But that's not entirely effective.
The blog is accessible on archive.org
https://web.archive.org/web/20200609065651/https://slatestar...
I Am Deleting the Blog
801–810 of 1001 posts
Re: I Am Deleting the Blog
#802What is an appropriate theory of when a journalist should reveal the name of someone who doesn't want that name revealed? Some simplistic possibilities: 1. Never. 2. Always. 3. Don't, if they're a 'good' person. Do, if they're a 'bad' person. My theory is that it's a sliding scale, depending on one's judgement of the following: Where does this person fit on the public/private scale? The more public a person, the less…
As others have noted, NYTimes had dozens of articles about Banksy, whose identity has been known by many and could easily be discovered by the NYTimes (if they don't already know it - I suspect they do).
By any possible scale, Scott's real identity deserves less publicity than Banksy's.
The "cancel my subscription" wave is well warranted, because that's the only vote people have with the NYTimes.
Re: I Am Deleting the Blog
#803I've also been reading SSC for a long time. I'm sad, but honestly, who's surprised? I mean, he defended Steven Hsu the other day for being on the wrong side of the whole "race/IQ differences" thing, despite having written probably a dozen essays over the years about the phenomenon of prominent people losing their jobs for being on the wrong side of the race/IQ differences thing. Scott's had a pretty amazing run of be…
Honestly, I'm surprised. This doesn't look like getting cancelled for being edgy. There's no mob that I can see pushing to doxx him.
It looks to me more like the reporter decided that Scott's refusal to use his real last name was a weird request, not a legitimate security concern for his patients and himself. The reporter just doesn't get it.
It's not like it adds to the story. Every on the internet knows Scott as "Scott Alexander". I didn't even know it wasn't his real last name until today. It just seems so cruel to insist on doing this to Scott when I can't see any good reason to do it.
Re: I Am Deleting the Blog
#804I don't understand why traditional media still exists in modern days, when p2p communication between people is possible. In the best case, a journalist is a middleman who will misunderstand and garble information unintentionally, since they are working under deadline to get stuff published ASAP. Not only experts, but even enthusiasts spend much more time researching than journalists. In the worst and most common case…
P2P information is not only "expert blogs". Expert and enthusiasts blogs are the media of niche communities. And believe it or not they can also be biased and push an "agenda". They don't have the monopoly of ethicsm, they are just less scrutenized.
The mainstream P2P communication is your Uncle of whatsapp and random people on Twitter. Journalism might not always be great but I'll take it over that.
Re: I Am Deleting the Blog
#805I never believe the newspaper and hard to trust the TV news you have to investigate and get the Truth always,they all want headlines and ratings, so always check it out before you believe
Truth with a capital "T" is a myth. If you ever think you've found it then you've lost your way.
Re: I Am Deleting the Blog
#806I've also been reading SSC for a long time. I'm sad, but honestly, who's surprised? I mean, he defended Steven Hsu the other day for being on the wrong side of the whole "race/IQ differences" thing, despite having written probably a dozen essays over the years about the phenomenon of prominent people losing their jobs for being on the wrong side of the race/IQ differences thing. Scott's had a pretty amazing run of be…
Honestly, I'm surprised. This doesn't look like getting cancelled for being edgy. There's no mob that I can see pushing to doxx him. It looks to me more like the reporter decided that Scott's refusal to use his real last name was a weird request, not a legitimate security concern for his patients and himself. The reporter just doesn't get it. It's not like it adds to the story. Every on the internet knows Scott as "S…
> The reporter just doesn't get it.
Full-time reporters don't get why a source might not want to be named? Dude that's a high-school level journalism discussion. If you're a full-timer at the NYT you get why, and are either complying with a corporate policy or grinding a political axe.
Re: I Am Deleting the Blog
#807But that's not entirely effective. The blog is accessible on archive.org https://web.archive.org/web/20200609065651/https://slatestar...
It's effective enough to force the hand of the NYTimes to respond -- likely by removing his name or removing the article altogether.
Re: I Am Deleting the Blog
#808Earlier quoted context omitted.
That seems covered by this paragraph: "Some people want to kill me or ruin my life, and I would prefer not to make it too easy. I’ve received various death threats. I had someone on an anti-psychiatry subreddit put out a bounty for any information that could take me down (the mods deleted the post quickly, which I am grateful for). I’ve had dissatisfied blog readers call my work pretending to be dissatisfied patients…
> Do you feel that that addresses your concerns? Many of the responses critical of his decision seem to read as "Here's reason X that his decision is non-sensical, and I didn't read the actual link where he clearly and reasonably addresses reason X."
That's pretty dismissive. I read what he said. I was not convinced. For him, this is an illogical, emotional, and disingenuous move. I fully believe this is about a personal slight by the reporter, who did not accede to his request.
He's taking his ball home.
Re: I Am Deleting the Blog
#809I've been reading this guy off and on since he was Yvain on Less Wrong. This is a really fucking strange place to take a stand when his name has been public knowledge for...almost forever. The guy physically meets people at conventions and the like and introduces himself with his full name. It's been less of a secret than who The Stig (top gear) is. NYT may or may not be doing a big wrong here, but it's a fruitless a…
Scott is less worried about his real name being known among readers of the blog, he mostly just wants it to be non-googleable to protect his professional identity. He has been consistent with this position since 2013, it was actually one of the main reasons he started Slatestarcodex. From his old LiveJournal:
“Several people have suggested I move off LiveJournal because it has a negative prestige aura surrounding it and a lot of people are unwilling to read or link to LiveJournals.
Further, one of the interviewers at one of the hospitals I visited found my blog and told me that if I got hired it would be unacceptable to have a blog that was easily traceable back to my real name. Even if I never talked about medicine on it, it's still probably not a good idea to have patients know too much about my personal life. Also, if I expressed any controversial political opinions (me? controversial political opinions? really?) it might bring someone into disrepute or something, or even offend patients and destroy the therapeutic relationship.”
and “This blog is now closed and locked.
Since part of the reason I closed it is to make myself less stalk-able, I'm not linking from here to the new blog. If you really want to know where it is, message or email me and I'll probably tell you.”
Re: I Am Deleting the Blog
#810Earlier quoted context omitted.
Honestly, I'm surprised. This doesn't look like getting cancelled for being edgy. There's no mob that I can see pushing to doxx him. It looks to me more like the reporter decided that Scott's refusal to use his real last name was a weird request, not a legitimate security concern for his patients and himself. The reporter just doesn't get it. It's not like it adds to the story. Every on the internet knows Scott as "S…
> The reporter just doesn't get it. Full-time reporters don't get why a source might not want to be named? Dude that's a high-school level journalism discussion. If you're a full-timer at the NYT you get why, and are either complying with a corporate policy or grinding a political axe.
> If you're a full-timer at the NYT you get why, and are either complying with a corporate policy or grinding a political axe.
Or you are just an asshole.
There does not seem to be a good reason to refer to him by his full name rather than Scott Alexander. But there are a lot of bad reasons.
The main way I could see using Scott’s full name as being valid is if the reporter is outing some sort of malpractice, which I do not think is the case. I struggle really to think of any other good reasons.