An exclusive gaming industry community targeted
to, and designed for Professionals, Businesses
and Students in the sectors and industries
of Gaming, New Media and the Web, all closely
related with it's Business and Industry.
A Rich content driven service including articles,
contributed discussion, news, reviews, networking, downloads,
and debate.
We strive to cater for cultural influencers,
technology decision makers, early adopters and business leaders in the gaming industry.
A medium to share your or contribute your ideas,
experiences, questions and point of view or network
with other colleagues here at iVirtua Community.
Following the Kathy Sierra debacle (see below), Tim O'Reilly of O'Reilly Media, Inc has posted a Call for a Blogger's Code of Conduct. However, rather than focusing on what bloggers post, it is mostly to do with the kinds of things that appear in comments.
O'Reilly says: "It seems to me that there's a big difference between censorship and encouraging and tolerating abuse."
Quote:
There's an attitude among many bloggers that deleting inflammatory comments is censorship. I think that needs to change. I'm not suggesting that every blog will want to delete such comments, but I am suggesting that blogs that do want to keep the level of dialog at a higher level not be censured for doing so.
There are many real-world analogies. Shock radio hosts encourage abusive callers; a mainstream talk radio show like NPR's Talk of the Nation wouldn't hesitate to cut someone off who started spewing hatred and abuse. Frat parties might encourage drunken lewdness, but a party at a tech conference would not. Setting standards for acceptable behavior in a forum you control is conducive to free speech, not damaging to it.
We don't usually get inflammatory comments on Radar, but in the past, when they've occurred, we've tended not to delete them, lest we be accused of censorship. But in future, we're going to adopt a policy of deleting comments that are ad-hominem, insulting, or threatening to any individual. I'd like to see other bloggers do the same. Obviously, there's a responsibility on the other side for bloggers not to delete comments solely because they express opinions the poster doesn't agree with.
The Guardian has now -- perhaps belatedly -- introduced such a policy, though it's very rarely used. When you post a comment here, you accept the following:
Quote:
By posting on this website you are agreeing to abide by our talk policy. We will remove posts that contain racist, sexist or offensive/threatening language, personal attacks on the writer or other posters, posts that exceed the maximum length, and posts that are off topic. Any poster who repeatedly contravenes the talk policy will be banned from posting on the website.
And, of course, anyone can complain about a comment they find unsuitable or offensive.
What do you think?
Have we got the balance right?
Would this be implemented more as "constitutions" for a blog to follow?
Would it be implemented?
Would non conformers be simple "bashed" by the blogging community?
Would it lead to flaming and trolling increases?
Digg Topic
Tag topic on On del.icio.us
Technorati Search
Post to Slashdot
