Interesting People mailing list archives
Re "The Real Name Fallacy"
From: "Dave Farber" <dave () farber net>
Date: Sun, 08 Jan 2017 05:41:51 +0000
---------- Forwarded message --------- From: Mary Shaw <mary.shaw () gmail com> Date: Sat, Jan 7, 2017 at 10:12 PM Subject: Re: [IP] "The Real Name Fallacy" To: Dave Farber <dave () farber net> Reaching for "real names" as the solution to this social problem confuses mechanism with principle. I believe the principle we're after is that people should accept responsibility for their actions, and in particular that (a) the author of a statement can be found again and (b) if there are consequences from online actions, they will fall upon the actor. I believe that the principle we're after is that authors should take (and keep) responsibility for their statements. A "Real Name" rule attempts to accomplish that by associating writings with a unique actual person. The first problem is that it doesn't work: Names are not unique. Unusual real names can fail the Real Name filter. Authors who consistently write under pen names are sometimes not recognized by their real names. People (especially women using two surnames) may use different names personally and professionally. And so on. The second problem is that insisting that an actual person have only one online identity denies us the capability of the technology. I have two principal meat-space personas (plus a couple of minor ones). Most IP readers know me through my technical persona. In Pittsburgh, I'm probably better-known in my bicycle/trail-developer persona. It's sometimes socially awkward when these cross over in real life. I can report that in Facebook it's a bit chaotic, because AFIK Facebook doesn't consider which of my friends know me in which role -- at minimum, they probably get stuff from my feed that they don't care about. For all I know, this can result in loss of credibility. Note that I'm not trying to be anonymous -- just to separate activities in different communities. This is harder to do under an online real-name discipline than in the Real World, where physical location does a pretty decent job of separation. Now, the usual objection to allowing people to have multiple online identities it that they can do mischief. Much (most?) of that mischief arises from the ability to duck responsibility for online writings and actions. So, back the the principle: Instead of trying to make Real Names do something they can't, why aren't we looking for ways to establish online identities to which actions and statements can be attributed? We could even continue to allow anonymous statements as long as they are recognized as having low credibility because of the anonymity. In software engineering we describe this as confusing specification with implementation -- confusing what should be done with how it should be done. Mary On Sat, Jan 7, 2017 at 2:16 PM, Dave Farber <dave () farber net> wrote: ---------- Forwarded message --------- From: Lauren Weinstein <lauren () vortex com> Date: Sat, Jan 7, 2017 at 12:53 PM Subject: [ NNSquad ] "The Real Name Fallacy" To: <nnsquad () nnsquad org> "The Real Name Fallacy" https://blog.coralproject.net/the-real-name-fallacy/ People often say that online behavior would improve if every comment system forced people to use their real names. It sounds like it should be true - surely nobody would say mean things if they faced consequences for their actions? Yet the balance of experimental evidence over the past thirty years suggests that this is not the case. Not only would removing anonymity fail to consistently improve online community behavior - forcing real names in online communities could also increase discrimination and worsen harassment. We need to change our entire approach to the question. Our concerns about anonymity are overly-simplistic; system design can't solve social problems without actual social change. - - - --Lauren-- REPORT Fake News Here! - https://factsquad.com CRUSHING the Internet Liars - https://vortex.com/crush-net-liars Archives <https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/247/=now> <https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/247/124143-b55e3b00> | Modify <https://www.listbox.com/member/?&> Your Subscription | Unsubscribe Now <https://www.listbox.com/unsubscribe/?&&post_id=20170107141644:D15069D6-D50D-11E6-A2BC-A31DD4627830> <http://www.listbox.com> ------------------------------------------- Archives: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/247/=now RSS Feed: https://www.listbox.com/member/archive/rss/247/18849915-ae8fa580 Modify Your Subscription: https://www.listbox.com/member/?member_id=18849915&id_secret=18849915-aa268125 Unsubscribe Now: https://www.listbox.com/unsubscribe/?member_id=18849915&id_secret=18849915-32545cb4&post_id=20170108004211:31CAED8E-D565-11E6-8B93-E8C2F0F3B473 Powered by Listbox: http://www.listbox.com
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