Blue Mass Group

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Blog civility debate hits the front page

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From today’s NYT:

Is it too late to bring civility to the Web?

The conversational free-for-all on the Internet known as the blogosphere can be a prickly and unpleasant place. Now, a few high-profile figures in high-tech are proposing a blogger code of conduct to clean up the quality of online discourse.

Last week, Tim O’Reilly, a conference promoter and book publisher who is credited with coining the term Web 2.0, began working with Jimmy Wales, creator of the communal online encyclopedia Wikipedia, to create a set of guidelines to shape online discussion and debate.

Chief among the recommendations is that bloggers consider banning anonymous comments left by visitors to their pages and be able to delete threatening or libelous comments without facing cries of censorship.

I think this plan sort of misses the mark. What is needed is not so much G/PG/R ratings for an entire blog (although there is probably no harm in that), or a ban on anonymous posters, but eBay-style trusted-user icons for individual contributors.

Incidentally, I found this anecdote quite amusing. Just goes to show what a poor sense of humor I have I suppose:

One public bid to improve the quality of dialogue on the Web came more than a year ago when Mena Trott, a co-founder of the blogging software company Six Apart, proposed elevating civility on the Internet in a speech she gave at a French blog conference. At the event, organizers had placed a large screen on the stage showing instant electronic responses to the speeches from audience members and those who were listening in online.

As Ms. Trott spoke about improving online conduct, a heckler filled the screen with personal insults. Ms Trott recalled “losing it” during the speech.

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Comments

  1. Civility is common courtesy. People that feel passionately about an issue will get angry and then apologize. The crazies will say anything. I’ve seen so many blogs turn into one sided simple minded drivel because some people were “offended” and the webmaster banned the alleged offender.

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    As a frequent and prominent poster here opined, “If you don’t like what I write then make good use of the scroll bar”.

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    What is going on in our society re what is acceptable and what is not and who is expounding it is becoming very troubling.

  2. Since last October, she has also had to deal with an anonymous blogger who maintains a separate site that parodies her writing and has included photos of Ms. Armstrong’s daughter, copied from her site.

    …

    People who disagree with his politics frequently leave harassing comments on his site. But the situation reached a new low last month, when an anonymous opponent started a blog in Mr. Silverstein’s name that included photos of Mr. Silverstein in a pornographic context.

    “I’ve been assaulted and harassed online for four years,” he said. “Most of it I can take in stride. But you just never get used to that level of hatred.”

    The article then goes on to talk about the “quality of dialogue on the Web.”

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    Um…what? “Civility,” isn’t the issue in these cases. It’s just harrassment.

  3. What is needed is not so much G/PG/R ratings for an entire blog (although there is probably no harm in that), or a ban on anonymous posters, but eBay-style trusted-user icons for individual contributors.

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    Check out a start up company called Rapleaf. They’re explicitly trying to reverse-engineer eBay’s “trusted user” technology, improve on it, and then let all web sites implement the technology into their sites.

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    I also believe OpenID will help solve identity-related problems (people acting differently than they would if their identity was more transparent).

  4. Last week, Tim O’Reilly, a conference promoter and book publisher who is credited with coining the term Web 2.0

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    Well, maybe he did coin the term, but the understanding of the term was that the IP address space was to be expanded from 32 bits to 128 bits.  Big deal.  I haven’t paid attention, but I haven’t seen any indication that it has happened.

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    The conversational free-for-all on the Internet known as the blogosphere can be a prickly and unpleasant place.

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    Is this supposed to be different than before the “blogosphere” came along?  Um, no.  Some of us were posting on right wing message boards long before the “blogosphere” came along.  The message boards could get quite vicious, but also quite entertaining.  And you had to have quite a backbone to survive them.  Or laugh at them, as I did.  It was quite a learning experience*. 

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    *I learned more derogatory terms for gay men in the couple of years posting on FreeRepublic.com that I had in my earlier 50 years on the planet.  But, I also figured out why straight men denigrate gay men.

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    The people who are complaining about the “blogosphere” now are the right-wingers who had dominated the Internet long before the “blogosphere” came along and allowed left-wingers to set up shop.  That is the pure-and-simple of it.  The right-wingers don’t like the fact that they don’t totally dominate the Internet any more. 

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    And so now they yell “civility.”  The right wingers weren’t civil then and they aren’t civil now on their own web sites.

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