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OpenTable is adding your first name to previously anonymous reviews

bleepingcomputer.com

21–29 of 29 posts

Re: OpenTable is adding your first name to previously anonymous reviews

#21

Are we finally waking up to the fact that unless actually anonymous, nothing is actually anonymous?! My pearls, etc.

Blaming users who were mislead and are being exploited is not exactly a constructive way to approach things. Nothing is really anonymous if you look hard enough. Even with a fake profile, VPN and throwaway email your unique browser footprint and data broker lookups will probably identify you. Let's place the blame where it belongs, on the company.

Re: OpenTable is adding your first name to previously anonymous reviews

#22
With the first name, photo and time of booking, restaurants are finally free to identify and punish bad reviewers. If you think businesses can't be that petty, just check out how 'Madison Square Garden Uses Facial Recognition to Ban Its Owner’s Enemies'.

https://www.nytimes.com/2022/12/22/nyregion/madison-square-g...

Re: OpenTable is adding your first name to previously anonymous reviews

#23
post #2

First Glassdoor, then OpenTable. Who will dox us next - Reddit? Hacker News?

It's no longer an assured impossibility that if certain populist political-religious extremists attained power, they wouldn't impose censorship and mandate requiring licenses and identity verification to use the internet.

Re: OpenTable is adding your first name to previously anonymous reviews

#25
post #4
post #2

First Glassdoor, then OpenTable. Who will dox us next - Reddit? Hacker News?

I do not disagree with you. But critics of the past were never anonymous. If you review film or food or anything, and it got published you put your name next to it. You were proud of your opinion and how it was delivered. I think it's why video is more interesting to the current generation than text. It isnt that video is more appealing, it's much harder to be in(un?)-authentic when your face is out there.

ITT: rumors, gossip, and nom de plumes never existed.

Re: OpenTable is adding your first name to previously anonymous reviews

#26

Tech companies sure love to run the domestic abuser's playbook: * I want to know everything about you and who you talk to (privacy violations) * I can change deals unilaterally and do whatever I want without your say-so (disrespecting user agency) * You can't leave me (vendor lock-in)

and love-bombing via marketing campaigns

Re: OpenTable is adding your first name to previously anonymous reviews

#28

Are we finally waking up to the fact that unless actually anonymous, nothing is actually anonymous?! My pearls, etc.

Blaming users who were mislead and are being exploited is not exactly a constructive way to approach things. Nothing is really anonymous if you look hard enough. Even with a fake profile, VPN and throwaway email your unique browser footprint and data broker lookups will probably identify you. Let's place the blame where it belongs, on the company.

I'm trying to convey that the whole story of a "free, open, $whatever_virtue" is a lie and the people who tell it are universally trying to get something out of us with the lie.

This line of reasoning takes one in short order to RSA-over-shortwave, which I really think should be more top-of-mind, especially for the weenies who dicker over which native chat app is more secure (an argument that makes me worry my eyes will get permanently stuck in a rolled-up state).

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