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Show HN: Using stylometry to find HN users with alternate accounts

stylometry.net

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Re: Show HN: Using stylometry to find HN users with alternate accounts

#381

Post by operator-name »

InGoodFaith wrote: post #215
sillysaurusx wrote: post #186

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It’s a little writing trick I leaned from (I think) Orwell. Any time you’re about to use a common metaphor, try to tweak it. You’ll catch readers off guard, which piques their curiosity. It’s a fun game, too. I wish I’d used “the cat’s out of the hat,” but I didn’t think of it till later.

What you are describing is also known as an eggcorn. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eggcorn

That's neeto!

The 2nd example also loosely falls under the classification of malaphor.

https://en.m.wiktionary.org/wiki/malaphor

Re: Show HN: Using stylometry to find HN users with alternate accounts

#383

Post by crtified »

davebillyhock wrote: post #309
CharlesW wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

If you don't mind sharing, are you "writing artificially" purely in your head, or are you using techniques like intermediate translations?

No mechanical means, but I have referred to a thesaurus occasionally. Mostly I tried to change my sentence structure, not just words. It requires actually thinking differently, in a way. Which makes it difficult to know how well I'm communicating.

I imagine this would be quite difficult in practise, due to all the subliminal factors behind a person's writing choices.

For example, as somewhat illustrated here, your personal vocabulary is a kind of fingerprint. As you mention, using a thesaurus can somewhat alleviate that, but if a thesaurus is only changing a small % of your words, then it will only have a suitably small % effect upon analysis.

To go yet further might (I suspect!) entail methods such as directly lifting and using other people's sentences to convey your own thoughts. But even then, "your own thought patterns" are still informing the manner of the post, to some extent, so over time increasingly robust analysis may still find patterns to hook into.

Re: Show HN: Using stylometry to find HN users with alternate accounts

#384

Post by neodypsis »

TheOtherHobbes wrote: post #369
b112 wrote: post #334

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are fools, one and all! This tool's only purpose, is to tag people who use it! Now they know just who cares about which alternate accounts. They know ! They freaking know, man! You have all fallen for their ploy. Fools!

It knows my IP now. (Or does it?)

It offers no privacy policy, so can't tell.

Re: Show HN: Using stylometry to find HN users with alternate accounts

#385

Post by rejectfinite »

lifeisstillgood wrote: post #322
rejectfinite wrote: post #262

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>online behaviour tracks back to real life This is good to you? Okay, let's just make it like China or SK where your login is your citizen ID and if you write bad things the bad word police will take you away. Also, no, I have no alts.

So I am asking because my views are only challenged inside my own head, hence the need for external thoughts. But firstly the "governments will come and do bad things" argument - yes this is clearly and obviously a major problem - but not one solvable by technology in anyway. Fixing violent dictatorships is a IRL problem - one that requires enormous effort and sacrifices (see Ukraine for obvious example). We cannot p…

I am of the generation and mindset that online abuse is not real. Straight up. Log out, turn off the screen and watch Netflix, take a walk and calm down, block the offending user. It's not real.

>I suspect we need better support for police in prosecuting such things

We do see that! But mostly people on Facebook. Here we have had judgements of people who posted threats on Facebook because it is tied to your real name.

And yes, abuse is part of the "fun". Under your system, my 10 years old Leauge and CoD chats would have me locked up.

>I mean a death threat is a death threat.

Is it? I would find it more concerning if someone on the street tells me he is going to kill me than a kid on xbox live.

NOW there is a difference in systematic stalking and harassment online if I would get bombarded with DMs and messages to kys. I don't know how to solve. But a one-off comment is NOT equivalent. Then it feels like I'm just old? At 31? Is it really so serious?

Re: Show HN: Using stylometry to find HN users with alternate accounts

#387

Post by kaba0 »

throwawayhghcj wrote: post #302

I’d like to request the author takes this offline please until the implications can be thought through. This is breaking anonymity that people incorrectly thought would not be revealed. For some it might be awkward, others it might be quite problematic.

I would agree with you but the genie is out of the bottle already. Nigh everyone can and could have reproduced these results, especially that archive.org and similar things exist.

So, I don’t think it causes any new harm, if anything it gives you future risk aversion.

Re: Show HN: Using stylometry to find HN users with alternate accounts

#389

Post by rejectfinite »

CharlesW wrote: post #275
fbdab103 wrote: post #265

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So is the lesson you should have GPT rewrite your manifesto so as to obscure your personal idioms?

Or something purpose-built like Anonymouth ( https://github.com/psal/anonymouth ), although it seems to be both unique and dead. Also interesting: > Ross Ulbricht aka Dread Pirate Roberts, the mastermind behind the infamous Silk Road site which served as a black market for drugs, weapons and fake documents was also well aware of the potential danger of stylometry being used against him. At the time of his arrest in a…

I mean he used an forum account with an email that had his name in it.
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