Toughen up – we need online anonymity
In this guest post, Craig Thomler argues that if the opponents of online anonymity got their way, we’d lose more as an industry and society than we’d gain.
Anthony Freedman wrote a piece for the Sydney Morning Herald on 9 September,“Bloggers must choose to be either constructive or cowardly“. In it Freedman claimed that anyone who chose to blog or comment anonymously was a coward. If you were an ethical adult who wished to be constructive you’d always put your name to your post. He isn’t the first to say this.
Media commentators have called anonymous commenters ‘vindictive’, ‘irresponsible’, ‘unethical’ and worse. There’s been regular assaults on online anonymity from the media, politicians and other sources over the last few years.
For example, on 27 September last year, James Massola, working for News Ltd, ‘unmasked’ Greg Jericho as being the ‘high-profile’ political blogger behind Grog’s Gamut, using his nickname ‘Grog’ as his online non de plume.
Greg, then a Commonwealth public servant, was outed by Massola after one of his blog posts was referred to by ABC CEO Mark Scott in comments to the ABC’s executive. The post criticised the quality of media coverage during the 2010 election.
Greg was supported by his employer and many media commentators and bloggers. At the time I tracked over 110 articles and blog posts discussing the outing over three weeks. Ironically, only 14% of blogs posted anonymously – compared to 13% of newsmedia articles. News Ltd itself published 16 articles justifying their decision – an interesting approach to filling column inches.
What was the impact of News Ltd’s expose?
Greg was offered a book contract and recently left the public service to write for ABC’s The Drum and to work as a researcher and script-writer on The Chaser’s new TV program. Sucks to be him.
Politicians in Australia have also sought to limit anonymous commentary, notably the former South Australian Attorney-General, Michael Atkinson, who snuck an Electoral Act amendment through South Australia’s parliament in January 2010. This required anyone posting a political comment from South Australia online during their March 2010 election campaign to be forced to also publish their full name and postcode.
The amendment required media organisations to store commenters’ real name and full address for six months. They were eligible for fines of up to $5000 if they didn’t provide this information to the SA Electoral Commissioner.
As the scope was poorly defined, the amendment potentially affected all comments on Facebook, Twitter, myspace and other online social networks, blogs, forums and news sites – whether they were hosted in South Australia and regardless of where they were domiciled – despite the challenges of fining organisations with no Australian presence.
South Australian media organisations venomously opposed the amendment, which they saw as an assault on freedom of speech and practically impossible to implement or enforce. Adelaide’s The Advertiser’s editor, Melvin Mansell called it censorship.
Atkinson said the amendment was necessary because the Liberal Party had created a fake account to criticise him online, “I’ll give you an example; repeatedly in the AdelaideNow website one will see commentary from Aaron Fornarino of West Croydon. That person doesn’t exist.”
Unfortunately for Atkinson, Aaron Fornarino was a real person, using his real name to comment. He was revealed to be living a few hundred metres from Atkinson’s office.
Due to a massive online backlash supported by local media, Atkinson was forced to back down quickly and state that the amendment would not be enforced. Following the election he stood down as Attorney-General, claiming personal reasons. He was the only person affected by his amendment.
So why have there been these regular attacks on online anonymity from the media, politicians and advertising industry executives?
It appears to be very personal, representing concerns over negative comments made publicly without attribution about an individual or media organisation. I’ve not seen any claims based on a broader public interest or desire to ‘clean up the digital streets’.
While I admit it can be confronting to see offensive comments about oneself online (and I’ve had them made about me as well), I hardly feel this is a reason to limit public discussion and end the western tradition of anonymity.
Anonymity has a long and illustrious history in the media and politics as a tool to allow passionate discussion without public retribution.
The earliest newspapers adopted anonymity through the technique of publishing articles under the masthead of the paper, rather than use an author’s byline – an approach still used today.
Newspapers and television regularly obscure the names, details and images of anonymous sources to protect them from potential prosecution. Journalists are willing to go to jail to avoid revealing the identities of their sources.
In politics, following the tradition of anonymous letters in Britain, such as the Letters of Junius, commentators in the U.S. used pseudonyms such as ‘Cato’ and ‘Brutus’ to publish their strong opposition to the ratification of their proposed Constitution in 1787.
In response supporters of the US Constitution released the Federalist Papers, 85 anonymous letters published under the pseudonym ‘Publius’.
Today many legitimate reasons remain for people to choose to write under a pseudonym or remain totally anonymous. These are not ‘cowardly’ or ‘unethical’ people, as some would suggest.
People in witness protection, those harassed by corrupt authorities, in prison, who fear an ex-partner or are otherwise in a vulnerable position may feel the need to conceal their legal name online.
Whistleblowers may conceal their identities to protect themselves from physical, legal or financial threats. Those aged under 18 may be advised by their parents to conceal their real names online, hoping to protect them from online predators.
Members of political parties, companies, sports team or media outlets may feel a need to make a strong statement about the organisation they support, however wish not to be branded or attacked by others who take a critique the wrong way.
I believe that if Freedman and the other opponents of online anonymity got their way, we’d lose much more as a society than we’d gain.
Wikipedia, with over 25 million pages, relies on anonymous users to contribute its content. Without anonymity it, and many other services, may not have succeeded.
Even if websites or governments required people to use their legal name online (as some services like Facebook and Google Plus are striving to do), it could be extremely costly and difficult to verify that someone is who they say they are. Trading ‘Anonymous’ for ‘Joe Blow’ or ‘Julia Gillard’ doesn’t help identify a person and the effort and expense to verify every individual’s online name matches their legal name and prevent identity theft may prove to be too expensive or technically impossible.
Even China, with its censorship Great Firewall, has been unable to stamp out anonymity. Their 485 million online citizens are able to comment relatively anonymously on blogs and forums. When the Chinese government last suggested the introduction of a real-name system they faced an overwhelming online protest from citizens and backed down.
Instead, following a ‘honey’ approach, China’s government has begun trialling verification of online gamer identities in order to “protect minors from addiction”. Gamers found to be using fake ID will receive less experience points for their characters when playing online.
Legal names are nebulous things anyway. People frequently use nicknames in most communications, only resorting to legal names on bank accounts or legal documents – and not even then. Ask yourself how many people you know who are known by one name but have a different legal name and you may be surprised at the answer.
So, assaults on online anonymity seem to be mainly from those who built their power or wealth through the use of old media who are struggling to come to terms with our new media landscape.
Their concerns are often personal and have never provided a clear public interest reason for restricting anonymous debate.
Certainly people take advantage of anonymity to say things which step beyond the bounds of polite society. However there are other ways to manage the outright abusive and offensive comments while preserving the strong, but publishable views, from moderation to court-ordered IP tracking.
I feel anonymity is a requirement for democracy, a necessary component of a free media. Sure it’s not always pretty. But we’ll just have to toughen up and live with it.
Craig Thomler is a blogger, government 2.0 and social media advocate. He works in Canberra
Sure anonymity is required for democracy in certain situations… But certainly not when it comes to critiquing of work, opinions or people.
If you have an opinion on work or people, then you should put your opinion behind your name otherwise you’re just a coward. That’s how society works.
IMHO, in our industry, the anonymous criticism of work does nothing to make the work better most of the time and serves only to line the pockets of the blog operators that allow it as people line up to take anonymous punches. It’s not productive and is quite often destructive.
Where else in the world do you see it?
I don’t think we should conflate the issues of anonymity for democracy’s sake and anonymity when it comes to criticism… They are two different animals.
cheers
Andrew Knott
User ID not verified.
Interesting read but perhaps not that relevant to the railing against anonymous commenting on this site.
Perhaps a more close to home reason why it happens here: most companies have a policy that employees can not make any comment publicly that can be traced back to their company name. If I feel an ad campaign is shit or an opinion piece is misguided I can’t comment on behalf of (by proxy) my employer, so I have to do it anonymously.
User ID not verified.
For most websites, the problem with the anonymous comments is that they are just a torrent of negativity and not really worth reading.
User ID not verified.
Reasons for online anonymity –
whistelblowers – check
people in witness protection – check
people being harassed by corrupt authorities – check
gutless people slagging off someones work on this site – I don’t think so. Man up, if you want to comment about someone or their work , have the balls to put your name to it.
User ID not verified.
While it’s true that there are certain situations where anonymity is needed by those posting comments online, 99% of the time it’s not. The reason why there is so much hate in public debate these days is because people can say whatever they want with virtually no repercussions. If people had no choice but to reveal their true identity every time they posted online then their language would be more measured and considered – perhaps even constructive.
But since their is no practical way to stop people from posting comments anonymously on websites it’s pointless even trying.
It should also be pointed out that Goggle, who started this whole debate, aren’t necessarily championing free-speech but are instead thinking of the profit to be gained from knowing more about our online activities.
User ID not verified.
I have a hard and fast rule when posting, if it’s something I wouldn’t say to someone’s face in the rule world, then I wouldn’t post it anonymously (sp?). So if I am critiquing someone’s work or opinion, I make it constructive (in my opinion at least) as I would address them in person, so I have no problems if I was forced to not do this anonymously.
I feel most on here are the same other than some who do it humoroulsy and a small percentage who are just hating tossers that crap on anything.
User ID not verified.
I think that Craig Thomler is missing the point. The anonymous commentary issue is about the content not so much the anonymity as a blanket. If an anonymous blog post is up and it is complimentary to a campaign or about someone there is no fuss or concern at all. If it is factual and legal then there is no issue.
The issue is that the anonymity also allows people to be more vile than they might ordinarily.
I agree there are times when anonymity is valuable but its a far stretch to compare to democratic issues when we’re really only dealing with nasty, bitchiness for no purpose. Subjectivity about what we think of someone’s work or of a person should be considered freedom of speech – where the line is drawn is where it slips into abuse which is what we’re talking about here.
Unfortunately anonymity allows the abuse to escalate which leads many to believe that’s the problem, when it is only part of the problem. This abuse happens in the office every day too actually. It is the employer and the publications that need to take responsibility and edit out abuse, allowing free expression of opinions but in a respectful manner.
I’ve got to say that anyone that can’t see the difference between freedom of speech and abuse is someone to stay clear of as they’re either perpetuating it or an abuser themselves.
User ID not verified.
“anyone that can’t see the difference between freedom of speech and abuse is someone to stay clear of as they’re either perpetuating it or an abuser themselves”
New version of Godwin’s Law?
User ID not verified.
@Ghost of Perry Kacker – very funny actually…
There’s a difference between Australian law and Nazi behaviour of course. I assume you’re posting this for the fun of the comedy rather than the misguided concept.
User ID not verified.
When I began at SOM (now Ogilvy) I was surprised to discover the staff had an anonymous complaints box. To his credit,CEO at the time Andrew Varasdi, would stand before the gathered agency each Monday morning and answer each complaint. Because it was anonymous he got the truth about what his staff were feeling. And because he got the truth he was able to air it and respond to it, sometimes positively and sometimes critically. He didn’t particularly enjoy it, but he did it. The important thing was that the topic –often about not being allowed to enter awards–was aired. Now imagine if he insisted on names.
Come on people, everyone knows that any opinion here is likely to be colored with professional grudges and vested interest (wonder if Andrew’s got any freelance going?). That’s what people do you gronks.
Mumbrella – just for one week, insist on names. See what that does to the debate. What’s the bet it turns into a load of hollow, self-serving spin that isn’t what people are really feeling or worth the paper it’s not written on.
User ID not verified.
There’s something not quite right with these PC crusaders who want us all to have a group hug so we don’t upset each other by expressing strong opinions, whether anonymous or not. In an environment such as here at Mumbrella we should respect the ability of the editorial team to decide what’s crossing the line and trust they will moderate accordingly. We don’t need do-gooders throwing grenades from the sideline to change the tone.
This is a tough industry with larger than life people with all sorts of opinions and personalities, let it find it’s own level. If you can’t stand the heat get out of the kitchen.
User ID not verified.
Tough talk there from anonymous Rob.
Typical.
User ID not verified.
Let us not confuse anonymity with moderation. If someone is being unnecessarily bitchy or nasty, then that is a moderation issue.
If it’s just that they’re anonymous and they don’t agree with your opinion then maybe you just need to grow a pair.
Having the ability to comment anonymously allows people to be freer with their thoughts, and not feel like they have to agree with the status quo for fear that they may be ostracised for having a difference of opinion.
Take a look at the conversations that go on in a networking situation. Get someone with an extroverted personality going and everyone around them will be nodding and agreeing even though you can see in their faces that he/she is talking absolute crap. I bet they all wish they could say something anonymously!
The whole idea of anonymity in online comments is about taking social status out of an opinion.
Yes people abuse it but it’s the responsibility of the sites to decide the proper balance of moderation to ensure that conversation and debate is encouraged.
User ID not verified.
Rob, strong opinions aren’t the problem – it’s the rabid language, the scare-mongering, the self-interest and the blatant lies that people get away with that’s slanting debate. It’s these comments that are ‘changing the tone’, not the other way around. The original article wasn’t about Mumbrella, but the entire digital community.
Strong opinions are welcomed, particularly here on Mumbrella, and when those opinions are being made by someone willing to stand behind their words then they hold even more weight.
User ID not verified.
@Dave – absolutely on the money and beautifully said.
User ID not verified.
likewise Bob….tool
User ID not verified.
@ Adam Paull if someone is pushing the language/scare-mongering/self-interest line then don’t they out themselves and their cause to most discerning readers anyway, whether using a real name/url or not?
User ID not verified.
I’m guessing that what everyone’s actually worried about are their clients reading this stuff. I’d be interested to hear from someone who’s client has held them to task over a critique of their work on Mumbrella. Does it happen?
User ID not verified.
@Rod – Discerning readers, yes… but how many of those are there?
User ID not verified.
@Rob, rather
User ID not verified.
Adnews got it right with the lead they took last month:
http://www.adnews.com.au/adnew.....f-no-troll
User ID not verified.
@Adam don’t sweat it, my real name is John….oops
User ID not verified.
As I client I don’t give a damn about squabbles on industry web sites like this.
Creative people tend to be prima donna’s insecure and bitchy with each other- it’s not like that’s shocking news.
As a client I don’t give a damn about awards either except for effectiveness – if you want to make pure art, put your work in a gallery or sell that script you’re writing.
So Peter Rush – no need to worry I don’t reckon about clients reading this – we know agencies are often full of drama queens.
User ID not verified.
I prefer to be anonymous to neuter ad hominem diversions and focus discussion on “playing the ball, not the man”
If everyone knew I was Harold Holt, every discussion would end up about the whole Chinese spy thing.
User ID not verified.
I have to agree with the writer’s article – anonymity promotes honesty.
No-one likes having their work criticised, but its a fact of life.
Without anonymity most of the industry will be unable to comment honestly as they will lose job opportunities etc.
As I said, it hurts to be criticised, but if the worst that happens is someone slags off your work, well then #firstworldproblem as the twitterati say.
By the way, what the heck is government 2.0????
User ID not verified.
Most of the people who don’t use a nom de plume have a link to their net site so their argument against anonymity could be said to be a little tainted.
There is no more to be said in favour of anonymity than has already been said. Those against it would be better off staying anonymous too lest they are identified with their shallow logic.
User ID not verified.
@Dave. Well said. I like the moderation part. If comments are too close to insults and could offend, a publisher can choose to edit, or delete them(.) I see videos on YouTube and I truly feel that Google / YouTube could be far better at moderating their comments. Every thread seems to turn into a racial slur fest – it is awful.
I also agree Dave with your social comment. I love to put forward my point of view. I don’t like to broadcast ‘me’, not because I am a coward, more, I don’t really want to be known. Some people like to get their name out there and state their place in an industry etc “me, me, me…” Not all. I however prefer a few pen names and thus keep my real self out of the spotlight.
Each to their own I guess (and I am not the best writer, so apologies for the waffle.)
I think that people who post comments (anonymous or named) can choose to be responsible / constructive or irresponsible and negative) I guess..?
At the same time, yes people will hide behind anonymity to offend others, which perhaps moderators could police a bit more? What do others think?
User ID not verified.
Groucho your post makes no sense at all
User ID not verified.
Thanks to everyone for their comments.
Knotty, Al, Devil’s advocaat, fraser and Adam Paull, I don’t agree with your views, but will defend to the death your right to express them.
My questions to you is where is the line between constructive and inappropriate comment (whether anonymous or not)?
The issue you outline is not one of anonymity but of judgement – where the line lies between comments that help stimulate thought and comments that are simply vindictive.
Given that individuals and organisations often learn more from unguarded remarks, and that everyone has a different tolerance level, who in society should judge whether a comment is constructive or not?
Certainly there are limits which most in society would agree is ‘too far’ (mindless slanging, deliberate trolling and personal abuse for example).
However these are best managed through moderation, not through attempting to prevent anonymous comment. And it bears keeping in mind that moderation, as an act of judgement, won’t be called correctly 100% of the time – just like referees in any sport. Expecting moderators to get it right every time (under threat of being sued if they get it wrong once) is unrealistic to start with.
Across society there is a broad grey area in which some people may find comments constructive and others find them abusive. Often it isn’t even the subject of the comments that has the issue (those in the public eye develop thick skins), instead it is third parties who are upset “on their behalf”.
Again, in my experience, this has nothing to do with whether comments are anonymous or not, it has to do with individual tolerance for criticism.
The solution is not to shut down those who criticise, but to consider whether those criticisms are valid and then address or ignore them as appropriate.
User ID not verified.
Hi Cairg, Thanks for the re-post, your argument there actually seems better formed than in the main post and I agree with most of it.
As my old uni lecturer used to say, the solution to debate you don’t like is not censorship, it’s more debate.
User ID not verified.
Welcome to the internet peeps.
If you’re unable to perceive hidden agendas in posts (beit anonymous or not), you’re in for a rough ride. Take it all with a grain of salt and enjoy a good chuckle when the ferals drop one into the debate – makes it all the more interesting and god forbid – entertaining.
@ Peter Rush & Craig – spot on chaps.
User ID not verified.
Great post Craig and well summarised in your re-post.
I have to concur with @Dave. As a long time Community Manager I can attest that people are confusing anonymity with moderation. The *real* reason that so many industry blogs (and beyond) are full of abuse and vitriol is a lack of community management. Of which there is much more to than simply removing or deleting comments. Setting the guidelines and tone are paramount to creating parameters and fostering a civil community.
User ID not verified.
Anthony Freedman is 100% right! There’s so much more I could say but I’m going to leave it at that!
User ID not verified.
Regular readers of this website already know my position on this subject. Can’t help feeling disappointed that it’s come up again.
User ID not verified.
Good one @Alison – I’m glad you too can see the real issue here. Same here @Paddy.
I’ve stopped sending Mumbrella any press releases now for any of my clients work (that can be several creative businesses at one time), my own news or content, and Commercial Ideas Network news and project postings. I know many others in the Commercial Ideas Network that say that they don’t either. This is possibly why Mumbrella is having to make up pointless and nasty content these days to generate interest (I wont draw attention to the articles I’m referring to as they don’t deserve my energy – appalling).
User ID not verified.
Well over a year since that incident happened with the Attorney-General and i’m glad to see sticking up for myself had such an impact on issues around anonymous commentary. I still contribute to AdelaideNow and voice my opinion whilst publishing my details online without fear of prosecution for politically interpreted ‘defamatory’ commentary (Atkinson said I never defamed him).
User ID not verified.
Freedom of the press doesn’t extend to freedom of the net?
User ID not verified.
hey anne miles why don’t you follow through your boycotting of mumbrella by staying away altogether…..your shtick is boring
User ID not verified.