Playstation 4 and your real name

[Akka]

Post slicing? Like you haven't done that...Also, please post such studies and documented examples since I am OBVIOUSLY (to borrow the caps lock button from you) too dumb to know better.

No, I don't do post slicing. I may separate a few (let's say, about up to three or four) main ideas, but I don't take every single sentence into a different quote, making the whole unreadable and without focus.

I am obviously stupid, please continue pointing that out in ANGRY CAPS nstead of making actual points.

I've already made actual points - online bullying is real and common, people have a right to be left alone and not have their personnal informations plastered online.
You just chose to ignore them, and play dumb by pretending you don't see how providing informations to potential harassers can be harmful.

You've Google at your fingertips, if you want to look for examples of people with life ruined (or at the very least serious psychological discomfort) because of being exposed and humiliated to the public at large, you can do it. If you refuse to do such a simple task, well it just confirm what I said.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

I am sorry I am too dumb to follow you...

 

[AlpsStranger]

Akka, please calm down. I really do appreciate you having my back on this issue but all you're going to do is get the thread locked and, ironically, provide an object example of the downsides of anonymity.

We get you are paranoid (not meaning that as an insult), now please explain how loss of anonymity has absolutely no potential upsides besides the fact that you personally won't stand for it? That's really all I am after, to get you to acknowledge this isn't black and white. However you are so (rightfully) concerned with this that your not even considering any possible upsides.

No offense, but you are bordering on 'taxes are theft' in your approach to the issue. The senseless, reflexive rigidity doesn't serve you well IMO.

No, it does have upsides. Go back and you'll see that I've conceded that it has upsides several times already. I said I don't feel like it has net upsides, but that's not the same as saying it doesn't have upsides.

But sure, it would certainly reduce certain types of crap comments and bad behavior. I certainly agree that it would. I too have had the distinct feeling of wishing I could call RacistTrashTalker#4512's mom and tell her what her son has been saying online.

My position is that anonymity loss definitely has upsides, but as I put it earlier, it's like burning a house down to get rid of roaches. It's an excessively brutal solution to a lesser issue.

Now, here's another possibility: Anonymity as a losable privilege. What if you did have an anonymous name, but if you were abusive then the victim could become entitled to your real identity. Is that not possibly a "best of both worlds" approach?

Please do discuss this one I highlighted guys. I really think something like this might be my favorite solution. You could, of course, abandon your anonymity voluntarily if you chose to do so.

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

How does losing anonymity make it easier for trolls to attack you, follow you around and harass you than it already is?

Because, if I do have anonymity/privacy, I can use different usernames on each site and nobody knows who I am unless I tell them? Whereas, if I use my real name, they can just look me up?

That's how my cyberstalker found me on half-a-dozen boards. Googling my name. This was from before I thought the privacy thing was a big issue.

 

[warpus]

In the end, like downtown said, the playstation is a luxury, not a basic need, so there's that.

However, consumers should have certain rights, and I think it's worthwhile to fight for those rights.. those very basic rights that we should have, no matter what the product is. Yeah, you can opt not to buy the playstation, or that stick of butter, or whatever, but that is a bit of a copout, IMO.

I'm not sure where I stand on this particular playstation 4/real name issue, as I don't know enough about the details.. but generally speaking, I think it's good that people are speaking up, starting a discussion, and generating awareness. Privacy is something important, even if the product or service in question is fully optional.

 

[AlpsStranger]

Because, if I do have anonymity/privacy, I can use different usernames on each site and nobody knows who I am unless I tell them? Whereas, if I use my real name, they can just look me up?

That's how my cyberstalker found me on half-a-dozen boards. Googling my name. This was from before I thought the privacy thing was a big issue.

The fairer sex, unsurprisingly, bears the brunt of the downsides of both anonymous and real name systems.

I recall during the whole "real name" debacle in World of Warcraft they looked up the place where one of the developer's children went to school to prove their point. I have a fairly unusual surname, but I know a guy who has a literally unique name-surname combination. There is only one of him in the entire world from what I can tell. We've searched exhaustively for another person with his name, but we've found nothing. He's very selective about showing it online, I can tell you that.

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

It's not even just the name thing. If somehow it slips that I'm female, sometimes the other players will treat me as less capable for the sole fact of the sex I am; not because, say, I'd been playing this game not very long and I have no use of my left eye at this point (it actually went about a week ago). No, of course it's because I'm female.

 

[AlpsStranger]

Wow, that sucks aimee

Is it permanent?

I remember this one woman from a Battlefield 2 server I used to frequent. She was an older hillbilly from God knows where. Sounded like somebody's aunt or something. Absolute monster whether she was sniping, tanking, assault rifle, w/e. She was certainly better than me, if I'm honest. I think she might have been a militia type

 

[Farm Boy]

Now, here's another possibility: Anonymity as a losable privilege. What if you did have an anonymous name, but if you were abusive then the victim could become entitled to your real identity. Is that not possibly a "best of both worlds" approach?

Not really I don't think. Stripping trash talking d-bags of privacy is no less problem riddled than than stripping it from anyone else. Plus, as a number of not anonymous services have already shown, it doesn't really stop people from being dbags anyways. It would just be a putative punishment to try and game, abuse, or stress out about. A better solution, and I'm going to shudder to say it, is SA's tenbux or Steam's approach to hacked games. Done something that breaches the terms of service? Account prohibitions/restrictions go in place.

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

No clue at this point. I've actually adapted pretty well. I have a video I just recorded two days ago, and the people I showed it to say they can't even tell.

 

[AlpsStranger]

A fair point as usual Farm Boy.

Man, this sort of stuff gets complicated. I can almost understand the appeal in the simplicity of nobody being anonymous. Still, anonymity is important to me so I try to preach it.

No clue at this point. I've actually adapted pretty well. I have a video I just recorded two days ago, and the people I showed it to say they can't even tell.

Don't answer if this is over the line, or PM if you're comfortable answering one person and not everyone, but what happened to your eye?

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

I spilled some sort of cleaning chemical in it when I knocked over the bottle, which I thought was closed. My glasses protected me from worse, but some of it got into my left eye.

 

[AlpsStranger]

Wow, that sucks. You've been to a doctor, right?

 

[aimeeandbeatles]

A couple times. I got some eye drops. They helped for a bit but then didn't help anymore.

(Also, I just looked in a mirror. My left eye doesn't look any different than the right one. I wasn't expecting that.)

 

[Akka]

I am sorry I am too dumb to follow you...

Just for the sake of the discussion, I'll do your own work for you (hoping it will at least useful for others, I don't expect anything from you).

Publishing your real informations online means that random people can get them. With the wealth of information that Internet has become, it also means that you can very easily, very quickly, get a LOT more personnal informations once you've grabbed a few critical ones (depending on the rarity of first/last name combination, it may be still rather hard to pinpoint the person and require a bit more informations, or it can be instantaneous). Basically, they can usually get your adress, phone number and Facebook pages.

To sum up, it means anyone can reach you, your home and your acquaintances.
Now think about what someone who has a grudge on you and can be rather certain of his impunity can do with this. I'm pretty sure it doesn't require a lot of imagination to get to some pretty creepy scenarios.

But well, for those who are too lazy to do such mental exercices, I'll just dig a few actual, real-life example that actually happened and have nothing to do with being "paranoid" or things like that. I took a few from each of three categories : a pretty minor (but illustrating the point), two rather serious and making life hard (which is far more than a reason enough to say it should not happen), and two downright criminal.


- The minor one : Blizzard attempted to do the same with their Battle.net accounts. There was a big uproar, of course. Among the discussion, I stumbled upon one interesting exchange. Guy A claimed that it wasn't a big deal and nothing would come from simply a name. Guy B asked "want me to prove it ?". Guy A posted his name and said "go for it". Then Guy B, after a bit of research, found who Guy A was and called him at his desk at work, and told him "See, found you".
Nothing more happened, but it opened the eyes of Guy A and he rescinded his support for the change.


- The first quite serious one : Still in the Blizzard and World of Warcraft world, I saw this on one of the forum of one of the biggest guild of the game, while looking for things completely unrelated.
Basically, one girl had a relationship with one guy from the guild, then a fall out (I don't remember what were the details, and they are pretty irrelevant ; the only thing is that the guy had her name, some pictures of her naked, and a grudge). So well, he wanted to take revenge, posted naked pictures of her in the thread, her number and her address.
Jerks found it fun to join in the bashing, and so it ended with the girl being :
- Constantly texted dirty message.
- Having pizza and the like delivered at her house in her name (which she didn't asked for of course).
- Her social page plastered with the pictures.
- Called at her landline all throughout the night until she cut off the phone.
The thread was closed a few hours later. I don't know how long the harassment happened, but even if it stopped right there, I still consider this rather traumatic.


- The second quite serious one : a rather well-known one too. A guy made a very disparaging and sexist comment about a woman. He was a dick, nobody deny it. The woman dealt a bit of poetic justice by publishing his name and his comment for everyone to see on the Net. Of course the guy was ridiculed, mocked and looked down upon.
But the thing is, as it became very well know, he ended up with a reputation completely destroyed, and people refusing to employ him. I'm not going to defend someone who was an idiot - but isn't the retribution quite disproportionate ? I don't think that making a comment, as disgusting as it was, warrant to have your entire career destroyed.


- And well, two rather well-publicized examples of other girls who just ended up DEAD because they were constantly bullied by people who posted their informations online. Amanda Todd and Rehtaeh Parsons. One girl who flashed her tits one day - too bad it was recorded, and you can imagine the mocking and bullying that ensued.
The other was raped when passed out at a party, with people taking picture of it. The crime has nothing to do with privacy, of course. The fact that once information is on the Net, it's nearly impossible to take it down, and that when something is linked to your name, it can follows you everywhere, is, though. These girls simply couldn't escape these events, even long after they happened.
Both commited suicide in the end.


Of course, I'm not saying displaying your name online will make you be raped or harassed. But it measn you give to people means to reach you, and once something is online, it's nearly impossible to take it out - meaning you can possibly not escape it. Also, it's to show just how much someone can ruin your life if he wants it enough and if he has your informations.
We have a right to privacy, we have a right to be left alone. Having anyone able to pinpoint you at will means that the only anonymity lost is the one of the receiving end - others can still grab your information without showing themselves, and can harass you without ever being in the spotlight.

 

[Akka]

Not really I don't think. Stripping trash talking d-bags of privacy is no less problem riddled than than stripping it from anyone else. Plus, as a number of not anonymous services have already shown, it doesn't really stop people from being dbags anyways. It would just be a putative punishment to try and game, abuse, or stress out about.

Not to add that if some poor random schmuck just happen to share the same name as the guy exposed to name and shame, he's likely to ends up as a collateral damage.

Exposing name for other to be able to do whatever they want with, is just mob rule. I thought we already, as society, determined that mob rule wasn't the kind of justice we wanted.

A better solution, and I'm going to shudder to say it, is SA's tenbux or Steam's approach to hacked games. Done something that breaches the terms of service? Account prohibitions/restrictions go in place.

Well, that's just violating another set of consumer rights. Less creepy but still not defensible.

 

[AlpsStranger]

Exposing name for other to be able to do whatever they want with, is just mob rule. I thought we already, as society, determined that mob rule wasn't the kind of justice we wanted.

I think direct policing would be a good name for this idea. I'm not saying that to be flippant or insult the people who are espousing it, but I do think that is basically implicit in the "accountability" part of the zero-anonymity argument. It's like direct democracy except it's applied to justice instead of politics. I also dislike it for almost the same reasons I dislike direct democracy.

And, honestly, if I'm not afraid of losing my job/wife or being harassed at work or having my kid beat up for what I said, then why would I be any nicer? You can't really espouse the upsides of zero-anonymity while skirting around the factor that creates the upsides. That factor is mob justice, plain and simple.

 

[BvBPL]

And, honestly, if I'm not afraid of losing my job/wife or being harassed at work or having my kid beat up for what I said, then why would I be any nicer?

I would say you would still want to be nicier, or at least more civil, because you want to protect your good name and save yourself from embrassment. Not every stick need be as fatal as losing your spouse and employment.

 

[AlpsStranger]

A fair point I suppose, but I still don't think real life "sticks" are necessarily appropriate retribution for anonymous-to-anonymous abuses.

Still, we'll just have to see what happens. Will 95% of people end up being comfortable using their real identities for everything in the digital world? I don't think so, but we'll have to see. Sony can only do what customers allow them to do at the end of the day.

 

[ace99]

I would definitely change how or what I post if it was connected to my real name. No doubt about it.