Hacker News Board Hacker News, browsed like a classic message board
Live data from Hacker News

When operating "at web scale", users often simply don't have "real names"

plus.google.com

Post reply on HN
Print view View original

41–50 of 119 posts

Re: When operating "at web scale", users often simply don't have "real names"

#41

Post by SeoxyS »

bugsy wrote: post #34
SeoxyS wrote: post #15

For the most part, I think that Google's crackdown on pseudonyms and anonymity is actually a good thing. In most cases, anonymity online brings out the worst of us—just look at 4chan, littered with mobs of minions proliferating senseless hacking and child pornography[1]. You need but look at the news lately to see the damages of unchecked anonymity: "LulzSec this," "Anonymous that" and so on. Enforcing real names is…

People love to bring up 4chan as an example to this discussion every time, and yet there is no one on 4chan who has not freely chosen to be there. All this "know who you are talking to in order to have a friendly community" stuff is nonsense. We know why Google and Facebook and the Obama administration want this. Control and tracking. End of story.

It's not about what 4chan does to its members—I couldn't give less of a fuck. It's about what they do to the rest of society. Things like Anonymous and LulzSec, which end up on the NYTimes frontpage, are is a direct result of places like 4chan.

Additionally, as a member of the Google+ community, I'm glad to see Google cares for its quality.

Re: When operating "at web scale", users often simply don't have "real names"

#43

Post by prodigal_erik »

SeoxyS wrote: post #26
saurik wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

4chan is an example of an "anonymous" system, not a "pseudonymous" one: the difference is whether you have stable identities over time, and therefore can build up reputation (positive or negative) for a particular "pseudo-name". As long as you have mechanisms, whether social or political, to "default distrust" new users that don't have much "cred" yet (mechanisms like the "green" user rendering that Hacker News uses…

I agree with you on two points. Firstly, you are right to make the distinction between anonymous and pseudonymous, they're two different things and you can build a reputation system and healthy community on a pseudonymous system (see HN). However, I think they both exhibit the same underlying problem that comes with lack of accountability. HN has been lucky, because it's for the most part an elite community full of s…

I use a pseudonym to shield myself not so much from my current but my next employer. Or landlord. Or girlfriend's family. HN gets what's really weighing on my mind, while Facebook gets heavily censored, cheerfully inoffensive pablum when I bother to participate at all. As I see it,

  true names : pseudonyms :: villages : cities
and cities are the wellsprings of progress because people can reinvent themselves and unpopular but good ideas can find support.

Re: When operating "at web scale", users often simply don't have "real names"

#44

Post by ilkandi »

As other posters have noted, many Chinese have the Chinese-lettered name eg "strong army", the pinyin version and if they move to a Western country they pick their own English name like "John" or something. In writing, Choi/Choy (and I think Chua and Chow) are the same. I will skip the philosophical discussion of what reality is to the viewer.

I don't understand the linking to a real name. Give everyone a private number, and then the user links whatever names they're known by to that number. When a searcher finds the name Skud and adds Skud, they will forever see Skud and whatever other names Skud has chosen to have visible to that circle. The link is the number, and the name is just a display. I wonder how they would deal with a woman who changed her last name when she was married, and reverted to her old name after the divorce. And she's also an author writing under a pen name (like Stephen King/Richard Bachman/John Swithen). It seems obvious to me but nobody's done it so there must be some unique flaw. Can any commenters enlighten me on why the unique private number idea is a bad one?

Re: When operating "at web scale", users often simply don't have "real names"

#45

Post by ilkandi »

SeoxyS wrote: post #15

For the most part, I think that Google's crackdown on pseudonyms and anonymity is actually a good thing. In most cases, anonymity online brings out the worst of us—just look at 4chan, littered with mobs of minions proliferating senseless hacking and child pornography[1]. You need but look at the news lately to see the damages of unchecked anonymity: "LulzSec this," "Anonymous that" and so on. Enforcing real names is…

Anonymity is not related to lack of forum moderation or escape from consequences. It just means a username is not recorded or displayed. BTW, posting underage obscenity, inflammatory statements, neo nazism etc gets the poster ip banned. [1] /b/ is an isolated case which is often quoted. It is only one of 40-something forums on 4chan. Please, go back and browse /adv/ instead. Same anonymous people, supporting and helping each other with advice. Anonymity is not the issue, it is the community which people create through their actions and expectations of finding other like-minded individuals in the same virtual space.

Re: When operating "at web scale", users often simply don't have "real names"

#46

Post by ilkandi »

SeoxyS wrote: post #15

For the most part, I think that Google's crackdown on pseudonyms and anonymity is actually a good thing. In most cases, anonymity online brings out the worst of us—just look at 4chan, littered with mobs of minions proliferating senseless hacking and child pornography[1]. You need but look at the news lately to see the damages of unchecked anonymity: "LulzSec this," "Anonymous that" and so on. Enforcing real names is…

Anonymity is not related to lack of forum moderation or escape from consequences. It just means a username is not recorded or displayed. BTW, posting underage obscenity, inflammatory statements, neo nazism etc gets the poster ip banned. [1] /b/ is an isolated case which is often quoted. It is only one of 40-something forums on 4chan. Please, go back and browse /adv/ instead. Same anonymous people, supporting and helping each other with advice. Anonymity is not the issue, it is the community which people create through their actions and expectations of finding other like-minded individuals in the same virtual space.

Re: When operating "at web scale", users often simply don't have "real names"

#47

Post by ReneeKline »

I paid $32.68 for a XBOX 360 and my mom got a 17 inch Toshiba laptop for $94.83 being delivered to our house tomorrow by FedEX. I will never again pay expensive retail prices at stores. I even sold a 46 inch HDTV to my boss for $650 and it only cost me $52.78 to get. Here is the website we using to get all this stuff, GrabCent.com

Re: When operating "at web scale", users often simply don't have "real names"

#48

Post by jamesbritt »

vdm wrote: post #6
jchrisa wrote: post #3

One of the stupidest things we've done as a culture in the last generation, is bend our ideas about what is and isn't "well-formed", so that we don't offend computers. Fixing this is a big part of why I am motivated to work on schemaless databases. When your database doesn't ask you do predefine the data structures, it's one less opportunity for an ignorant programmer to blunt the human spirit.

The same thing applies to postal addresses. I look forward to the day when I can make my own shipping label when ordering goods online. This just needs to be a free text, multi line field. The theme you touch on is covered at length in the book 'Computer Power and Human Reason'.

This just needs to be a free text, multi line field.

I tried that for a project, using the Google geocode API. Worked OK, though not flawless.

Users entered their address into a textarea. This got passed off to Google, and the app then looked at Google's response. In case of ambiguity the user would be prompted to clarify the address and try again.

The intent was to reduce crap in the application database, but at the same time we had to allow users to override whatever Google thought and provide a literal address.

Re: When operating "at web scale", users often simply don't have "real names"

#49

Post by chipsy »

SeoxyS wrote: post #15

For the most part, I think that Google's crackdown on pseudonyms and anonymity is actually a good thing. In most cases, anonymity online brings out the worst of us—just look at 4chan, littered with mobs of minions proliferating senseless hacking and child pornography[1]. You need but look at the news lately to see the damages of unchecked anonymity: "LulzSec this," "Anonymous that" and so on. Enforcing real names is…

The difference in discussion quality is this:

With identity, because users can form a social hierarchy and praise or shame each other, they live in a box that others have defined them to be in. You may be in a pleasant box, but you are not seeing "the truth." Everyone manipulates their image and how they present themselves to others. This is fine within small groups as it can make the group more stable. However, it does not work at scale; this is the subject of Assange's theory of "conspiracy as governance." Blow the whistle on the conspiracy and you will be a threat, and shut down by any means necessary...

Without identity, you have to constantly prove your worth. What Anon tells you is incoherent, and usually overly emotional, but also usually honest...trolling aside... And in this way, truth can gradually be exposed.

Since Anon's breakthrough into "the real world," governments face a situation where the global strong-identity hierarchy is being disrupted. They can no longer spin a manipulated version of facts to the public and expect it to last for very long.

We need some of both. Strong identity within small groups; weak identity when dealing with society at large.

Re: When operating "at web scale", users often simply don't have "real names"

#50

Post by notatoad »

lmkg wrote: post #4

Remember, Google is getting into the Social scene because it's a rich data set that they don't currently have access to, and Google likes data. Google wants your "real" name so they can tie all your information back together. The good news is, they'll probably ease the restrictions once they figure out how to normalize identities even with non-normalized names. As a side note, I'm in a similar boat to Patrick with re…

i don't see how having a real name is interesting to google. a handle is a much better unique identifier, which is what you actually want when you are attempting to collect data from a bunch of sources. i could tell google that my name is james smith, and they'd be happy but it would be absolutely useless (and false). i could tell google that my name is notatoad, and that would probably be enough to aggregate all the information there is about me online.
Post reply on HN