Diaries series, “Princess Mia,” came out in December.

Getting teens to pull the plug is no small hurdle: A recent survey by the Pew Internet & American Life Project found 59 percent of teenagers said they participate in at least one form of content-creation online. That includes sharing artwork, photos, stories, video, blogs and personal Web pages. From 2004 to 2006, the number of teen bloggers nearly doubled.

While many parents have focused on the threats of cyber-bullying and stalkers, a greater number of young people are probably affected by the more subtle ways in which the Internet might interfere with wholesome teenage living.

Carlene Miller, 16, who recently interviewed Cabot for a story in The Buffalo News’ teen section, said some of her peers are turning back to personal journals after having bad experiences with saying too much online or reading hurtful things written about them.

“A lot of kids have been getting kind of mean,” Carlene said, including herself in that reproach. Recently, she and a friend she hadn’t seen in a while had a falling-out online after tension built up during a visit.

“We ended up having the, quote, MySpace fights that are so common now,” Carlene said. “People’s friendships are on the brink here because you’re more at ease to say things online. … Things came out that we normally wouldn’t have said to each other.”

Cabot’s main reason for advising teens against spilling their guts online is the chance that their words could hurt others – friends or family members featured in the online rant. In addition, the permanence of comments on the Internet makes temporary thoughts appear everlasting.

“It’s not how you feel all the time, just right then,” Cabot says. If you say you hate your mother or your best friend or your math teacher in a journal that you stash under your bed, you know it’s probably a fleeting feeling. But once it’s fixed online into the communal catalog of complaints, it is there for your mother, best friend or math teacher to see forever.

Still, some say a lack of boundaries isn’t always a bad thing. Carlene says it can also be easier to express positive thoughts online than in person. If somebody posts an entry about a struggle they’re having, friends might be more likely to offer words of support online, whereas giving encouragement can be awkward in person.

It’s similar with photo comments, Carlene says.

“Kids so freely can be like, ‘Oh you look so pretty,’ but you wouldn’t say something like that in person,” she said. Some of her peers who have gone back to traditional journal-writing say they don’t get support from other teens when they keep their thoughts and feelings in a private diary.

But there’s probably room for both, experts say, and a time and place for each – the same way alone time and socializing are both important. The line between the two is subjective.

As part of its Self-Esteem campaign, Dove started an online series called the Reality Diaries (doverealitydiaries.com) that features four girls from across the country documenting their various internal battles with self-esteem, boys, body image, family and school. Guided by self-esteem expert and author Jessica Weiner, the four high school girls – Sydney, Chelsea, Irene and Jordyn – post regular written entries and video blogs about some very personal and intense emotions.

They talk about friends, ex-boyfriends, negative comments at school, fights with parents, makeup, racism, popularity, feeling fat, wanting a nose job – even the death of loved ones. In other words, it’s the kind of stuff you might not want everybody in the world to read about.

But Weiner says the series has built a kind of community among teenage girls that never existed before the Internet. She said the girls have gotten a great response and blogged for the right reasons – to open up important dialogues among young people, rather than to vent about specific other people.

“Right now it’s like breathing to teenage girls, being online,” Weiner said.

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