One code of conduct, many alligators
When I heard a long the pipeline of a blogging code of conduct, I, being the sort of person that has a desire to restore honor and dignity to the blogoshere, immediately began a mission to locate the said code. After risking my life several times in the pursuit of this goal (including in a pond containing several small but nevertheless highly dangerous alligators) I have managed to procure the document for your viewing pleasure:
- Responsibility for our own words
- Nothing we wouldn't say in person
- Connect privately first
- Take action against attacks
- a) No anonymous comments OR b) No pseudonymous comments
- Ignore the trolls
- Encourage enforcement of terms of service
- Keep our sources private
- Discretion to delete comments
- Do no harm
My first thought as I stood in in my wellies surrounded by alligators was that they're actually quite cute in a way. My second thought was a lot of this code is common sense right?
OK, so for the righteousness test, lets see how well I compare:
- Responsibility for our own words - check, I take complete responsibility for anything I say, will say or have ever said on this blog.
- Nothing we wouldn't say in person - this one's difficult... this blog presents one side of me and I know people have a lot of different views of me and and I'd like to keep it like that, thats why not everyone I know knows my blog url
- Connect privately first - if I think that something I want to say is too personal to be broadcast on a blog, I'll email, so yeah I do stick to this one.
- Take action against attacks - oh yeah!
- a) No anonymous comments OR b) No pseudonymous comments - I completely fall down on both of these and in both ways, I allow anonymous comments on blog and I allow people to use whatever name they like (can't really stop them) and I've left the odd anonymous comment and I have so many pseudonyms/pen names I can't even keep track of them all.
- Ignore the trolls - yup!
- Encourage enforcement of terms of service - well I don't go out with "OBEY YOUR ToS!" banners, but I don't encourage violations of the ToS either.
- Keep our sources private - well it depends on the story you're blogging right? I mean if I got something from the BBC, I'll say so. If I got something from another blog I'm even more likely to say so because it's good blogging manners to link to people who's story you're building on.
- Discretion to delete comments - while I have a policy to try to all leave my comments (I think comments are the responsibility of the commentator, not myself), spam comments/flames are deleted as soon as I see them.
- Do no harm - try telling that to the alligators!!
The task is to preserve the fauna and increase local wildlife. But when
you're up to your arse in alligators it's hard to remember you're trying to
clear the swamp.
Certainly watch out for the alligators, trolls?? I'm not sure of this
definition...maybe some kind of lurker? The code is very good and I'm glad
you risked life and limb to get it...but trolls?? Maybe you could go back
in the swamp and get a definition??
i also believe in freedom of expression in websphere as long as you are
prepared to take the responsiblity for your words. Interesting that you
link the code of conduct with alligators.
Alligators? I hope they didn't hurt you...
as a lover of all animals great and small (expect my brother) i love the
alligators. what will they now do without their code?
xxxxx