Re: Re: Re^x: No Anonymous Reply Option

Very few things are an unmixed blessing. Anonymous Monk is not without its drawbacks. There are the occasional cowardly swipes made by registered users switching to anonymity for the purpose of making the swipe. There are the occasional swipes made by visitors who have never registered (I can't say that with total certainty, of course, but I feel quite sure of it). There are also lots of good nodes written by anonymous users (many of whom have never registered) and lots of good users who wouldn't have joined if we had tried to force them to register from the beginning.

i do applaud you for your plans not to use Anonymous

I've written several nodes anonymously. A couple because I was discussing sensitive material that I didn't want tracked back to me (I'm not registered as anything like 'wizard toto' so writing something under my usual login connects it with me personally, not just within the "walls" of PerlMonks).

Some were quite critical of my employer or former employer. Even posting anonymously, I didn't feel it appropriate to name the employer and I never mention who I work for when on-line (I've seen too many people get into trouble as a result of such). But I didn't want my employer to one day get curious about what I'm doing on-line and find a node with my name on it being critical of them (even though I don't name them). Employers can be total jerks in such situations.

I started writing this node using my usual login and then realized that I didn't even want to admit to having been critical of my employer using that name. So you get another anonymous reply.

No, I don't want to register a different name to put all of my "not quite so closely associated with me" nodes. For one thing, that would make it easier to figure out that that batch of nodes was written by me (more evidence to correlate). I don't want to work that hard, either. And I don't want to "waste" a username. And I'd feel deceptive hiding behind a different name (and yet it'd help defeat the purpose to even note that the other name was an alias).

I've also written anonymous nodes just to be funny (there are lots of reasons that one joke or another might be funnier anonymously rather than "from me"). I've also written anonymous nodes expressing a personal opinion that I didn't wish to make "public" except anonymously.

And I think I did make one anonymous swipe. I wish I hadn't, but I'm glad I haven't done that often or recently.

So, obviously, I'm not one more to add to your list. I'd certainly like to see fewer people willing to use AnonyMonk to make immature swipes (but I don't see this problem as being a big deal, at least not yet). I'd also like to see fewer registered users making immature swipes. :)

And I'm glad we have AnonyMonk, despite the warts. It is still very much a net win on my tally sheet.

Respectfully,
me

Comment on Re: Re: Re^x: No Anonymous Reply Option

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Re: Re: Re: Re^x: No Anonymous Reply Option by zengargoyle (Deacon) on Nov 27, 2003 at 09:44 UTC
very good, you've covered about everything. when you posted that critical post, what would have happened if minutes later you realized you let something slip that you really shouldn't have. like way too many people might get the Mr. BigWig reference or there's a paragraph that you missed during proofreading that identifies you to the people you were critical of. if you had created a user (even throwaway) you could fix, and in the time it takes to get the password email you might have lightened it up a bit. count to 10 before posting. what if after the first reply to your post another Anonymous had started to twist and contort what you had said to make it look even worse (or had started profusely appologizing for what you had said)? if it's CYA it should be done well. i do tend to think worst case sometimes (makes whatever happens milder)... if you were here for the first time again, knowing very little about Perl, how could you trust what Anonymous was telling you (even if it was correct) if two posts down Anonymous is being a trollish jerk? the inexperienced newbie isn't helped by wisdom from Anonymous. what happens when the next blogfordollars spamming script comes out and has perlmonks in it's list because you can post here with no preparation? but i hadn't thought of the funny parts, or Meditations and Poetry and such. i'm sure nothing bad will make ever make it to the front page, but i wonder if someday there will be too much of the bad for the monks who keep the monestary safe to handle. this possibly irrational fear of the DOS aspects that anonymous allows is probably what has kept me in this thread with my whining because i think it's a very important aspect to consider. that's what i've seen in the past, abuse has to be cleaned up by somebody, there are rarely enough somebodys to keep up with the abuse, something that nobody wanted to do has to be done because there's no other way to keep things working. my final evil plan would go something like: new sessions get Anon . $UNIQ if they take the cookie (permanent or not) it stays theirs for as long as they can keep track of it and use it (see cleanup below) if while they have the cookie they give email then it's just like a current account, get password/homenode but homenode can't be linked except by node_id (may change Anon name later) if they're here this far they'll have the option of changing their name sometime in the future, but only once (no links to AnonXXX but links to Name). they would probably change their name when they gave email, but could keep AnonXXX name if they liked. Anon users get cleaned up, no post for 6mo, year, whatever, posts get moved to Anonymous. this may or may not be needed. a little rough here and there, but casual browsers notice that they're Anon43851, if they come back and they kept cookie they notice they're still same. they can edit their posts (good thing or bad thing), if one proves trollish they can be chastized or ignored or whatever. i do realize that alot of monks like the use of Anonymous, but using it is i think giving up something they don't think about at the time (yes, another presumption). they're giving up something like parentage. they can't protect the virtue and integrity of what they've posted because they abandoned it to the owner Anonymous instead of just another anonymous. but i have thought about this too much for now, it's making my brain hurt. actully now that i've been to the store and back there might already be in place some sort of cookie mechanism to allow Anonymous to edit their posts, i'm just assuming that Anonymous can't edit their posts once posted. that might even be a good feature to add if it isn't there.	[reply]

Replies are listed 'Best First'.

Re: Re: Re: Re^x: No Anonymous Reply Option
by zengargoyle (Deacon) on Nov 27, 2003 at 09:44 UTC

very good, you've covered about everything. when you posted that critical post, what would have happened if minutes later you realized you let something slip that you really shouldn't have. like way too many people might get the Mr. BigWig reference or there's a paragraph that you missed during proofreading that identifies you to the people you were critical of.

if you had created a user (even throwaway) you could fix, and in the time it takes to get the password email you might have lightened it up a bit. count to 10 before posting.

what if after the first reply to your post another Anonymous had started to twist and contort what you had said to make it look even worse (or had started profusely appologizing for what you had said)?

if it's CYA it should be done well.

i do tend to think worst case sometimes (makes whatever happens milder)...

if you were here for the first time again, knowing very little about Perl, how could you trust what Anonymous was telling you (even if it was correct) if two posts down Anonymous is being a trollish jerk? the inexperienced newbie isn't helped by wisdom from Anonymous.

what happens when the next blogfordollars spamming script comes out and has perlmonks in it's list because you can post here with no preparation?

but i hadn't thought of the funny parts, or Meditations and Poetry and such.

i'm sure nothing bad will make ever make it to the front page, but i wonder if someday there will be too much of the bad for the monks who keep the monestary safe to handle.

this possibly irrational fear of the DOS aspects that anonymous allows is probably what has kept me in this thread with my whining because i think it's a very important aspect to consider.

that's what i've seen in the past, abuse has to be cleaned up by somebody, there are rarely enough somebodys to keep up with the abuse, something that nobody wanted to do has to be done because there's no other way to keep things working.

my final evil plan would go something like:

new sessions get Anon . $UNIQ
if they take the cookie (permanent or not) it stays theirs for as long as they can keep track of it and use it (see cleanup below)
if while they have the cookie they give email then it's just like a current account, get password/homenode but homenode can't be linked except by node_id (may change Anon name later)
if they're here this far they'll have the option of changing their name sometime in the future, but only once (no links to AnonXXX but links to Name). they would probably change their name when they gave email, but could keep AnonXXX name if they liked.
Anon users get cleaned up, no post for 6mo, year, whatever, posts get moved to Anonymous. this may or may not be needed.

a little rough here and there, but casual browsers notice that they're Anon43851, if they come back and they kept cookie they notice they're still same. they can edit their posts (good thing or bad thing), if one proves trollish they can be chastized or ignored or whatever.

i do realize that alot of monks like the use of Anonymous, but using it is i think giving up something they don't think about at the time (yes, another presumption). they're giving up something like parentage. they can't protect the virtue and integrity of what they've posted because they abandoned it to the owner Anonymous instead of just another anonymous.

but i have thought about this too much for now, it's making my brain hurt.

actully now that i've been to the store and back there might already be in place some sort of cookie mechanism to allow Anonymous to edit their posts, i'm just assuming that Anonymous can't edit their posts once posted. that might even be a good feature to add if it isn't there.

[reply]