Catshanghai

The Internet may seem like a paradise for free speech, but the recent spate of online harassment and death threats targeted at blogger Kathy Sierra has generated some intense soul searching and discussion among the neterati about the action that should be taken, if any to keep the Internet free of such abuse.

Tim O’Reilly has published the following draft code of conduct for bloggers to engage in self censorship:

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.

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

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.

4. When we believe someone is unfairly attacking another, we take action.
When someone who is publishing comments or blog postings that 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.

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.

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 code of conduct provides a practical set of guidelines giving clear, ethical boundaries for acceptable behaviour within blogs. It is better for this initiative to come up from the grassroots community rather than being imposed by governments. Bloggers understand the issue and they can give leadership that the rest of the community can accept without feeling that their free speech is being taken away. It clears up the ethical uncertainty that may lead many bloggers to refrain from deleting abusive comments in case they feel they are trampling on someone else’s free speech. The argument against deleting comments is feeble in the first place. If deleting comments was such a problem, you could accuse spam filters of undermining free speech and I do not remember the last time I could leave an anonymous comment on a blog or forum.

The bloggers who sign up to this code of conduct are already aware of the issues, which is a good sign that they are already behaving ethically. Unless ISPs, hosting companies and blogging sites embrace the code of conduct as part of their terms and conditions then there is nothing to stop someone from setting up a blog that completely ignores these guidelines.

Excluding anonymity may seem the only way to force people to take responsibility for their comments within blogs. I agree with this for the most part, but there are exceptional occasions when it is sensible to withhold your identity. What happens if your government restricts free speech by persecuting those who wash the government’s dirty laundry in public? What happens to the whistleblower who tells the world that their employer is behaving in an irresponsible or unethical way? Does the refusal to allow anonymity extend to all forums and circumstances even when this may jeopardise the safety of the commenter? Steve Gibson of Security Now argues that you can not have free speech unless you have anonymity, but that would make it easy to bully and abuse without being held accountable.

There is no clarity on the issue of deep linking to other people’s content from your own blog or site. While it is not strictly stealing content, there is some concern that it is rude to make other people carry the bandwidth cost for images, videos or multimedia that you are linking to. A link is only a link and non commercial websites must accept a certain amount of recipricocity of deep linking between each other’s content. Also, deep linking was the engine that drove Youtube videos onto Myspace sites and into Google’s portfolio. Deep linking is the icing that makes blog posts much more than bland text and it is an important tool to make content accessible and exciting. There should be an implicit understanding that blogs should be given fair use to deep link, unless the content holder explicitly requests that it is not used in this way. Also, it is courteous for bloggers to acknowledge the source. That is something I have not done in the past, but I will from now on.

While this code of conduct is not perfect, it provides a useful reference point in many places especially schools where blogs and social networks are gaining traction as a wonderful resource for expression, reflection and communication. Learning communities can use this guideline to create a culture that draws a clear line in the sand between acceptable and non acceptable free speech so that bullying and abuse can be prevented before they even begin.

Links:
grc.com,
headrush.typepad.com,
newsimg.bbc.co.uk