Blog . Jiboneus

Our local blogosphere (blog community) has been getting all of attention lately, with the lawsuit taking place, a couple of negative remarks by politicians alike. There is also an alliance of bloggers formed, all up in arms adding fuel to the fire.

Over on the more international blogosphere, it is not much different either. A series of targeted violent and disturbing anonymous death threat comments against a blogger Kathy Sierra had raise a firestorm throughout the blogging community.

Tim O’reilly on the O’reilly Radar, yes the Tim O’Reilly, the guy who did coin the term ‘Web2.0‘ has posted a call for a Blogger’s Code of Conduct. There couldn’t be a more perfect time for this. Here is the early initial draft: -

We celebrate the blogosphere because it embraces frank and open conversation. But frankness does not have to mean lack of civility. We present this Blogger Code of Conduct in hopes that it helps create a culture that encourages both personal expression and constructive conversation.

1. We take responsibility for our own words and for the comments we allow on our blog.

We are committed to the “Civility Enforced” standard: we will not post unacceptable content, and we’ll delete comments that contain it.
We define unacceptable content as anything included or linked to that:

• - is being used to abuse, harass, stalk, or threaten others
• - is libelous, knowingly false, ad-hominem, or misrepresents another person,
• - infringes upon a copyright or trademark
• - violates an obligation of confidentiality
• - violates the privacy of others

We define and determine what is “unacceptable content” on a case-by-case basis, and our definitions are not limited to this list. If we delete a comment or link, we will say so and explain why. [We reserve the right to change these standards at any time with no notice.]

I’m glad that I am not the only one who thinks that bloggers are also responsible for the comments made by their readers on their blogs. They themselves must be their own censorship board to enforce civility on their commenting system.

2. We won’t say anything online that we wouldn’t say in person.

This is a difficult one as I’ve meet several bloggers with totally different personality online and offline.

The purpose of this particular code of conduct is to practice the same restrain online just as what you do offline. If there is something you wanted to write on your blog regarding a certain, person, party or organization, make sure it is something that you are willing say in person if you were to be in the same room.

3. We connect privately before we respond publicly.

When we encounter conflicts and misrepresentation in the blogosphere, we make every effort to talk privately and directly to the person(s) involved–or find an intermediary who can do so–before we publish any posts or comments about the issue.

It is always good to settle conflicts privately first before you go gung-ho, all out in fighting it publicly.

4. When we believe someone is unfairly attacking another, we take action.

When someone who is publishing comments or blog postings those are offensive, we’ll tell them so (privately, if possible–see above) and ask them to publicly make amends.
If those published comments could be construed as a threat, and the perpetrator doesn’t withdraw them and apologize, we will cooperate with law enforcement to protect the target of the threat.

It is always the case that a blogger will delete comments that are use to abuse, harass, or threaten themselves but not comments of that nature that are targeted to others.

5. We do not allow anonymous comments.

We require commenters to supply a valid email address before they can post, though we allow commenters to identify themselves with an alias, rather than their real name.

While I understand that to moderate comments on your blog might be difficult if you run a very popular blog, so making it a requirement for commenter to register before commenting might be an option to look into.

I have always had allow anonymous comments and will always allow anonymous comments for a long time on this blog. Anonymity isn’t an issue for me. However I do actively delete comments that are not (related) or what I think is not appropriate.

6. We ignore the trolls.

We prefer not to respond to nasty comments about us or our blog, as long as they don’t veer into abuse or libel. We believe that feeding the trolls only encourages them–”Never wrestle with a pig. You both get dirty, but the pig likes it.” Ignoring public attacks is often the best way to contain them.

This is a universal rule that everybody who had been actively participating on the Internet for a long time would know.

However there are great blogs that I love to read that could not even last a 0.01 second under such code of conduct. To this, Tim O’Reilly proposed an “anything goes” badge. Yes, what he did was actually creating badges.

These rules or Code of Conduct is by no means to be or will be enforce in anytime soon or ever. Just take this as self-regulations imposed to oneself in writing a blog.

No blogger has to go by these rules but, as much as I love the anarchy world known as the Internet, it is good if you do have some code of conduct when online.

As for myself, the code of conduct that I go by as a blogger is simple, don’t write crap, and don’t link to crap.

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