Journalist wants to ban anonymous comments
Fine. Only if you also ban unsigned editorials.
13 Responses to “Journalist wants to ban anonymous comments”
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March 29th, 2010 at 11:57 am
This is why anonymous emails are a must.
March 29th, 2010 at 1:48 pm
Anonymous comments are what makes the Internet flourish… right? 🙂
March 29th, 2010 at 2:20 pm
As a pseudonymous poster (not using a very specific or unique pseudonym), I don’t go to great lengths to hide my identity, I’m not anyone worthy of attention, but at the same time, I don’t want comments I make permenantly tied to my name forever. In the past, in the era of letters to the editor before the internet, you could sign a letter to your local paper, and in all likeyhood, in a few years no one would remember you wrote it. It would be in an archive someplace, but a perspective employer would be unlikely to dig it up. Unless someone for whatever reason remembers you wrote it, it would be effectively burried unless you ran for an office worthy of some extremely serious vetting.
Today, thats different. Who knows how long a comment or forum post I make today will be available. And not just theoretically available, but available with a quick google. Do I want every comment I’ve ever made to be reviewable to a perspective employer? Even if I have always been respectful, and never said anything that could ever be construed as slanderous, I could have said something THEY happen to find offensive.
As an aside, I love it when tenured proffesors come out against anonymous comments. Extreme job security, and prestige to provide thier comments if they are signed…
March 29th, 2010 at 2:57 pm
… and unnamed “sources” and “officials”.
March 29th, 2010 at 4:04 pm
Fine? Not fine. Anonymous speech is in our highest tradition of liberty.
March 29th, 2010 at 4:04 pm
Says who?
March 29th, 2010 at 5:20 pm
Who cares? I have had many conversations, debates, agreements and disagreements with people whose names I never knew, nor did they know mine.
A truly intelligent man does not assign value to a viewpoint based on the identity of the speaker/holder of that viewpoint, but rather on the validity of the point in that view.
I repeat, who cares?
March 29th, 2010 at 5:25 pm
There are no anonymous comments.
Just ask Gleeeen and someone whose name you don’t want to write but Jeff Goldstein knows.
No name comments are fine, sure most of them are trollish, but so? People will just make up a name. Or are we going to have the gov’t make sure that you put your name on everything your computer does?
Solutions to “too much freedom” are often much, much worse.
March 29th, 2010 at 7:21 pm
There are more folks posting with the same monikers, on different boards, sites, and news sources, than I want to think about. I added an extra “e” to my moniker to avoid being identified with a troll on another website who went by “Mike” and I have found it suitable for some time now.
I would guess that there are several hundred people using “Mikee” on the internets, we just don’t cross paths that often.
March 29th, 2010 at 8:40 pm
The “journalist” in question, Connie Schulz, is Mrs. Sherrod Brown, a particularly undistinguished Senator whom I believe her paper endorsed — in an unsigned editorial.
March 29th, 2010 at 11:35 pm
“People enjoying too much Liberty doesn’t keep me up at night” – Alan Gura
March 30th, 2010 at 10:46 am
But it’s different with unsigned editorials. They come from an editorial staff, so it’s special.
They are special. So special.
March 30th, 2010 at 4:21 pm
That’s why they ride the short bus to work? who knew?