[Foundation-l] Stalking Article

[John Vandenberg]

On Fri, Jun 13, 2008 at 8:03 AM, Anthony <wikimail at inbox.org> wrote:
> On Thu, Jun 12, 2008 at 10:02 AM, David Gerard <dgerard at gmail.com> wrote:
>> 2008/6/12 Charlotte Webb <charlottethewebb at gmail.com>:
>>> Focus on prevention rather than perpetually ineffective treatment. By
>>> more actively discouraging (perhaps outright prohibiting) the use of
>>> real-life identity or any information traceable to it. Ask Florence to
>>> buy some paper-shredders for the Office. Be creative.
>>
>> Contrariwise, there are those who move from a wacky net handle to
>> their real name. I created my account in my real name because I
>> started editing Wikipedia to do a serious job of work and didn't
>> consider a wacky handle appropriate. Also, should copyright ever
>> become an issue, I suspect having my real name being used will help.
>> That is: I'm entirely unsure blanket discouragement of real names is
>> actually a good idea.

My thinking was very similar.

I suspect that using a real name also helps prevent "casual
harassment", as the would be harasser is aware that their comments
will be associated with a real identity, who will likely get quite
annoyed, and so they talk to the real identity more like they would in
real life.

Using a real name does however assist the serious harasser, but keep
in mind that the serious harasser would have squirreled their way
through the pseudonym anyway, eventually obtaining the real identity,
but because of the effort involved in obtaining it, it is their first
victory and they will want to share it.

> I'd go so far as to say such blanket discouragement would be a bad
> idea.  Pseudonymity is incredibly difficult to maintain.  And where's
> the fun in contributing to a website if you've gotta worry constantly
> about whether or not you're revealing your identity?
>
> I wouldn't recommend using your full real name as your username,
> mainly because the search engines overrank the talk and meta
> namespaces (I wouldn't go so far as discouraging it either, though).
>
> But I would recommend not trying to hide your identity, not making
> edits that you wouldn't be willing to attribute to your identity, not
> editing during work hours if you wouldn't be willing to have your
> employer find out about it, etc.  At least, I'd make this
> recommendation to people who don't live in or plan on visiting places
> with highly oppressive governments.

.. and if there are edits which you dont want tied to your real
identity, create a sock, send the checkusers or arbcom a note so that
there can be no confusion, and state on the userpage that it is a sock
that the checkusers are aware of.

--
John