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You won't even have to go further than this site to run into obstacles, you can't delete your HN account, I've tried. And, like me, OP seems to have used their

You won't even have to go further than this site to run into obstacles, you can't delete your HN account, I've tried. And, like me, OP seems to have used their real name.

closeparen 10y ago
What do you think deleting your HN account would accomplish? All your comments will still be there, and likely backed up by Google Cache, the Internet Archive, HN Search, and anyone else using the HN API. "Delete my account" may be feel-good symbolism but AFAICT it rarely if ever makes a real difference to the subject (other than emotionally).
464192002d7fe1c 10y ago
Technically I also used my real name as my account name... just the md5 of my name :)
gaius 10y ago
Yeah, this is an issue for those of us who came online in a different era of the Internet. Nowadays people can and should assume that the Internet is actively hostile and malicious before they even log in for the very first time. We grew up in a far more innocent age. Loads of us used our real names on Usenet for example because it simply never occurred to us that someone was archiving it all, after all, why would anyone even want to do such a thing? And who had the money for it? And they didn't tell anyone they were doing it until years after they started, which was in very poor taste.
- ghaff 10y ago
  Even way back when, archives of Usenet postings were a thing. (Although it wasn't really systematically or completely archived.) Perhaps many people didn't fully appreciate how things they wrote under their True Names could be out there "forever." Or they assumed that Usenet was pretty much an exclusive club and things they wrote wouldn't be visible to the general public. But I'm not sure why someone posting on Usenet would assume that whatever they wrote was ephemeral and wouldn't be seen by anyone else a few years hence.
  - gaius 10y ago
    I don't think anyone anticipated the shift in online culture from "what goes online stays online" to the present day when people are actively scouring forums, mailing lists, archives etc for something to weaponize and brigade in the "real world".

You won't even have to go further than this site to run into obstacles, you can't delete your HN account, I've tried. And, like me, OP seems to have used their real name.

closeparen 10y ago

What do you think deleting your HN account would accomplish? All your comments will still be there, and likely backed up by Google Cache, the Internet Archive, HN Search, and anyone else using the HN API. "Delete my account" may be feel-good symbolism but AFAICT it rarely if ever makes a real difference to the subject (other than emotionally).

464192002d7fe1c 10y ago

Technically I also used my real name as my account name... just the md5 of my name :)

gaius 10y ago

Yeah, this is an issue for those of us who came online in a different era of the Internet. Nowadays people can and should assume that the Internet is actively hostile and malicious before they even log in for the very first time. We grew up in a far more innocent age. Loads of us used our real names on Usenet for example because it simply never occurred to us that someone was archiving it all, after all, why would anyone even want to do such a thing? And who had the money for it? And they didn't tell anyone they were doing it until years after they started, which was in very poor taste.

ghaff 10y ago
Even way back when, archives of Usenet postings were a thing. (Although it wasn't really systematically or completely archived.) Perhaps many people didn't fully appreciate how things they wrote under their True Names could be out there "forever." Or they assumed that Usenet was pretty much an exclusive club and things they wrote wouldn't be visible to the general public. But I'm not sure why someone posting on Usenet would assume that whatever they wrote was ephemeral and wouldn't be seen by anyone else a few years hence.
- gaius 10y ago
  I don't think anyone anticipated the shift in online culture from "what goes online stays online" to the present day when people are actively scouring forums, mailing lists, archives etc for something to weaponize and brigade in the "real world".