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Of course both anonymity and transparency are needed. The need for transparency is obvious in many scenarios. Anonymity is more contentious. Some people would l
by terio 15y ago
Of course both anonymity and transparency are needed. The need for transparency is obvious in many scenarios. Anonymity is more contentious. Some people would love to avoid it completely. For example, I just came back from Spain and I saw a debate, which was none after all, on TV about the need to identify everybody to prevent slander.
I firmly believe that anonymity is in many cases the only tool to express oneself, like when power asymmetries or divergence from social conventions make such an expression extremely expensive.
Anonymity is fundamental for democracy. If it was not, there would be no secret voting. Other examples in which anonymity is obviously required are when you need an honest opinion which could be affected by power asymmetry (rate your professor, give your employer some feedback, etc); when the subject matter requires privacy (sexual behavior poll); and so on.
Dealing with anonymity in the internet is not easy. The usual problems are slander, low quality content, trolls, spam, etc. [Shameless plug ahead] That is part of our mission at spottiness.com. We allow anonymous users to send messages that remain posted in our web site. We guarantee the quality of the content of the messages, and although there is no way to fend off slander from the beginning, the site offers tools to fight back.
- Silhouette 15y agoI think several of your anti-anonymity examples are flawed. For example, if voting in elections were truly anonymous, anyone could vote many times over. In practice, they know very well who has voted, as they must to make sure the election is properly conducted. What they can't do is associate how someone voted with that person. (Except that actually they often can, because in many electoral systems the ballot papers are numbered and they can in theory figure out who got which paper. You are protected in this case only by the separation of the electoral register-ballot paper index from the ballot paper-vote cast connection, making it another excellent example of how sharing limited data with independent parties can be fine but combining that data in the hands of a single party can have unintended consequences.)
- terio 15y agoIf you are part of a big enough group, and your ballot is not traceable to you, your vote is essentially anonymous even when the authority can determine for sure that you voted. I agree that voting may be flawed in cases. Electronic voting is particularly vulnerable.
- bugsy 15y agoIndelible ink is used worldwide to prevent double voting, while preserving the right to vote and anonymity of voters. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Election_ink http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Election_ink