Post 292469 by jannamark@octodon.social
(DIR) More posts by jannamark@octodon.social
(DIR) Post #184290 by tauli@chaos.social
2018-09-25T07:20:37Z
6 likes, 9 repeats
Unless you have a very good reason not to, or are publicly known anyway, there is really no need for you to use your real name or photo online.Back in the 90s when i first discovered the internet, this was common knowledge. Nobody used their real name on forums or share personal information without considering the consequences. Those few who did were promptly told that's a bad idea.It seems somehow we unlearned this, right when corporations started monetizing that information.
(DIR) Post #184293 by gayhobbes@mastodon.social
2018-09-25T14:38:05Z
1 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli hard cosign, although I think one of the reasons we didn't share our real identities back then was this pervasive fear that we'd be stalked and killed for doing so, which it turns out wasn't really a threat, but in general I don't share the real me online because I don't want my opinions to impact my employment
(DIR) Post #185008 by phoe@functional.cafe
2018-09-25T15:37:16Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli It's a little bit different when you're a free software developer and your identity is a part of your personal brand and the general web of trust. Sure, you can grow to learn and even trust a software developer who is anonymous and uses a handle like xyzzy <xy22y@xy22y.hax0r.net>, but there's a noticeable difference between this and someone who puts their full name on display, like Linus Torvalds <torvalds@transmeta.com>.
(DIR) Post #185085 by lordbowlich@mastodon.social
2018-09-25T15:45:30Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli I blame FB pushing users to equate "social media" online with "socializing with people you know offline." My online network really shrunk over that time as I went from regularly chatting with strangers in Europe, Asia and Latin America to only my local physical communities.The pseudonymous era really encouraged a much more diverse mixing of the political, social, and global spectrum. People who otherwise wouldn't have been inclined to interact IRL.
(DIR) Post #185266 by sajith@mastodon.social
2018-09-25T14:03:37Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli @checkervest This would be good advice for most people.But... I wouldn't give up the friends I made in the Internet and then met in real life. Many of them are very precious to me. Those friendships wouldn't have been possible without revealing things about myself. Cost of doing business, I guess.Some paranoia is essential and necessary for survival, but the need to find ways to co-operate, the need to find our "tribe" -- I believe these are also central to our existence.
(DIR) Post #185267 by checkervest@octodon.social
2018-09-25T14:12:24Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@sajith @tauli there are definitely some great internet friends that I've met and kept up with in real life, but all those friends were people I met through sites like this that weren't attached to public real-name associated profiles. They were people I got to know over a long period of time, who were vouched for by other people or who proved trustworthy with small things. And each time was a gamble, with the potential risks carefully weighed and considered against potential benefits.
(DIR) Post #185268 by sajith@mastodon.social
2018-09-25T15:54:31Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@checkervest @tauli It must be also that I grew up in a "communal" eastern culture and not an "individualistic" western culture where expectations of social interactions are different.(I think I came across that distinction in Robert Sapolsky's book, "Behave: The Biology of Humans at Our Best and Worst". Great book, by the way.)My culture is pretty bad with personal boundaries, but I guess that is the price you pay for stronger bonds. I haven't been able to make as many friends in US. :-)
(DIR) Post #185791 by StevenDBT@writing.exchange
2018-09-25T16:27:03Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli Too late for me. But it was a conscious decision.
(DIR) Post #186062 by roka@pl.smuglo.li
2018-09-25T16:39:51.927032Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli it's the eternal 2007/09
(DIR) Post #186832 by valhalla@mastodon.social
2018-09-25T17:22:16Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@sajith @tauli @checkervest I also started being on the internet at a time when so-called-real names were frowned upon, and met a number of people in person.Even in the cases where I know the name that the state knows them under, I usually call them with the nickname they choose themselves, and in some cases I tend to be slightely perplexed when I hear people calling them with their other name.
(DIR) Post #186843 by rainy@chitter.xyz
2018-09-25T17:23:19Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauliIt's actually illegal in some countries but I still do it cuz I'm a naughty boy :3
(DIR) Post #188087 by sajith@mastodon.social
2018-09-25T18:34:31Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@valhalla @tauli @checkervest That is interesting, because it worked the other way around for me! When real-life friends signed up on various internet communities with various adopted nicknames, that was pretty amusing to me. But that could be also because I was too lazy to think of a nickname for myself. :-) (And that was before Facebook etc, just to be clear.)
(DIR) Post #189147 by telent@mastodon.social
2018-09-25T19:35:29Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli your experience of 90s internet, maybe. Mine was Usenet (real names and often employment info too) and then Wiki (the c2 wiki not wikipedia which came later) which actively encouraged real names in the belief it led to better behaviour. And anyone with a domain name had their IRL address in whois
(DIR) Post #189316 by KitRedgrave@glitch.social
2018-09-25T19:46:44Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli more people got on the internet and ended up right on Facebook, that demands that you put a legal name up there
(DIR) Post #189404 by FimbulFlower@niu.moe
2018-09-25T19:50:59Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli yeah what the fuck. I'm not trying to get hired online so nobody needs to know me that well.
(DIR) Post #189730 by zorinlynx@mastodon.social
2018-09-25T20:11:44Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli I blame Facebook. They were the first major social media site that required you use your real name.Before them, pretty much everyone used pseudonyms or handles. Some people would freely give their name, but it was considered optional.Livejournal was one of the bigger pre-FB communities and you were just a username that could be anything.
(DIR) Post #190542 by keiyakins@elekk.xyz
2018-09-25T20:56:09Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli Of course I've been using this handle so long that it *is* my real name, in the sense of being what I call myself. And will probably change my legal name to. Whoops.
(DIR) Post #192091 by wakingrufus@mastodon.social
2018-09-25T22:22:25Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauliI think this was a deliberate change engineered by the purveyors of surveillance capitalism such as Google, Facebook, and 3-letter agencies. The flip from pseudonyms to real names happened when Facebook and Google+ pushed it.
(DIR) Post #194547 by stuart_otterson@meow.social
2018-09-26T01:06:12Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli Replies have pointed to Facebook as the driving force and whilst true, they aren't solely responsible. We have to acknowledge it's what a lot of the population want to do.I think it's a curious case as there are people who believe we should only ever use legal names. I don't agree but I can understand why they might come to the conclusion. Anonymity has its own downfalls, but we have to strike a balance between the extremes.
(DIR) Post #196880 by astheroth@niu.moe
2018-09-26T04:27:44Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli Just disconnect from Internet. If people wish to do, just let them. I prefer to do it on floss networks than privative ones.
(DIR) Post #198844 by NfNitLoop@mastodon.social
2018-09-26T08:11:37Z
0 likes, 1 repeats
@tauli OTOH, I started just using my real name online to remind me that it’s often easy to map online identities back to real IDs. Especially on social networks where you interact with RL friends and family, who may also share personal details/names.I’d rather just consciously post things publicly than later worry about things I thought I said anonymously being uncovered.(I do realize I am in a privileged position that lets me not worry about doxxers/stalkers/etc.)
(DIR) Post #198962 by tauli@chaos.social
2018-09-26T08:24:04Z
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@NfNitLoop good point. don't think that i would adopt that for myself, but that's certainly an interesting way of thinking about it.
(DIR) Post #198994 by tauli@chaos.social
2018-09-26T08:27:35Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
From some of the replies i've gotten, it seems that some think i want to tell people how they should present themselves online. This was never my intention.It just worries me, that some social media sites (most notably facebook) seem to have been successful in normalizing everyone just using RL names and photos. This has been done not for the benefit of the community, but to make their business model possible.
(DIR) Post #207476 by Joachim_Rees@mastodon.technology
2018-09-26T14:04:06Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli I chose to use a real looking name and picture for my account on purpose, as it's somehow linked to another community with the same info. I have the idea the people will more easily recognize me this way. But I agree, we do have a choice, and there's no force to use real info. Using a pseudonym is a good default!Thanks for reminding/bringing this to attention!
(DIR) Post #209370 by wink@chaos.social
2018-09-26T14:49:16Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli Maybe my perception is skewed for using most things resembling online social networks since the 90s, but ...Usenet and lots of MLs (at least in Germany) was using real names and you were sometimes kicked off for using pseudonyms (sure, you could be John Doe)Forums and everything before FB (~00-07) was mostly non-real names.Twitter/IG/... is half and half.My point: real names online are not new, but maybe FB is so big you think it made it the norm?
(DIR) Post #210571 by tauli@chaos.social
2018-09-26T15:16:10Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@wink From what i remember, real names were the norm on everything that used email. esp. work or university related. But online forums, irc, instant messengers was all pseudonyms. Of course, experiences differ from person to person and from (real/virtual) place to place.
(DIR) Post #292469 by jannamark@octodon.social
2018-09-29T23:38:42Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli Since the trolls already know who I am, I see no reason that decent people can't also know
(DIR) Post #1789569 by mu@mudl.us
2018-12-07T02:18:26Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli @HerraBRE This captures exactly what I've been trying to put my finger on for like 10 years. I think it was Facebook that unlearned us. Seemed like such a good idea at the time, I don't think I ever used my real name for shit before Facebook. I trusted Facebook to be semi-private, just school friends, how naive.
(DIR) Post #9g77VWn8jXCAVemnlw by wicche@radical.town
2019-02-23T03:27:49Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli I feel this very hard. As a 31 year old who started internetting at 13, I post plenty of face photos and identifying info... but only locked to relatively trusted viewers. The thought of just throwing all my non-pseudonymous stuff out there is beyond me. I do have an "offline me" account in a couple places for professional purposes but there's no way I'm posting selfies here.
(DIR) Post #9g79vhjWsHjxslhtKq by jannamark@octodon.social
2019-02-23T03:52:53Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli wow, this is some heavy duty damned if we do, damned if we don't. If the trolls and the gamergaters find us, it's our fault. If we can't be found and lose part of our livelihood, its our fault. Also, as we know, the trolls already know where we are. Good to know.
(DIR) Post #9g7iS1gbcfQ5TOvJ9k by tauli@chaos.social
2019-02-23T10:21:47Z
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@jannamark Never meant to imply that victims were to blame for what is happening to them or deny anyone their livelihood. I'm talking about the billions of people unthinkingly sharing intimate details of their lives with big corporations and subsequently everyone, just so that those corporations are able to make more profit by better targeting ads.On a large scale, normalizing what companies like Facebook and Alphabet do, hurts those who value their privacy.
(DIR) Post #9gEdAlrwKXhrlF1s9o by lyliawisteria@octodon.social
2019-02-26T18:25:36Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli facebook broke netiquette the moment it came into public existence, in all of the ways you're describing.
(DIR) Post #9gEgflGYvBwIjN0zmS by hashRaygoza@mastodon.art
2019-02-26T19:04:49Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli I blame facebook and the whole "influencer" thing for that
(DIR) Post #9gEma2EzUqyNMdvtdA by dictvm@mastodon.social
2018-09-25T12:41:00Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli in my experience it was just easier to be who you want to be on Internet or to show affiliation with something that's personally important you by having a certain handle and a fitting avatar next to it. Back then it didn't have much to do with security, except of course for minorities, but those communities (like e.g. Fetlife) still mostly exist with anonymous handles.
(DIR) Post #9gEma2ck4XyIYJ2reS by dictvm@mastodon.social
2018-09-25T12:44:37Z
0 likes, 0 repeats
@tauli there also was no such thing as swatting in the 90s and early 2000s. That just wasn't a risk anyone ever expected to exist. Your biggest fear back then was being scammed, being stood up when meeting in "real life" or while dating.
(DIR) Post #9gEma3Am21C4Fqy2hE by djsumdog@hitchhiker.social
2019-02-26T20:10:56Z
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@dictvm @tauli I mean, that's still not significant real risk. How many people have actually been swatted? I'm pretty sure it's <100 out of a nation of >300million. The one famous case current has the people who did it facing criminal chargers, and I hope they end up going away for at least 15~25 years. It still sucks someone lost their life, but I don't think it's a realistic viable fear or risk for most people.