Comments on: Comments Threads and Spam

By: Frog in a Well - The China History Group Blog

Frog in a Well - The China History Group Blog — Sun, 18 Dec 2005 11:45:31 +0000

[...] Via a Crooked Timber post on how Chinese people are using web sites to comment on Lu Xun’s In Memory of Ms. Liu Hezhen to comment on Dongzhou [...]

By: Crooked Timber » » Evolution

Crooked Timber » » Evolution — Tue, 11 Oct 2005 02:12:34 +0000

[...] UPDATE: Oops, sorry, this is a CT dupe! I knew I had seen “Noitulove” somewhere recently.:) When I saw Kieran’s post I was on a machine that couldn’t deal with a .mov file so I never clicked through and by now it’s off the front page. (As has been noted we’ve been quite busy around here recently. And as has not been noted – because I have been too busy to note – I’m too overwhelmed with deadlines right now to spend much time on CT these days. I shouldn’t have broken my vow to stay away for a few more days. Oh well, at least I made CT history.:) [...]

By: Positive Liberty » Blog Archive » The Pros and Cons of Graduate School

Positive Liberty » Blog Archive » The Pros and Cons of Graduate School — Wed, 28 Sep 2005 13:47:37 +0000

[...] Here’s a quote from a comment thread at Crooked Timber. I found it weirdly uplifting, given my continued search for employment: Anyhow, I must say that if you’re not interested in a career so much as knowledge, there are far worse ways to spend the best years of your life than graduate school. Those I know who elected to embark on the “real world” route are currently underemployed, unhappy and desperate for something meaningful to slam them in the face forthwith. I, on the other hand, have spent the past few years poor… but worrying only about money… (Not a glowing endorsement of either lifestyle, I agree… but we live in a hard world, and living a meaningful life is much more difficult than our earlier incarnations ever imagined.) Trackback URL: http://positiveliberty.com/2005/09/the-pros-and-cons-of-graduate-school.html/trackback/ [...]

By: Crooked Timber » » Here’s the outrage

Crooked Timber » » Here’s the outrage — Sat, 17 Sep 2005 23:20:07 +0000

[...] Chris asked, quite correctly, where the blogospheric outrage was about the UK government’s current “anti-terrorism” legislation was. I didn’t have any particularly intelligent analysis to add, which is why I haven’t posted so far, but upon reading the bloody thing, I realise that this is hardly an excuse. So here we go. [...]

By: a dude somewhere… » Blog Archive » Today is Today

a dude somewhere… » Blog Archive » Today is Today — Tue, 23 Aug 2005 17:17:07 +0000

[...] Flaming the Left. [...]

By: Crooked Timber » » Witchfinders-general

Crooked Timber » » Witchfinders-general — Tue, 16 Aug 2005 23:10:59 +0000

[...] I’ve gone through the comments to my previous post, and found a quite considerable number of people who appear to have made egregious claims about opponents of the war rooting for the other side. I’ve excluded people whodon’t fit the criteria for being well-known etc (including a couple of bloggers). I’ve included both Glenn Reynolds and Hindrocket of Powerline, who both seem to me to qualify as well-known individuals beyond the blogosphere. Where there’s some real degree of ambiguity, I’ve not included the links; where (as with the Wall Street Journal editorial board’s slur-in-passing), I think that any reading other than the obvious one is simply making excuses for the inexcusable, I’ve included them. Which is not to say that I don’t fully expect some of our regular commenters to engage in aforementioned excuse-making, special pleading etc. The links are below the fold. [...]

By: Prometheus-5.Org » Blog Archive » Intelligent Design: Anti-Science

Prometheus-5.Org » Blog Archive » Intelligent Design: Anti-Science — Thu, 11 Aug 2005 05:22:48 +0000

[...] Since August 3rd, there has been a lively discussion on CrookedTimber on the topic. Reading the blog is always an education. Reading the post was the same. [...]

By: Crooked Timber » » Academic lectures and discussions available online

Crooked Timber » » Academic lectures and discussions available online — Thu, 28 Jul 2005 14:46:31 +0000

[...] It is certainly nice to have one central repository of such materials. If the project succeeds in getting lots of places on board and hosting material from all over then it has the potential to be a great service. In fact, the collaborators it already has lined up are already a good sign of its potential. (Then again, some people have suggested [see first comment] that “text is the only useful information on the Internet”.;) posted on Thursday, July 28th, 2005 at 9:16 am Post a comment [...]

By: mon

mon — Sat, 17 Apr 2004 15:36:51 +0000

keith – ok, anonymity is not the same thing as privacy, but on the internet, for people who, unlike you, chose to not use their real full name, anonymity is a means to preserve privacy. Whatever reasons they may have to choose that option, I simply object to it being reduced to a lack of responsibility. It does depend on the actual content of what one writes. If you were here trolling and posting objectionable stuff and insults and racist comments and so on, you’d be a moron with no sense of responsibility anyway, whether you used your real name or not. Choosing anonymity does not automatically mean you’re abusing an internet forum. You can’t lump in together anonymous trolls and anonymous commenters just because they both happen to not display their real names. You know? There might a lot of good reasons not to use your real name, aside from avoiding spam itself. Everyone chooses what they feel comfortable with. I find this attribution of “cowardice” to anonymous posters quite pretentious to be honest.

But there’s no reason in the world that I have a “right” to get up on a soapbox in the public square yet hide behind a curtain.

No? Why not? It is everyone’s right to choose what they prefer, anonymity or real name. Actually, the way you’re putting it here, seems to me you’re the one getting on the high horse of “I use my real name therefore I am more responsible than you”. What kind of higher accountability does that give you? I see none. What matters in the context of a discussion on the net is simply what you’re writing in that particular discussion. Nothing else.

Well, okay, traditionally there is some value seen in anonymous political speech (and related), but in that traditional world such anonymity was the exception, not the rule. One had to go to some trouble to be an anonymous public figure. Today, everyone can be and many are.

I don’t know what you’re referring to, honestly. Seems to me anonymity and/or privacy are becoming more and more of an issue, in terms of legislation as well. So seems to me it’s actually considered a right. Even voting is private and anonymous. Yes, you do need to ID yourself to vote but no one will know who and what you voted for. So the most relevant form of public (as it does have a public outcome) expression of one’s political views is envisaged to grant you the highest anonymity. If privacy wasn’t a right, I guess we’d all be forced by law to declare our vote and have it attached to our social security or ID card or something like that. So I don’t see what’s so odd about considering it a right to keep one’s views anonymous in the context of a discussion on the internet. I’ve signed petitions with my real name and address, I’ve sent non-anonymous letters to editors, or to political parties or media, etc. But the internet is different. For the reasons teep explained above, among others. Besides, when I’m writing to a paper or tv network, I know they have editors and they have to respect laws as well as professional codes of conduct in matters of privacy and everything else. I cannot always assume or demand the same standards from an internet forum or a website, no matter how much I may consider it reliable and trustworthy. Web sites are not subject to the same requirements as printed publications; which is fine, as that allows more people to speak their minds, but it means it’s a completely unregulated context and therefore I’ll have to be responsible for protecting my own privacy myself. I’m not going to let anyone, whatever reasons they may have, collect information about me that they may use in ways I may not particularly care for, from spamming to abuse to stalking to harassment to slander; but I still like to take advantage of the opportunity to contribute to a discussion, if the owner of that site accepts and welcomes comments. I don’t understand what’s so despicable about that.

By: teep

teep — Sat, 17 Apr 2004 13:16:23 +0000

keith m ellis wrote: Now, there’s too little personal accountability—this anonymity in public is being misused far, far more than it is being socially useful. This may be a valid complaint about the internet. However, there are two factors that complicate “public life” on the internet a bit beyond what we are used to in regular, real-world public life. First, a lot of the internet is permanent or semi-permanent. In real life, there’s a reasonably-permanent paper trail, but it isn’t a continuous thing… there are dinner bills and charge card receipts and rental cars and airline tickets and so forth, but there is no data about what happens outside of the paper trail AND the paper trail takes some effort to amass. Joe Average would have to do some serious legwork to get a real-world paper trail together. On the internet, due to the nature of the interactions, a whole lot more of them are logged. It’d be one big paper trail if the internet used paper, which it does not. In addition, most of the logged transactions are instantly, easily searchable by anyone with the sense to crank up google or whatever. In real life, my dad can’t pull up an archive on my college years and discover how much semi-anonymous sex I had on his nickle while I was allegedly getting an education. (Good thing, too.) On the internet, throwaway posts I wrote to message boards five years ago still exist. They’re easily searchable. I honestly feel that these sorts of archives, unexpectedly permanent and unexpectedly easy to riffle through, will eventually wind up biting someone in the butt. Probably several someones. He also wrote: People say outrageious things on the net that they’d never, ever say in real life simply because they can get away with it. I refuse to allow myself that unaccountability. This is your perogative. However, I will not be joining you at that table. I do not wish to make it clear, obvious, and easy for anyone with my real name (like, say, my grandmother) to be able to pull up my web pages on yaoi bondage manga. I don’t think yaoi bondage manga is wrong, particularly, but I don’t see any reason to make it super-easy for my grandma to find out I read* the stuff. [*for values of ‘read’ that include a dictionary and a handbook of Japanese grammar] Because of the volume of the paper trail on the internet, because of its unexpected permanence, and because of the ease with which it may be searched, I see no harm in keeping my real-world identity somewhat apart from my internet identity.

By: Keith M Ellis

Keith M Ellis — Sat, 17 Apr 2004 11:30:12 +0000

Privacy hasn’t traditionally been a “right” in the sense that other rights have been recognized. And what I mean by “public privacy” is what I think you’re misleadingly calling “privacy”: anonymity or semi-anonymity in public. Real privacy is…privacy. That acts that occur in private are private. But there’s no reason in the world that I have a “right” to get up on a soapbox in the public square yet hide behind a curtain. Well, okay, traditionally there is some value seen in anonymous political speech (and related), but in that traditional world such anonymity was the exception, not the rule. One had to go to some trouble to be an anonymous public figure. Today, everyone can be and many are. This has turned the equation on its head. Before, there was too much personal accountability for one’s speech in the context of asserting unpopular political or religious ideas and anonymity served a necessary purpose. Now, there’s too little personal accountability—this anonymity in public is being misused far, far more than it is being socially useful. That you ask: “does that alone make what you write more interesting or valid or reliable?” indicates that you don’t get where I’m coming from at all. It’s not about making my writing more appealing to you, or more credible, or whatever—it’s making me be accountable for what I write. People say outrageious things on the net that they’d never, ever say in real life simply because they can get away with it. I refuse to allow myself that unaccountability. This language of “rights” really bothers me because, firstly, I don’t believe in “natural rights” anyway; and, secondly, even if I did, I don’t see how there could be a “natural right” to being anonymous in public. Yeah, I can come up with a utilitarian argument for it…maybe…but that this is automatically cast in the language of assumed inalienable “rights” just drives me crazy.

By: mon

mon — Sat, 17 Apr 2004 07:38:14 +0000

Keith: sorry but what other kinds of privacy apart from ‘public privacy’ are there? Privacy is all you preserve from the public area. There’s nothing bizarre at all in considering it a right because it simply is. By all definitions, legal included. I don’t understand why you seem to believe that in order to comment or write anywhere on the internet, people have to know your full name and address. Does that alone make what you write more interesting or valid or reliable? I don’t think so. I don’t care who you are and what you do in ‘real’ life and if I can look your name up in a telephone directory or not. I’m only reading your opinions on a specific forum. I’m not interested in the rest, whether you think it’s relevant or not. I’m a real person too living a real life as well, the fact you don’t know my name and surname from the net does not make any difference because you don’t know me in person anyway. This whole notion that you have to ID yourself as to the police only to post an opinion on a discussion board is what sounds truly bizarre to me. In letters to newspaper editors, you can actually only write your first name and they will publish it all the same. They are bound to respect your anonymity. I don’t know any paper who violates a a request not to publish one’s name and address. But even if your details appear in a newspaper, there are still next to no risks of being spammed and abused. On the internet, there are tons because your details are forever there and searchable, by bots or individuals. If privacy is not a right, then what, spamming and stalking are?

By: Anatoly

Anatoly — Sat, 17 Apr 2004 00:26:34 +0000

anno-nymous: nice address! I’ve only seen one address which impressed me even more than yours does—this guy.

By: Keith M Ellis

Keith M Ellis — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 22:44:55 +0000

Yes, well, this expectation of a public privacy seems to me to be an accident of history, an aberration that people have for some bizarre reasons come to think of as a “right”. Newspapers don’t publish addresses but almost all refuse to publish anonymous letters. It doesn’t take much effort to track someone down if you know their name and where they live. And the fact that my address and phone number have been easily obtainable has more to do with my resume being on the web than anything else. The key anti-anonymity point I was making was that my real world identity is not hidden or obfuscated and thus what I say here reflects on me in my real life. As it should.

By: mon

mon — Fri, 16 Apr 2004 22:36:35 +0000

I don’t believe it’s a matter of ‘personal accountability’ when it comes to making a comment, writing your opinions, even keeping a web site or weblog. Anonymity is a right. Especially when voicing opinions. You’re still responsible for what you write. Obviously. But I don’t think the choice of preserving your privacy above all should be so disparaged. You can write letters to the editor of a newspaper, they’ll publish it if it’s interesting, and bin it if it’s not – but they won’t publish your home address and telephone number unless you ask them to specifically, for whatever reason. So I don’t see why it should be different on the net. Besides, even when you’re posting anonymously, if someone wants a way to contact you, they can just ask in the thread and you can give a simple spam-proof instruction. So, no need to turn internet privacy into some kind of irresponsibility. It’s a very precious thing. No better reminder of that than when it’s abused. I suppose it’s all a matter of personal experiences, but I’d rather not risk having nastier ones than those I’ve already had.