Doubtless everyone has heard of Tim O’Reilly’s Draft Blogger’s Code of Conduct, which is an attempt to instill (restore? inspire?) civility in blogging. I had some difficulty with the concept from the beginning, since it centers around the "tone of the blogs", which is a vague and very subjective thing. O’Reilly’s draft code of conduct isn’t much less vague and subjective:

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.]

Now if "we" means the individual blogger, fine. However, if "we" means some external authority, well, I have problems with that "we".