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Comment by Veen | Hacker News Reader

Anything you choose to publish on the BBC's website is their business. It's not as though they're going around looking for naughty posts on third-party websites and tattling about it.

There is no automatic right to anonymity when posting on someone else's website. If you post something publicly, surely the expectation is that you're fine with anyone seeing it. If the BBC chooses to share that with your boss, why is it different to anyone else choosing to share it with a member of the public.

If you don't want everyone to know that you're a dick, don't be a dick in public.

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It doesn't matter whose business it is, the BBC still can't use communication between you and the BBC to interfere in a relationship you have with your employer that is illegal.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tortious_interference

It's not really between you and the BBC, it's not private correspondence, it's a public post.

Its A) codified into a business contract, not the actions of a private individual B) the use of private metadata and C) the stipulation that BBC is the enforcement mechanism that is problematic here.

Otherwise the BBC would quickly find that when they are late paying the contractors who work on their website their credit cards mysteriously get charged for the services rendered.

An analogy I have in mind might help. Say I write book arguing that a marginalized group are in fact responsible for all the evils in society. A publisher chooses to publish that book. Someone decides to send my boss a copy of the book and I get fired. Do I have cause to sue the sender for tortious interference?

I don't know what the status of private communications with the BBC would be in this regard, but if you're using their platform to publish, then I think that my argument holds.

IANAL, but as I understand it, in that situation you would not have grounds to sue the sender.

However, if the publisher you sent the book to publishs it, then goes to your boss with the intent of getting you in trouble and/or fired, you might have something to sue over.

The court treats the actions of individuals on a case by case basis. Your analogy breaks down when codified into a business contract. By stipulating a course of action that may cause real financial harm. Even if they were to stipulate fines or other remedies in response to perceived financial harm on their part the enforcement of such penalties is not their responsibility. They have taken enforcement powers away from the government.

Think of it like this: If I'm a web developer and I haven't received payment for my services I can withhold those services or even retain control of the product I am providing or use the courts to enforce the contract, but if I used the client's credit card info to enforce fines and pay myself I have broken the law regardless of whether I put it in the contract.

This does depend on the scenario. If the abuse it's coming from a corporate network, from an employee, the employer is getting contacted. They are legally responsible for both.

If it's somebody posting from home in their own time, dobbing them in seems a bit weird. How do they know who I work for?

FYI, many people will perceive this comment of yours as dickish. Do you want everyone to know you're a dick, or do you feel like you're just expressing an opinion and having somebody attempt to personally harm you based on it would be an unreasonable overreaction?

I'm not a relativist. I think that in a civilized society there are standards of behavior that all reasonable people can agree on. Everything I say is premised on that assumption, so you're free to reject the argument if you don't feel such standards exist.

I certainly agree such standards exist. But one of those standards of behavior that reasonable people agree to seems to be "Don't try to ruin people's lives just because they hold unpopular opinions." The people I know who do believe in that kind of vigilante justice against ideological opponents are not at all what I'd describe as reasonable. Like, do you look at Joseph McCarthy and his supporters and say, "There was a bunch of reasonable folks"?

Just forward them to the police and get an ASBO slapped on them: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Anti-social_behaviour_order

> If the BBC chooses to share that with your boss, why is it different to anyone else choosing to share it with a member of the public.

I assume you never did something embarrassing in a bar? Or were more than a little drunk?

Funny, I've never heard of an Officer of the BBC. I've heard of an Officer of the law and an Officer of the court. They're generally responsible for enforcing penalties, fines, jail sentences, probation, sex offender lists, etc.

If you'd like to add, "tattling to your employer" to that list I suggest you talk to parliament. They get awfully upset when you try to "do things for them" via cellophane business contracts.

Certainly BBC has officers. Some of them even have "Officer" in their job titles.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/BBC#Executive_Committee

In making this argument to personal friends I have heard several times, "Well what about tow trucks? They have the right to enforce contracts on private property and they aren't officers of the law!?"

The answer is that there are existing federal statutes in place to allow this. They are controversial and often challenged. Tow truck drivers operate in a grey area of the law and are frequently found to be in violation of the law. I would hope that the BBC values their operating license more than my local tow company.

You really don't see a difference between an individual sharing something about you and the same info coming from one of the biggest media corporations on earth straight to your boss?

>There is no automatic right to anonymity when posting on someone else's website.

Put another way, anyone who posts anything on your site, you have a right to discover the name of. Do you agree with this satement? Do you agree that YCombinator, owner of the site you are posting this on, has a right to investigate and discover your name? (Which you are not posting under.)

For me, I would think that would be the case if you cross a certain line. They do not have the right to discover that you're actually (celebrity investor) and then, since of course you have "no right to anonymity", publish the fact that (celebrity investor) comments here.

I think this example logically proves that in fact you do have a right to post anonymously. (Since if you didn't, sites would have a right to go to any length to discover your identity.) Or what am I missing? I might have a flaw in the deduction made in this comment and am open to someone pointing it out.

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