8 ms·

Well, this is why I don’t have a blog. I have a lot of strong opinions that might be interesting to some people, but I don’t want to miss opportunities because

by rland 6y ago

Well, this is why I don’t have a blog. I have a lot of strong opinions that might be interesting to some people, but I don’t want to miss opportunities because some HR person googled my name and found a post they disagreed with. Or, in the future, not a real person but an algorithm.

throwaway1777 6y ago
Start an anonymous blog. I have one. Also an anonymous hacker news account. :)
- Reelin 6y ago
  The trouble with that is that once you post something to it you can never associate it with yourself (even accidentally!) or deanonymization of everything else posted by that identity will also occur. Half baked idea: A decentralized and properly anonymized (at the protocol level) service intended for long-form articles. Employ cryptographic primitives to allow association of a single article with one or more identities at any time after publication. (I suspect such a system would just end up getting abused, but who knows?)
  - derrick_jensen 6y ago
    I'm about to release something very similar to this. You might see it here in a week or two
    - jborichevskiy 6y ago
      This sounds cool - I'll be keeping an eye out!
  - hk__2 6y ago
    > Half baked idea: A decentralized and properly anonymized (at the protocol level) service intended for long-form articles. Employ cryptographic primitives to allow association of a single article with one or more identities at any time after publication. (I suspect such a system would just end up getting abused, but who knows?) The downside is that as a reader you wouldn’t be able to follow your favorite authors anymore.
  - adrianN 6y ago
    That won't be safe for very long. De-anonymization based on writing style is pretty good already.
    - langitbiru 6y ago
      Maybe AI that changes the writing style to monotonous style would help. Say, you always write like Yoda speaks, "Great you are." Then the AI would change it to, "You are great." I know, I know, it's a tall order.
      - pferde 6y ago
        I suspect that resulting articles would be, while probably reasonably safe from style analysis, awfully boring and difficult to read. Good and interesting writing style is a skill.
      - stagas 6y ago
        You could pass it through a Google Translate, or maybe a couple, then back - correct for minor errors and style has changed (maybe not that much, but enough to scare AI).
      - WalterSear 6y ago
        Not necessarily that tall: you just need copies of a long enough text, written in different writing styles.
    - Reelin 6y ago
      That's definitely true, but depending on the usecase it might not matter all that much. Also, that problem already applies to an anonymous blog anyway! Consider the usage of semi-anonymous accounts on HN or Reddit or wherever. There's some risk of deanonymization depending on usage style and how determined the attacker is, but it's still quite different from openly publishing things in a manner that links back to you directly. The issue for me is that (for an anonymous blog) once I decide to publish something to it the article becomes permanently and publicly linked to all the others as well. This means that I can never change my mind in the future without simultaneously changing my mind about all the other content published there. It also means that if I ever slip up (say on a non-anonymous HN account) and reveal that I'm the author then I've inadvertently and publicly tied the entire blog to myself (not just that one article).
  - jstanley 6y ago
    How would such a system be "abused"? What does abuse of a blogging platform even look like? People might write text that others don't want to read?
    - Reelin 6y ago
      I hadn't really thought it through honestly. I'm just assuming that if an anonymized publishing service with a low barrier to entry exists that people will find creative ways to misuse it. Semi-related Google Drive usage: (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19907271 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19907271) Consider all the issues that Reddit and HN have with spam and other sorts of abuse. Then again, BitTorrent and IPFS seem to work well enough. At a minimum, I suspect that issues will tend to crop up anywhere a search or other curation mechanism exists that can potentially be gamed in order to gain an audience.
  - larsrc 6y ago
    "Hi! It looks like you're trying to solve complex social problems with technology. Would you like some help in your futile endeavour?"
    - Reelin 6y ago
      What complex social problem? All I see are a few technical problems regarding security, anonymity, and interrelations between nodes on a graph. There's also a closely related ease of use (ie UX) problem regarding the convenience (or rather lack thereof) of publishing things in a reasonably anonymous manner. All the social problems, such as the underlying reasons for wanting or needing anonymity in the first place, remain.
      - pferde 6y ago
        It is a social problem because even the strongest, most bullet-proof cryptography solution can't prevent people slipping up and making mistakes, which a motivated attacker can then use to de-anonymize and connect their various identities together. And people will slip up and make mistakes. A lot.
        Reelin 6y ago
        I agree that the potential for making mistakes could contribute to a social problem, but it's one that already exists. I also wasn't proposing to solve it - hence my earlier response.
      - tonyarkles 6y ago
        “Authorship Attribution” is an active field of research. Even if you manage to solve the problem of anonymously publishing a bunch of content under distinct anonymous pseudonyms (or completely anonymously), there’s a non-negligible probability that, as soon as the author of one work is identified, the entire body of work can be attributed to that person.
  - Rerarom 6y ago
    You can invent a separate identity with the goal of being deanonymized one day. And post what you want to keep anonymous using other identities.
- narengowda16 6y ago
  I did write a lot of articles anonymously back then(was afraid due to validation/criticism as I was learning) but later I found out that my blogs are legit and people liked them. And later couldn't associate with real me. Now making System design videos with real face and name and able to reach a subset of the audience. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCn1XnDWhsLS5URXTi5wtFTA/ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCn1XnDWhsLS5URXTi5wtFTA/
chipotle_coyote 6y ago
Anecdotal counterexample: I successfully moved from development into technical writing because I had a blog that a company got in touch with me about and said, "We really like your writing. Have you considered being a technical writer?" My honest feeling is that if you're a good writer and not just posting ranty flamebait -- and "strongly worded and highly opinionated" is not the same thing, although it can be -- blogging is valuable. Or at least it used to be. And really, I'd like to see it make more of a return, too.
- afiori 6y ago
  Sometimes I feel like I want to write something I have strong opinions about, then I realize how much research I would have to do to actually justify my unfounded opinions and give up. It requires work to avoid being flamebaity
kang 6y ago
Its better in a way. Stupidity rejects you and you end up being in a happy place where you dont have to bend your mind.
tunesmith 6y ago
It'd be nice if robots.txt were actually respected so that your blog was visible to people you trackback, or from blogs that link to you, but not to search engines.
- larsrc 6y ago
  I find most of my blog entries using search engines. And I suspect I'm not alone in this. Blocking search engines gives you a serious bootstrap problem.
larsrc 6y ago
https://xkcd.com/137/ https://xkcd.com/137/

by rland 6y ago

throwaway1777 6y ago

Start an anonymous blog. I have one. Also an anonymous hacker news account. :)

Reelin 6y ago
The trouble with that is that once you post something to it you can never associate it with yourself (even accidentally!) or deanonymization of everything else posted by that identity will also occur. Half baked idea: A decentralized and properly anonymized (at the protocol level) service intended for long-form articles. Employ cryptographic primitives to allow association of a single article with one or more identities at any time after publication. (I suspect such a system would just end up getting abused, but who knows?)
- derrick_jensen 6y ago
  I'm about to release something very similar to this. You might see it here in a week or two
  - jborichevskiy 6y ago
    This sounds cool - I'll be keeping an eye out!
- hk__2 6y ago
  > Half baked idea: A decentralized and properly anonymized (at the protocol level) service intended for long-form articles. Employ cryptographic primitives to allow association of a single article with one or more identities at any time after publication. (I suspect such a system would just end up getting abused, but who knows?) The downside is that as a reader you wouldn’t be able to follow your favorite authors anymore.
- adrianN 6y ago
  That won't be safe for very long. De-anonymization based on writing style is pretty good already.
  - langitbiru 6y ago
    Maybe AI that changes the writing style to monotonous style would help. Say, you always write like Yoda speaks, "Great you are." Then the AI would change it to, "You are great." I know, I know, it's a tall order.
    - pferde 6y ago
      I suspect that resulting articles would be, while probably reasonably safe from style analysis, awfully boring and difficult to read. Good and interesting writing style is a skill.
    - stagas 6y ago
      You could pass it through a Google Translate, or maybe a couple, then back - correct for minor errors and style has changed (maybe not that much, but enough to scare AI).
    - WalterSear 6y ago
      Not necessarily that tall: you just need copies of a long enough text, written in different writing styles.
  - Reelin 6y ago
    That's definitely true, but depending on the usecase it might not matter all that much. Also, that problem already applies to an anonymous blog anyway! Consider the usage of semi-anonymous accounts on HN or Reddit or wherever. There's some risk of deanonymization depending on usage style and how determined the attacker is, but it's still quite different from openly publishing things in a manner that links back to you directly. The issue for me is that (for an anonymous blog) once I decide to publish something to it the article becomes permanently and publicly linked to all the others as well. This means that I can never change my mind in the future without simultaneously changing my mind about all the other content published there. It also means that if I ever slip up (say on a non-anonymous HN account) and reveal that I'm the author then I've inadvertently and publicly tied the entire blog to myself (not just that one article).
- jstanley 6y ago
  How would such a system be "abused"? What does abuse of a blogging platform even look like? People might write text that others don't want to read?
  - Reelin 6y ago
    I hadn't really thought it through honestly. I'm just assuming that if an anonymized publishing service with a low barrier to entry exists that people will find creative ways to misuse it. Semi-related Google Drive usage: (https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19907271 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=19907271) Consider all the issues that Reddit and HN have with spam and other sorts of abuse. Then again, BitTorrent and IPFS seem to work well enough. At a minimum, I suspect that issues will tend to crop up anywhere a search or other curation mechanism exists that can potentially be gamed in order to gain an audience.
- larsrc 6y ago
  "Hi! It looks like you're trying to solve complex social problems with technology. Would you like some help in your futile endeavour?"
  - Reelin 6y ago
    What complex social problem? All I see are a few technical problems regarding security, anonymity, and interrelations between nodes on a graph. There's also a closely related ease of use (ie UX) problem regarding the convenience (or rather lack thereof) of publishing things in a reasonably anonymous manner. All the social problems, such as the underlying reasons for wanting or needing anonymity in the first place, remain.
    - pferde 6y ago
      It is a social problem because even the strongest, most bullet-proof cryptography solution can't prevent people slipping up and making mistakes, which a motivated attacker can then use to de-anonymize and connect their various identities together. And people will slip up and make mistakes. A lot.
      - Reelin 6y ago
        I agree that the potential for making mistakes could contribute to a social problem, but it's one that already exists. I also wasn't proposing to solve it - hence my earlier response.
    - tonyarkles 6y ago
      “Authorship Attribution” is an active field of research. Even if you manage to solve the problem of anonymously publishing a bunch of content under distinct anonymous pseudonyms (or completely anonymously), there’s a non-negligible probability that, as soon as the author of one work is identified, the entire body of work can be attributed to that person.
- Rerarom 6y ago
  You can invent a separate identity with the goal of being deanonymized one day. And post what you want to keep anonymous using other identities.
narengowda16 6y ago
I did write a lot of articles anonymously back then(was afraid due to validation/criticism as I was learning) but later I found out that my blogs are legit and people liked them. And later couldn't associate with real me. Now making System design videos with real face and name and able to reach a subset of the audience. https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCn1XnDWhsLS5URXTi5wtFTA/ https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCn1XnDWhsLS5URXTi5wtFTA/

chipotle_coyote 6y ago

Anecdotal counterexample: I successfully moved from development into technical writing because I had a blog that a company got in touch with me about and said, "We really like your writing. Have you considered being a technical writer?" My honest feeling is that if you're a good writer and not just posting ranty flamebait -- and "strongly worded and highly opinionated" is not the same thing, although it can be -- blogging is valuable. Or at least it used to be. And really, I'd like to see it make more of a return, too.

afiori 6y ago
Sometimes I feel like I want to write something I have strong opinions about, then I realize how much research I would have to do to actually justify my unfounded opinions and give up. It requires work to avoid being flamebaity

kang 6y ago

Its better in a way. Stupidity rejects you and you end up being in a happy place where you dont have to bend your mind.

tunesmith 6y ago

It'd be nice if robots.txt were actually respected so that your blog was visible to people you trackback, or from blogs that link to you, but not to search engines.

larsrc 6y ago
I find most of my blog entries using search engines. And I suspect I'm not alone in this. Blocking search engines gives you a serious bootstrap problem.

larsrc 6y ago

https://xkcd.com/137/ https://xkcd.com/137/