Hey we haven't had THIS discussion for a while!
Basically the prefered style can change from person to person, many companies have specific style guidelines, mine for instance. It IS a preference though. The Style Guide here is aimed at helping people make their code as neat, tidy and readable as possible, some people may feel that they prefer alternatives though.
However, since in the industry developers are generally asked to conform to some kind of style rules, we made our own style guide primarily for the use of those taking part in The Cattle Drive, to pass an assignment there your code must obey the Javaranch rules, just like here where I work, to get your code past a code review it must obey the company rules.
Basically there is no right or wrong, only what those who set the rules deem to be preferable.
