2 ms·

You fail to see the importance of anonymity because you're set on proving that anonymity is of little use or harmful. A historical comparison is irrelevant and

by wnight 14y ago

You fail to see the importance of anonymity because you're set on proving that anonymity is of little use or harmful. A historical comparison is irrelevant and fallacious - we didn't have modern surgery hundreds of years ago and despite people dying society ticked on. If all you see is the forest you can pretend the pain of the trees doesn't matter. And the internet is just a playground for the technological elite too (you need a computing device after all) so I suppose you see no need for it either.

rayiner 14y ago
> And the internet is just a playground for the technological elite too The internet is not a playground for the technological elite, not any more. It's a place where my mother in law trades baby pictures with my mother. As internet use becomes ubiquitous in the real world, and the boundaries between "meat space" and internet space evaporate, the anarcho-idealism of the technological elite that got onto the internet early is evaporating too. This is to an extent lamentable, but you can't expect the "wild west" to continue to exist after the land stops being the frontier. That isn't to say that anonymity isn't important, it is, but it's just one concern to be balanced against many.
- AnthonyMouse 14y ago
  >This is to an extent lamentable, but you can't expect the "wild west" to continue to exist after the land stops being the frontier. The internet has never been the wild west. Twenty years ago it was a bunch of middle class scientists and mathematicians discussing philosophy and writing code. It's about as far away from any kind of real danger as you can possibly imagine. The result of the "wild west" metaphor is to imply that we need to have some cowboys come in with blankets and other "gifts" for all those wild Indians who once occupied it so that they can hurry up and die out and make room for Walmart and Cable TV and upstanding members of the Chamber of Commerce. But the internet isn't a dangerous place. It isn't even a place. It's just a thing that lets computers and users all over the world communicate with one another. About the worst thing that the average person is even capable of doing with it is to lie to someone else or infringe copyright, or maybe (if we're the sort of people with an interest in keeping our comrades compliant members of The Party) they could distribute or gain access to some "subversive propaganda" from the likes of Jane Fonda or Adam Smith or whoever we don't like this year in this part of the world. The internet isn't the dangerous thing, it's the rest of the world -- the dangerous thing is an internet without anonymity. Because if people know who you are then saying the wrong thing or reading the wrong thing can get you killed (or fired or harassed or wrongfully imprisoned). And all not knowing who said something really does is the same thing as the First Amendment: It requires you to respond to speech with speech instead of with punishment.

by wnight 14y ago

rayiner 14y ago

> And the internet is just a playground for the technological elite too The internet is not a playground for the technological elite, not any more. It's a place where my mother in law trades baby pictures with my mother. As internet use becomes ubiquitous in the real world, and the boundaries between "meat space" and internet space evaporate, the anarcho-idealism of the technological elite that got onto the internet early is evaporating too. This is to an extent lamentable, but you can't expect the "wild west" to continue to exist after the land stops being the frontier. That isn't to say that anonymity isn't important, it is, but it's just one concern to be balanced against many.

AnthonyMouse 14y ago
>This is to an extent lamentable, but you can't expect the "wild west" to continue to exist after the land stops being the frontier. The internet has never been the wild west. Twenty years ago it was a bunch of middle class scientists and mathematicians discussing philosophy and writing code. It's about as far away from any kind of real danger as you can possibly imagine. The result of the "wild west" metaphor is to imply that we need to have some cowboys come in with blankets and other "gifts" for all those wild Indians who once occupied it so that they can hurry up and die out and make room for Walmart and Cable TV and upstanding members of the Chamber of Commerce. But the internet isn't a dangerous place. It isn't even a place. It's just a thing that lets computers and users all over the world communicate with one another. About the worst thing that the average person is even capable of doing with it is to lie to someone else or infringe copyright, or maybe (if we're the sort of people with an interest in keeping our comrades compliant members of The Party) they could distribute or gain access to some "subversive propaganda" from the likes of Jane Fonda or Adam Smith or whoever we don't like this year in this part of the world. The internet isn't the dangerous thing, it's the rest of the world -- the dangerous thing is an internet without anonymity. Because if people know who you are then saying the wrong thing or reading the wrong thing can get you killed (or fired or harassed or wrongfully imprisoned). And all not knowing who said something really does is the same thing as the First Amendment: It requires you to respond to speech with speech instead of with punishment.