noteworthy wrote:
Kevin Whitelaw:

Users have been flocking to social networking sites like Facebook and Twitter, where they voluntarily share all kinds of details about their lives.

I file the idea that "all anonymous speech is irresponsible" right next to the idea that "the important thing about books is the way that paper smells" under the heading "ignorant rationalizations made by people who see the Internet as a threat to tradition." I've heard this refrain before, many many times.

Today our online personas are more connected with our real identities because our personal lives are more intertwined with our relationships online than they used to be. Its harder, today, to build a reputation for an anonymous identity online, starting from scratch. But people can do it - and as these identities serve little purpose unless other people pay attention to them, obviously there is something valuable being offered by any anonymous identity that matters enough for people to be aware of it and offended by it. Whether its interesting or trash is obviously a matter of perspective. Its obviously interesting to someone. The notion that its "all trash" or there is too much risk of "trash" to allow anonymity to go on is an authoritarian reflex.

If you don't like it don't read it. Encourage other people to not read it. Shame its irresponsibility. But to attack it for being published anonymously is to call for it to be censored and to attack anonymity in general is to call for the power to censor in general.

RE: Gotcha! Why Online Anonymity May Be Fading