I think Tim O’Reilly is a really great guy. He gets the Internet, he groks technology, he’s part of the culture. But his effort to draft a Blogger’s Code of Conduct is seriously flawed, to the point that it’s clearly a big steaming pail of horse shit.
The starting premise doesn’t work, because:
- Bloggers do not exist; and
- A code of conduct is anathema to the world in which these bloggers do not exist.
It’s fair to say that it won’t be a problem including the majority of the blogging community in a basic definition. Hell, just by listing a small number of blogging websites you can pin down and categorise a very large number of people. But not everyone. And that’s where the borders start to get fuzzy. Is Alice a blogger because she self-identifies? Is Bob a blogger because he uses the technology, yet emphatically denies that what he does is blog? Does updating a daily news site qualify as blogging? If a CMS is used? Or if the pages are hand-spun HTML? If the articles are written by professional journalists? And what if the articles are written by an ill-informed chimp who can’t tell his “theirs” from his elbow?
A fixed definition for what exactly constitutes blogging does not exist. A simple proof of this would be the wishy-washy definition Wikipedia gives for the word “blog”:
A blog is a user-generated website where entries are made in journal style and displayed in a reverse chronological order.
User-generated websites versus websites generated by the Daleks? Journal as in diary or journal is in newspaper? Then why is a newspaper not a blog? Or why isn’t a blog simply a newspaper? Because a newspaper isn’t user-generated? Then why isn’t a forum a blog, where all the entries are clearly user-generated?
If we can’t pin down who bloggers are (apart from the most basic definition: Tim and his friends and those who self-identify as Tim’s friends), how can we ever have a blogger’s code of conduct?
The next problem kicks in the moment we admit that there is a community of people who would call themselves bloggers, and who would potentially subscribe to a code of conduct. This community rose from the ashes of a thousand Usenet flame wars, and are typified by their total rejection of any form of authority. Even blogging about grannies baking cookies can become a fundamentalist religious war the moment a wayward granny troll starts questioning chocolate chip distribution.
Blogging is not about playing nice. Blogging is about giving a voice to those who were previously excluded from the debate through court orders and/or incarceration in psychiatric institutions. Blogging is about shaking the tree until all the nuts fall out. Blogging is about putting your credibility and (quite possibly) future employment on the line, and speaking your mind. Without being filtered by a code of conduct. Or logic.
Tim’s draft consists of six points, which the wiki-driven public consultation will no doubt push up to a thousand then whittle down to six again.
We take responsibility for our own words and for the comments we allow on our blog.
As it happens, this is already a legal principle, codified in law in most countries, and enforced with varying severity according to rising levels of democracy and/or declining levels of tolerance. If I call George W. Bush a jackass (which I most likely have), the rights afforded me by the European Union should protect me from being sent to jail. On the other hand, if I publish a list of European Union officials who I think look like secret drinkers and kiddie fiddlers, I’ll probably be locked up faster than you can say “right to a speedy trail”. Not only do you own your own words, like an inbred pitbull it will often come back and bite you in the ass.
We won’t say anything online that we wouldn’t say in person.
Oh yes I will. I most likely won’t tell Tim O’Reilly in person that I think his code of conduct is a “big steaming pail of horse shit”. I might think it, but more than likely not even that. Like most people, I’m a social coward, and if I can push my point of view without fear of being interrupted or having my face punched, I’m pretty much content. Not only do I distinguish between the online me and offline me, I also draw a line between different versions of the online me. On some of my blogs I’ll go just that little bit further than my sense of decency dictates, and on some I’ll be really well behaved. Just as different social situations call for adjustments to the offline me, different online situations require different personas.
We connect privately before we respond publicly.
Private conversations can be expected to remain private, unless agreed upon, and likewise public conversations should be expected to remain public. When an off-topic conversation on a mailing list irritates the list members and threatens to draw the focus away from the list’s core topic, it’s only natural that participants are expected to take their conversation off the list. But when a conversation follows from a blog post or a blog comment, it only follows that the conversation remains public. Anyway, calling an anonymous stranger a cocksucker isn’t nearly as much fun if there isn’t a crowd to impress.
When we believe someone is unfairly attacking another, we take action.
We can’t all support the underdog, some of us have to be villagers with torches and pitchforks. As big a fan as I am of seeing the rabble rise up, I can’t help but think you have no reason to get involved in someone else’s battle if you don’t feel yourself part of that battle from the start. If I see an innocent victim getting the stuffing kicked out of him or her on a blog, I might stare, but I wouldn’t get involved. On the other hand, if it’s a fight about evolution or a related topic, I’ll definitely stick around to throw a punch or two.
We do not allow anonymous comments.
I do. Most of the time. Even when I ask people to leave a name and/or e-mail address, I don’t check these. If you have a point of view, I’ll allow it. If you’re a spammer, I’ll delete it. Either way, my blog, my call. What’s so difficult about this?
We ignore the trolls.
Only when we want to. Why on earth pass up the opportunity to restate your most salient arguments in response to some troll’s comments? If they have good arguments, I’ll debate them. If they have rubbish arguments, I’ll still debate them, and pretend I won the argument. And if they stoop to name-calling and idiocy, I’ll call them a cocksucker. End of debate, and I still get to pretend I won the argument.
So where’s the problem this code of conduct is supposed to solve? What’s so broke that it needs fixing? If you get death threats in your comments, tell the police. That, to a large degree, is what they do for a living. A death threat received by comment is no different from a threat wrapped around a brick and thrown through a window. It’s up to trained law enforcement professionals to decide whether the threat is credible, and whether to follow up with an investigation. They’ll probably cock it up, and you might get killed, but that’s not a blogging issue. If someone calls you a slut, and you don’t agree with the sentiment, delete the comment. Even better, edit the comment, and don’t forget to tell the world. The name-calling retard looks bad, you look good.
Sheesh, why won’t people just grow up, and allow natural selection to sort out sense from nonsense? The blogging world isn’t high school, and nobody gets made hall monitor. You can sign up to be captain of the AV club, but that might really get you beat up. If you’re an adult, do you really need to be protected from yourself? And if you’re not an adult, aren’t these the hard knocks that are supposed to get you the best qualification you could ever get?
And Tim: badges? We don’t need no stinking badges!
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