Anonymity and Pseudonymity

Posted By Blackfive

Anticipatory Retaliation discusses anonymous blogs and points to a Roger Simon related piece (about anonymity among other things). Roger Simon starts out by saying that he doesn't trust blogs that are anonymous - but then recants a bit as he blogrolls a few anonymous blogs like the excellent Anticipatory Retaliation. The comments are worth a read.

Military bloggers have a whole different set of issues to worry about...I get questions from military bloggers who ask, "what is crossing the line?". You don't have to do much to cross the line to get in trouble in the military. If I was on Active Duty or in the Reserves, a lot of what I have said here might have gotten me into trouble. The Case for LTC West being just one issue that serving in the military would make it harder for me to weigh in on. Criticism of the Commander in Chief would also be a problem for a Military Blogger that wasn't anonymous.

There are other reasons for anonymity or pseudonymity. Employment being a big one. What if your opinions are not looked favorably upon by your boss? Not many of my friends read Blackfive, but my boss sure as hell doesn't - my boss makes Howard Dean look conservative.

Security is another reason. My wife is always concerned that I share too much personal information on the blog. I haven't had too much trouble with security, just enough to make me think twice about it.

I have gotten emails from people that say I shouldn't be pseudonymous, and, if I had cojones, I would use my name. That's their opinion.

What do you think?

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Anonymity and Pseudonymity

Anticipatory Retaliation discusses anonymous blogs and points to a Roger Simon related piece (about anonymity among other things). Roger Simon starts out by saying that he doesn't trust blogs that are anonymous - but then recants a bit as he blogrolls a few anonymous blogs like the excellent Anticipatory Retaliation. The comments are worth a read.

Military bloggers have a whole different set of issues to worry about...I get questions from military bloggers who ask, "what is crossing the line?". You don't have to do much to cross the line to get in trouble in the military. If I was on Active Duty or in the Reserves, a lot of what I have said here might have gotten me into trouble. The Case for LTC West being just one issue that serving in the military would make it harder for me to weigh in on. Criticism of the Commander in Chief would also be a problem for a Military Blogger that wasn't anonymous.

There are other reasons for anonymity or pseudonymity. Employment being a big one. What if your opinions are not looked favorably upon by your boss? Not many of my friends read Blackfive, but my boss sure as hell doesn't - my boss makes Howard Dean look conservative.

Security is another reason. My wife is always concerned that I share too much personal information on the blog. I haven't had too much trouble with security, just enough to make me think twice about it.

I have gotten emails from people that say I shouldn't be pseudonymous, and, if I had cojones, I would use my name. That's their opinion.

What do you think?

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Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Anonymity and Pseudonymity:

» Says Who? from Army of One
Blackfive has a great post that also points to a post by Roger Simon regarding a blogger's identity. I wrote way too much on the comments section over at Blackfive and then still had more to say. Instead of filling... [Read More]