The anonymity of the internet has existed since almost the beginning of the internet itself. The initial intentions were to provide people the freedom of expressing what they felt about a topic posted online. However, vile comments started to appear, and now, there is even a term to call the people who post abusive comments online: trolls. To deal with this matter, many news sites including the Huffington Post, ESPN.com, and Popular Science got rid of the anonymous system and encouraged their readers to post comments with their real names. Taking a step more, the Sun Chronicle newspaper launched a program on July that requires their readers to register to their site with their names, addresses, phone numbers, and credit card numbers. The number of people who registered from the 7th to the 19th recorded 22 people. There were 22 people who were willing to post the majority of their personal information online to share their ideas with another 21 people. Now, there's a need to remind yourself what the initial purpose of allowing online comments was. It was to promote diversity online. It was to allow other readers to know what other readers think about the same article that they just read. But how diverse could 22 opinions be on the worldwide web, especially when the Sun Chronicle is a local paper of Attleboro, Massachusetts? Not very.
An online leading commenting service corporation called Disques discovered in a study that contributors that were most productive online used pseudonyms. A pseudonym is a fake name that commenters choose. Disques states in their study that using pseudonyms online are different from being anonymous. Their study concluded that online(Facebook, in specific) users who use pseudonyms contribute most to the online society, noting that they were accounted for 61% of all comments and commented 6.5 times more frequently than anonymous users and 4.7% more than people who used their authentic name. However, it cannot be understood how a pseudonym is different from being anonymous. Fictitious names are not real names. So if someone did the math and counted people who used pseudonyms as anonymous, it would be even more apparent how much anonymous comments contribute to the online society.
1. What does everyone knowThey know that there are anonymous comment boards on news sites
They know that some are good and some are bad
do they know that recently, news sites are getting ride of the anonymity?
Do they know that there's really no such thing as zero anonymity online?
if a news site forces people to be themselves online, less people participate, and how many fruitful comments would you get from that?
2. Research done on my topic
Disqus — a leading commenting service company — has published a study that found some of the most productive contributors online are those using pseudonyms. Pseudonyms are often used because they are more expressive than our birth name.
People whose political opinions differ from their neighbors or employers
• Crime victims
• People vulnerable to discrimination
• People with minority political opinions
• People who fear reprisals for political or organizational criticism
• People whose beliefs or personal practices put them outside the norms of their communities
Previous research has also demonstrated that what's written in the comments below the story influences how people interpret the story itself. In her New Yorker article"Psychology of Online Comments," author Maria Konnikova framed an analysis around the announcement by Popular Science that it won't allow commentsonline anymore because they undermine the integrity of the science.
http://www.nj.com/njvoices/index.ssf/2014/01/poll_should_news_sites_continu.html
the Huffington Post in December proved controversial: A news article announcing the change from anonymous posting to Facebook-verified posts was met with nearly 6,000 comments — many of them taking exception in unpleasant terms. “Some people felt we were limiting their right to free speech,” said Tim McDonald, HuffPost’s director of community.
http://www.washingtonpost.com/lifestyle/style/some-news-sites-cracking-down-on-over-the-top-comments/2014/05/07/4bc90958-d619-11e3-95d3-3bcd77cd4e11_story.html
"By allowing anonymous comments, you're going to get things and information that otherwise would not come to light," said media lawyer Robert Bertsche, who represents the New England Newspaper & Press Association.
Jean Balloon, whose comments have been recommended on the site more than 500 times to date, says she's gotten death threats from other commenters in the past.
"Die and die quickly," read one of the threats, about a comment she posted on a story about BP and the Gulf oil disaster. (the Wall Street journal)
http://edition.cnn.com/2010/TECH/web/07/19/commenting.on.news.sites/
https://disqus.com/research/pseudonyms/
3. Implications
What if i'm right? ???what if i'm right
What if i'm right and people ignore me?
No diversity online. No free speech online.
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