FC: LA Times columnist wants it to "be harder to be anonymous" online

[Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>]

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Date: Wed, 1 May 2002 21:47:20 -0500 (CDT)
From: William Knowles <wk () c4i org>
To: Declan McCullagh <declan () well com>
Subject: Privacy vs. anonymity on the Web
Organization: C4I.org - http://www.c4i.org

http://www.siliconvalley.com/mld/siliconvalley/3170530.htm

By John Balzar
Tue, Apr. 30, 2002

[...]

Legitimate announcements and news stories are hijacked from Web sites
and rewritten by anonymous mischief makers. Once in the vapors of the
Web, a stink arose when my byline was circulated over a fabricated
story about the president of the United States being a child molester.

The creative geniuses who have given us the Web still insist that
anonymity is one of its cornerstones. If so, the foundation is wormy.
The longer that Web-heads insist on anonymity, the more the
credibility and usefulness of their creation will be undermined.
Already, one of the first lessons taught in middle-school computer
labs is to regard everything on the Web as you might a puff adder --
apt to bite you at any moment. Is this the best we can expect from the
information revolution?

So instead of worrying ourselves silly about ways to protect these few
who are afraid to stand up for their words and actions, we should be
going in the other direction: making it harder to be anonymous,
marginalizing those who try.

We may never humanize the automobile, but we can the future -- by
tearing down those barriers that shield us from each other and tempt
us to be our worst.


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John Balzar is a Los Angeles Times columnist.




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