Received this interesting story written by the New York Times’ Brad Stone in yesterday’s e-mail suggesting the world of blogging needs better policing. These “rules of the road,” if you will, would voluntarily mandate a code of conduct among bloggers and, ostensibly, those folks — for the most part, good, kind and rational ones — who read them faithfully.
The problem regarding “bad manners” among bloggers and readers came to a head recently after book author and popular blogger Kathy Sierra began receiving death threats after a heated difference of opinion “over whether it was acceptable to delete the impolitic comments left by visitors to someone’s personal Web site.”
Sierra was so frightened — one Web site displayed her head next to a noose — that she canceled a public appearance at a trade show and asked police to intervene. Even worse, these cyber-attacks have made Sierra reconsider whether she should take her act elsewhere, move her blog to a private, invitation-only model or stop blogging entirely, a great loss for many of us.
To that end, a friend of Sierra’s, Tim O’Reilly, drafted a blogger’s code of conduct, six rules for which you may or may not have a problem. While reading O’Reilly’s rules, I thought about the way I conduct my blogging business here and elsewhere, and realized I pretty much followed those same guidelines, with an exception or two, anyway. No doubt, your mileage may vary, depending on where you’re sitting…
Some of you Net-veterans may believe Sierra and O’Reilly “over-reacted” to all the nastiness, especially with talk of badges and codes of conduct. But how do you feel about all the hatred spewed over a female blogger’s decision to moderate the public comments on her blog, which led to someone posting images of that very same woman’s children on a parody site, as the NYT article describes in disturbing detail?
I’d like to think even the most thick-skinned of us would have problems with that scenario along with those ridiculous death threats.
I’ve had my say… now it’s your turn.
April 11th, 2007 at 3:21 pm
I’ve been following this through salon.com’s reportage and it’s very dis-heartening. The ability to be annonymous on the internet leads to a lot of open discussion, mostly good, but some of it is very frightening. Really the only way to avoid getting these types of unsettling comments is to limit yourself to a forum like the Engine which requires real names instead of aliases. I really don’t know what the answer is. I pretty much follow all of the rules on the code O’Reilly posted and rarely say anything I wouldn’t say to someone’s face, but some people go on the internet for this very reason, for good or ill.
That all being said, I truly hope she reported the pictures of her children being put on the “parody site” to the police. Someone may think that’s funny, but that’s a threat to me.
April 11th, 2007 at 3:41 pm
Sierra’s experience seems like a rather extreme exception, the kind that well-intentioned rules rarely have an effect on, and in that light, the spirit of what O’Reilly proposes in a code of conduct is admirable, if ill-conceived. Most forums have similar codes of conducts, and yet the people they’re intended to police rarely abide by them. They’re really just there to give admins license to police members.
On a personal blog, though, I don’t see why the owner needs codified permission to do as they please.
April 11th, 2007 at 3:42 pm
Death threats are clearly over the line. Messing with someone’s children obviously is too. But I wonder how anyone got a jpeg of this woman’s children. I would frankly never post anything identifying my children online to the great unwashed public. As far as what a blogger should or shouldn’t write about or behave I could care less. It’s a free marketplace of ideas and reader’s can decide for themselves if it’s worth continuing to support.
As far as handling post comments go, I don’t think anything should be deleted that isn’t illegal. The blogger opened their blog up for public comment and you get what you get. If someone posts something you, the blogger, find offensive or hateful, live with it. Deleting it inevitably just causes more problems and hurt feelings. It’s okay for people to disagree with you, upset you and even hate you. That’s just life.
The Blogger as god of her domain can delete upsetting comments, it’s their blog after all. But I don’t see the need why you ever would. Let others comment as they wish. It’s what it’s there for to begin with. What you find upsetting, distasteful, offensive or upsetting may not be so to other readers/commenters. They may see it as honest discourse, satire, or as a poster setting an example of how others should not act. Most bloggers spend too much time trying to patrol and control the responses to their blogs which says more about them than “unfair” comments about them ever could.
April 11th, 2007 at 3:42 pm
“…give admins license to moderate/ban members” is what I meant to say.
April 11th, 2007 at 4:04 pm
As far as handling post comments go, I don’t think anything should be deleted that isn’t illegal. The blogger opened their blog up for public comment and you get what you get. If someone posts something you, the blogger, find offensive or hateful, live with it. Deleting it inevitably just causes more problems and hurt feelings. It’s okay for people to disagree with you, upset you and even hate you. That’s just life.
You come to my party, you’re expected not to shit on the couch or insult the guests. My website is not a free-speech, no-spin zone. I’ll delete distasteful comments without any hesitation. I do the same on my forum. If you want a site where you can say wherever you want, start your own blog.
Unless you have nothing interesting to say, which I suspect is the case.
April 11th, 2007 at 4:10 pm
That’s the way I feel. I don’t allow anonymous comments on my blog, and if I feel something needs to be deleted, I certainly will do so. Bloggers are in no way obligated to let whoever stops by say whatever they want. Screw hurt feelings — some stuff should just go away.
That said, it’s actually never been an issue on my blog, which doesn’t get a whole lot of strangers anyway.
April 11th, 2007 at 4:17 pm
say wherever you want, start your own blog.
That should be “whatever.” Stupid whiskey.