Techdirt Podcast Episode 182: Anonymity In The Media & Online
from the someone-said dept
Anonymity is back in the news in a big way, especially since the New York Times published an explosive opinion piece by an anonymous White House official. Here at Techdirt — proudly one of the few blogs that still allows completely anonymous comments with no sign-up — we've talked about anonymity for a long time in the context of the internet. On this week's episode, Mike and regular co-hosts Dennis Yang and Hersh Reddy talk about the benefits, challenges, and overall importance of anonymous speech.
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Filed Under: anonymity, comments, journalism, media, podcast
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Meanwhile much of the worst abuse directed at people online comes from those who happily flaunt their real identities, because it's not about anonymity emboldening them to do it, it's about the notoriety and attention they get for doing so.
Those people held up as examples of the "problem" with anonymity have every incentive *not* to be anonymous in this day and age.
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It's kind of like how old AOL or other e-mails turn up in reverse-lookup searches.
Lost count of the number of "anonymous" people who didn't realize they were anything but. Your computer may hide behind a VPN but your brain doesn' t. Also nothing is onymous on the outgong end and thanks to the software, LE knows where to look for that.
Nothing to hide, nothing o fear.
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You speak for you, not for anyone else.
Or you speak for the advertisers of this site and 'll let them know someone said they don't want my business.
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All I said here is that anonymous speech no longer exists unless someone doesn't post as themselves anywhere else, because "speech matching" software can identify most anonymous speakers within minutes based on their unique language patterns.
As for how being pirated millions of times equates to having made millions, that's your logical fallacy.
The software has already caught a few lawyers posting anonymously on places like Twitter and will prove very useful with Bar Association complaints.
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You have yet to do so. This earned you derision, as anyone unable to substantiate their claims rightly deserves. Again, what business could you offer to the point where you can boast about rescinding it?
Go ahead, take it to the Bar Association. Should bear as much fruit as the federal violations you claimed to have.
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Four talks by Eben Moglen
As a longtime, regular lurker on techdirt, this is my first post. So I would like to add a thank you to it, for your blog Mike. Though not 100% perfect (and which blog is?), your blog far exceeds most others out there in subjects of interest and those that matter.
https://snowdenandthefuture.info/index.html
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