Why do we want to be anonymous?

In My Humble Opinion
1

Very, very few Dopers post here under their real names. Clearly, if you’re posting here about crimes you’ve committed, diseases you don’t want others to know you have, trouble with your spouse, or your attempts to overthrow the government, anonymity is the name of the game.

But it’s inconvenient. I wanted another SDMB member to email me something the other day. One of us either has to post our email address here (which I avoid doing for spam reasons), or create a throwaway email address just for this transaction. What a pain! I also have to think through each post trying to decide whether it gives away too much info about me. It also creates a more abrasive culture. People say incredibly rude and obnoxious things here they’d never dream of saying in real life.

I’ve been using message boards for close to 20 years, through the Web, CompuServe, Usenet, and private BBS systems. I’ve almost always used my real name for everything I’ve done. I have several email addresses, all of which contain my real name. I’m not ashamed of my opinions, and it just seems like extra work to remain anonymous.

The culture on the SDMB is one of anonymity, however, so I’ve been going with that.

I’m looking for some arguments I might not have thought of on either side of the fence. I’ve never posted anything on here that I wouldn’t want my wife, kids, in-laws, or employees to read. I have no intention of posting in any of the “sex with watermelons” threads.

So what advantage do I have in remaining anonymous? What advantages would there be to putting my real name on my posts, or even a link to my Web site in my signature block?

As my opening paragraph said, I understand why certain people need to be anonymous. I’m talking about an average person with nothing in particular to hide.

2

I don’t care a bit about anonymity. For practical and safety reasons, I won’t divulge my SSN or post my home address on a messageboard but telling people my name is Robert Deaver and that I live in Dallas, Oregon doesn’t cause me any great concern. I know a handful of people on this board better than I know any of my neighbors and I have much more reason to fear them simply because they know exactly where I live and have greater opportunity to hurt me than some stranger online does.

3

Like Robert, I have no reason to be anonymous, but I do like how we don’t run around and call each other Frank or Pearl all the time. Something magical in having names like the Invisible Wombat and talking to people without ever meeting them, I guess. Just so darn amazing.

  • Jared Watson
4

I never understood the point of anonyminity myself. I’m me, these are my views, these are my messages, what’s the big secret?

Granted, posting my address and social security numbers might be a bit much, but I always thought that folks who wrote incendiary comments under an alias were engaging in a mild form of cowardice.

5

I’ve been participating in online societies since the BBS days of the early 1980s.

I have had some really icky problems with stalkers in the past. I’ve left two Internet communities because of a few people who developed obsessions and wouldn’t leave me alone.

I used to be quite open about my “real life” identity. I wish I could do that again. But unless some magic sanity gas envelops the earth, there are always going to be weirdo whackaloons, and I seem to be a whackaloon magnet, so I’ll hide behind my handy-dandy pseudonym for now.

6

Does it count if you actually use your alias in “real life” as well?

I generally go as “Angus MacSpon” on the net. But most of my off-net friends call me Angus, too. It’s gotten to the point where I answer to “Angus” almost as automatically as “Allen”. So … I dunno.

7

My guess: The Dope is about truth (ignoring the irony of my entire post to follow) most of the time, anonymity is not a problem because nobody realy cares who you really are if you know goat gaggingly obscure details about your industry.

But when you start tapping into the threads outside of GQ well, there are the TMI threads which can be HIGHLY informative resources about pretty non-genteel stuff. Sure, all the bodily functions threads are pretty much universal (if sometimes gender-specific) but it’s easier to be honest about that kind of thing when there is next to no chance a real person will sit down next to you in the park or in the office and ask you to tell them again what human semen does when tossed into a frying pan.

Also, this place spurs tremendous personal growth. Anonymity makes it easier to believe that my truly inane point of view three years ago won’t come back at me in real life tomorrow when I no longer think that way. Plus a faux username can say a lot about how you’d like people to think of you as opposed to accepting how they’re going to think about all the other “Roberts” they’ve known.

I’ve got some nasty mental illness, the stigma of which would cripple my professional career but the symptoms are manageable to the point where I’m viewed as an asset to my employer. This place helps ME and I think I’m able to fight a little ignorance on behalf of the afflicted. Put my real name on my posts and that goes away.

8

Pretty much the same here*. I also like the idea that it’s only what you say that matters. If someone looked at me, they might assume that I’m a typical preppy 16-year-old with nothing worth saying. Alright, so maybe that last part is true, but the point is that it doesn’t matter. What you are saying is what matters. We give out the information about ourselves that we want or that is relevant. But it doesn’t matter if people know that stuff or not, so why tell? I mean, if you’re out at a bar talking to people, you don’t tell them every little thing about yourself–they don’t need to know it. Same here.

-Marj

*[sub]That, plus I don’t like my real first name. Too pretty[/sub]

9

I think it’s because your entire online persona is based on what you want to project, rather than a mere decision on the part of your parents, based on things like grandparents, name trends, acceptability…

Your handle, however, is something that is uniquely you, that is how you wish to be seen. The real world and your genes determine how you look in real life, but you alone decide how people see you online, and the first thing most people see about you is your handle. Personally, that’s also why I like avatars - it’s “choose your own body” in a place where what you decide actually makes a difference.

10

I don’t know who the hell you are - how do I know I can trust you?
Of course the same can be said of random strangers on the street - I don’t know who the hell they are, but then I don’t typically engage them in conversation, certainly not to anything like the level I do with you lot here.

11

All good points. As far as the social security number goes, I don’t give that to anybody unless they’re giving me money or I’m otherwise required to by law.

I guess the only reasons I’ve stayed anonymous here so far are that everyone else has, and I may want to participate in one of those TMI threads at some point. Who knows? Of course, I’ve probably given out so much information by now that a really determined stalker could figure out who I am with a little bit of legwork.

I know sock puppets are incredibly easy to abuse, but it sure would be handy to put out 99% of my posts under my real name and then create an alias just for those “ooky” threads! :wink:

12

I am also not afraid of people knowing my name; I don’t post anything terribly provocative and I’m just a guy. I am the same person online as I am in real life. But I think that sometimes I might come off as less charming online because typing just doesn’t capture the nuances of face-to-face interaction.

I could see how women would be more circumspect because creeps are everywhere.

13

I remember a decade or more ago, when I was but a sprite and my family first got online, everyone was anonymus. We were, too. We were gfloyd, short for genghisfloyd, the mixture of genghis khan and pink floyd. When I was 14 or 15 and starting have a presence online, I used gfloyd as well, I didn’t want to exist, really. Now that I’m more my own person on line, almost everything has been converted over to priestessoforgo. I’m a chem geek, if you couldn’t tell. I still use genghisfloyd as an sn on AIM and as a handle here, but I’m slowly changing that. I might even get around to changing my screen name here, not sure.

But do I currently have a problem with all of you knowing that I’m Sarah Jane Fischer (call me Janey and die) and I grew up in Waltham, MA but now live in Lowell, no, not at all.

14

I’ve had some creepy experiences with people online.

Someone (friendly, lucky for me) tracked down my work e-mail address based on various “clues” I’d let slip on an anonymous message board. I’m a little more careful about my “clues” now.

I grew friendly with someone else I knew on an anonymous message board, and when I drifted away from that board, he asked me for my e-mail address and I gave it to him. After a couple months of on-again, off-again friendly correspondence he declared that he was in love with me.

I had an extended work-related e-mail exchange with another gentleman. He knew my real name, of course, and without my knowledge looked up my home address and emailed me a small gift. I threw it out without every bringing it into my house. He later turned out to be delusional (thought that television programs contained special instructions to him specifically from a secret branch of the government.) Thank Og he lived in the UK, or I would have been scared.

15

Well, now, that would be quite a trick, wouldn’t it? He snail-mailed it, obviously.

16

I’m not at all protective about my anonymity here, but I think the illusion of anonymity is still important to me. Even though people know where I live and I’ve linked to my personal website from which you could easily get my name, address, and phone number, I doubt many people would bother to do so.

I think most people buy into that illusion a bit too much, though. I once seriously creeped a girl out by sending her an IM after we had chatted on IRC. About five minutes with google, her IRC handle and the college she went to was all it took. I hadn’t meant to startle her; I just saw something that made me want to follow up on the conversation, and she wasn’t on IRC. At least it was me, and not some stalker, right?

17

It would be totally easy to figure out my real name (if you wanted to wade through all 7000 of my posts – yikes, I can’t imagine why), but there’s no reason to make things too easy. Some of that is a gender thing for women (esp. those who live alone). Similarly, IRL my listing in the phone book is under J.M., not “Judy,” and I don’t say my name on my answering machine message. I maintain a secondary email account at yahoo as a more or less anonymous way of communicating with people from here and elsewhere on the web. That’s my contact email address here, though at least a dozen of my fellow Dopers have been switched over to my main account, which is a firstnamelastname address.

For me, the main point, though, is that I enjoy my twickster persona. She has a hell of a lot in common with me – but she’s not identical with me. Since I don’t even read, let alone post in, the TMI threads, it’s not that there’s info associated with my username that would embarrass me if I met you (and I knew that you knew that one time I …). So I guess that’s one of the ways twickster is like Judy – she’s got a strong sense of privacy. :wink: But it’s not about secretiveness – or creating a false persona – as much as it’s about downplaying some elements of my self (physical appearance, the occasional bad mood, etc.) in favor of emphasizing others (my humor, knowledge, empathy) – which are equally authentic to my self.

18

I agreed with the OP’s original point about being willing to stand behind my opinions, so I didn’t make up an anonymous name here. If someone really wanted to try, it wouldn’t be hard to deduce who I am just by putting together stuff I’ve posted here.

I’ve contemplated changing to some other ID, but I figure as long as I keep this name it helps keep my urges to post to the TMI threads in check. Or at least the worst of them. :slight_smile:

Shit - I’d love to have a name like Q the M’s or Bosda’s. :smiley:

19

I have no concerns about anonymity. Hi I’m Mitch Falter in Washington DC. I can certainly understand though why someone wouldn’t want their real name floating around the internet. Like Twickster said this goes double for women as the internet seems to breed stalkers like sea monkeys.

What I don’t understand is people who won’t reveal even their general location. Many times I have read a post where a person’s location has direct bearing on the topic. Not only don’t they list it in their profile, they choose not to reveal so much as their state or country of residence. To me, barring special circumstances, goes beyond caution to paranoia.

20

Safety issue. I’m female and I want nothing to do with Joe Weirdo in Columbus OH who may be jacking off to my posts(not likely, but a girl can dream…jk).

I kinda like having a second persona–it’s fun. And here (and another bb I post on) I can say stuff that might be awkward face to face–and not just the pitting stuff. It’s easier, sometimes to talk about core issues with anonymity.