Bloggers Propose Code of Conduct 199
akintayo writes "The New York Times reports that in response to the recent brouhaha, some technology bloggers have suggested raising the level of civility on tech blogs by implementing a code of conduct. Kathy Sierra, a technology blogger and friend of O'Reilly was subjected to threats and insults from readers and other bloggers. In partial response, O'Reilly and others have proposed a code of conduct which could include restrictions like the outlawing of anonymous accounts."
Kind of a worthless piece of reactionary tripe. (Score:4, Interesting)
Re:interesting final thought (Score:5, Interesting)
who does the managing?
as a subset of that: can we trust them? what about potential abuse? etc.
how does restriction produce greater freedom?
how can you get more free than uncensored?
and now the special features, aka rambles:
one of the things i love about
Of course, it only works because of the millions of users willing to forsake their right to speak for the greater good... how this would work with mom 'n' pop's blog site that some viagra spammer is targetting, I don't know. Actually. I do. It wouldn't
I've had the feeling for a while that net communication would work a lot better if *everything* was anonymous. In the truly anon sense; "user24" is not anonymous. My internet footprint is massive.
She unfairly blamed other bloggers (Score:4, Interesting)
Note that there's a big difference between a known blogger "insulting" you and an anonymous one writing threats.
A blogger's code of conduct? "We won't say anything online that we wouldn't say in person." Yeah, might as well shut down the entire Internet.
The great thing about it is you can say what you want. It's a double-edged sword, but trying to turn it into a butter knife will simply result in everything becoming numbingly dull corporate-speak.
The ethics of non-anonymity (Score:2, Interesting)
But what mechanisms actually lie behind this? Surely the concept of accountability for unconstructive or insulting posts relies on the mechanisms of fear and status. If someone doesn't care about status, then it is all fear - you are fearful that posting the insulting comment will result in negative experiences for you personally. Which it most likely would and is part of the intended design from the beginning - the rationale is that if someone goes around posting 'Sieg heil, sieg heil' or 'gay homofagosexuals' in comments section, then their real name _should_ be visible, so that cyber and real life activists can descend upon them and intimidate and frighten them from posting stuff like that again, and also that the government can rule them out of jobs like e.g. social care where their mindset is a danger to the health of children and the vulnerable.
Compare this to the mechanism in China. Why do people criticise China for banning anonymous blogs? Because they somehow infer that posting unpopular or government/society-critical will lead to them being personally harassed, subject to cyber and real life activism, and also that the government can rule them out of jobs.
The difference between the 'evil guys' (China) and the 'good guys' (us) then becomes that they harass people for saying good and true things, while we just harass people for saying deconstructive and antisociety and insulting things towards groups and individuals that they deserve harassment for.
Comment removed (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Actually, methinks both are wrong (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:Why is this news only now? (Score:2, Interesting)
The thing is, though, you can't root out racism and sexism by politely appealing to racists and sexists (or to those who don't give a damn about racism and sexism in their blogs' comments) to adhere to some do-gooders rules.
The rules will only be held up by a minority of dreamers within the large group of people who already know how to behave. Those who don't, won't care.
This "code of conduct" might well be - like it might be expected of people like Tim O'Reilly - just an attempt to improve the public image of blogs, their protagonists and their business environments. It will change nothing at all, except providing a warm feeling for those who proudly publicize their adhering to the code.
Re:Actually, methinks both are wrong (Score:3, Interesting)
You think someone receiving death threats, and consequently cancelling speaking engagements and their blogging activities, is an "imaginary problem"?
Yes, the problem is sometimes overhyped. But that doesn't mean it's not really there and people aren't really being damaged by it. The world is not drawn in black and white.
Re:Why is this news only now? (Score:1, Interesting)
As was noted in another post, the whole point of these internet wars seems to be to take the actions of an individual, put that individual in a group, and then blame the group. It is like watching two siblings "mind game" each other hoping one will crack and Mom will punish only one of them. Oblivious to the fact that Mom knows exactly what is going on.
Finger 1/2 inch from brothers head--"I'm not touching you!!"