Hacker News Reader

Comment by brandonmenc | Hacker News Reader

> It's almost as if people desire the ability to be a public figure without any of the downsides.

This is a dangerous trend in thinking I'm seeing more and more.

Run a blog when you're not at your day job and answer questions for an interview? Congrats, you're a "public figure!" Say hello to Kanye for me.

Sharing a dumb article with friends on Facebook? Nope. You're actually "publishing content on a global news platform."

etc etc

View on HN

If you are running a blog presented to the public for public access, what do you expect? Yes, you are indeed trying to become a public figure. You are interacting with the public on public terms. Otherwise you would restrict the blog to a more private venue such as yourself (a journal) or some small community (friends, family, etc).

Sharing content is a different matter because you didn't originate the content and you didn't set the public policy on it.

I think you're creating a binary where one doesn't exist. People communicate ideas for a variety of reasons only one of which is to gain public notoriety. If someone wishes to publish their writing pseudonymously then they should be free to do so with the expectation that any reasonable person will respect their right to privacy. The idea that people should just keep to themselves or their in-group to avoid public persecution is directly contrary to the idea of a free and open society and has been repeatedly demonstrated to be a symptom of authoritarian regimes or movements.

It's not about notoriety. It's simply the physics of interacting with the public. If you don't like the results you need to change the physics to private. There is nothing that can guarantee your anonymity or pseudonymity as you distribute your information to public actors. They can correlate your actions regardless of your wishes on the matter. That's what doxxing is.

Sounds like a recipe for a chilling effect to me. Why risk being denounced? Just shut up and never interact with anyone in any way that others could use against you. As a society we need to enforce norms that protect everyone's ability to operate in good faith. If a person or an organization doxxes someone or publishes information against their expressed wishes without a clear moral obligation to do so then they should be held accountable. I'm hoping that this case has garnered enough attention that the pressure is being felt by the NYT and others.

If I talk to my friends in a pub, I don't expect my boss to get a full report on my speech the next day. I also don't expect that report to appear at my next job interview.

Unfortunately, internet blurs the boundaries between the work and non-work life. We need to find out new ways how to navigate this. It seemed like using a pseudonym would be a solution (because you can hardly hide your real name from your boss). Unfortunately, seems like unless you use paranoid precautions, people will take pleasure at connecting your private life to your job.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com