Monday, November 14, 2005

Anonymous said:

Josh writes:

In the interests of keeping this discussion out of the comments thread of an unrelated post, the Anonymous Commenting Conversation shall take place here. I'd prefer to keep them, since there are people who read this who don't have blogger accounts (who leave comments under their name). But to be blunt, they're pissing me off and I am a Vengeful God.

To address the points Morthos made in the other post -- he says:

A comment (well, a good one, where 'good' is either funny or informative) should stand on its own whether you have the context of the person putting it forward or not.

I agree. I'm not saying that anonymous posts are by definition no good, but the ability to post anonymously increases the likelihood of posts that are a waste of time. Having to put your name to something seems to cause people to put more effort into producing something that, well, that they don't mind putting their name to.
...the 'Anonymous' tag has its use. It allows you to put forward a view without necessarily having to own or subscribe to it. It's the equivalent, in many cases, of the Devil's Advocate in the Blogsphere (hate that term);

Or you could just say "this isn't my view, but..." or "if I can play Devil's Advocate for a minute here..." There are plenty of disclaimers a person could use.
if you write something under your own name then people tend to think that you must believe or support it;

Unless you say "this isn't my view, but..." or "if I can play Devil's Advocate for a minute here..." or some other disclaimer
if given the chance to voice the comment anonymously you can throw the idea out there without anyone having to contextualise it in re yourself.

Not quite sure what you mean by that, but it sounds like saying you don't have to take responsibility for what you say. Which is what annoys me about anonymous posting the most: the ability to not have to take responsibility for your words; an ability that is abused more than it is used, in my opinion.

In conclusion, I provide the following (not actually a) syllogism:
  1. Anonymous commenting isn't necessary to write good comments
  2. Anonymous commenting makes it easier to get bad comments
  3. Fuck anonymous commenting.
Out of interest, what are other bloggers' policies/opinions in this area?

5 comments:

Josh said...

Kate: your timing is impeccable.

"Tim": I'm not sure if you're actually Denying the Antecedent or just a Straw Man. Regardless, as we all know, Amanda Plummer's line was actually "Any of you fucking pigs move, and I'll execute every motherfucking last one of you".

Apathy Jack said...

Hell, keep 'em, but from now on I'll be disabling comments to my posts, because I can handle being hastled by teeagers (I'm even paid for it) but I can't handle being bored, which is what's happening.

That Morthos Stare said...

To paraphrase yourself, Jack, you don't have to read the comments. If you're bored of them then just don't read them. Don't deny the masses (scummy prolertariet scum that they are) their fun.

hoodooyoudo said...

I'm personally leaning towards Josh's view. Anonymous Commenting isn't the same as Free Speech - it's not like brainstab is going to be protecting the identities of chinese anti-corruption protesters or something.

It's just fucking annoying in exactly the ways Josh has outlined - no responsibility for what you're saying, and much more likely to be abused than used.

Josh said...

"it's not like brainstab is going to be protecting the identities of chinese anti-corruption protesters or something"

Jesus Christ, man -- now you've blown it! Everybody, run! Run while you still can!