Do bloggers need a code of conduct?

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Do bloggers need guidelines about blogging conduct and civil behaviour? Tim O’Reilly is drafting a Blogger Code of Conduct, which is shaping up by the collaborative effort of bloggers on a wiki committed to the “Civility Enforced” standards.

O’Reilly has posted the first draft, which is also posted on the Blogging Wikia, where you can join in and edit the wiki and encourage others too. The final version will be posted on bloggingcode.org, along with the html to display the badge and link to the code. It is based on the Blogher community guidelines, that embrace the spirit of civil disagreement and declines to publish unacceptable content.

Here is what the blogger conduct code says now -

1. We take responsibility for our own words and reserve the right to restrict comments on our blog that do not conform to basic civility standards.
2. We won’t say anything online that we wouldn’t say in person.
3. If tensions escalate, we will connect privately before we respond publicly.
4. When we believe someone is unfairly attacking another, we take action.
5. We do not allow anonymous comments.
6. We ignore the trolls.
7. We encourage blog hosts to enforce more vigorously their terms of service.

You may not agree on many of these points. So they have also decided on a “anything goes” badge for sites that want to warn possible commenters that they are entering a free-for-all zone.