University of Queensland researchers have found there are two key reasons people choose to be anonymous online – self-expression or toxic behaviour.
A team led by PhD candidate Lewis Nitschinsk from UQ's School of Psychology collected data from more than 1,300 participants across the globe via an online survey and daily diary, where they tracked their online behaviour over a week. "Our study specifically looked at what people do online when they're anonymous, as opposed to when they make themselves identifiable," Mr Nitschinsk said.
[...] Mr Nitschinsk said the results help understand the complexities of how people interact online.
"Learning about different motivations means we can be better informed about potential benefits and risks of being anonymous online, and interacting with other anonymous people in online communities," he said.
"The next stage of our research is to understand how seeking anonymity is associated with one's wellbeing and how anonymous online behaviour differs across cultures."
[Also Covered By]: Phys.Org
[Journal Reference]: https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/10.1177/01461672231210465
What motivates you to be anonymous online ?
(Score: 2, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @01:07AM
It's nice to think you can trust everyone in the chain to respect your privacy like they promise they do. Pinkie swear!!!
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @01:10AM (17 children)
It's the ability to speak openly without being cancelled.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Friday January 26 2024, @01:52AM (16 children)
You think anonymous speech is less cancelled than speech from identified speakers?
An "anonymous source from some unidentified port on the Internet" starts at automatic -1 mod in my Soylent settings, two clicks below khallow.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 5, Touché) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @02:24AM (7 children)
No. I think that if I said "fuck Joe Biden" anonymously I would probably keep my job and stop shitlibs from trying to dox me.
(Score: 5, Touché) by Gaaark on Friday January 26 2024, @03:23AM (3 children)
So what would happen if you said "Fuck Donald Trump" anonymously? Keep your job and stop shitreps from trying to dox you?
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. I have always been here. ---Gaaark 2.0 --
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @08:25AM (2 children)
You're both crazy. Who would ever think anyone would get canceled simply for criticizing the President [wikipedia.org]?
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday January 26 2024, @11:13AM (1 child)
Lesson: know your customers.
See also: Ellen DeGeneres and the long term results of her "coming out.". Spoiler: she was briefly cancelled and then found customers 10x as lucrative.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by DadaDoofy on Friday January 26 2024, @12:43PM
Correct. The Dixie's Chicks were either naive or just plain ignorant about who was actually buying their records.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday January 26 2024, @11:08AM
Fuck Joe Biden is a popular bumper sticker and yard sign around here. It's not exactly professional corporate work conversation, so tying it to your real name and identity online isn't a great idea, but I see it done on Facebook all the time.
Signed: Not really Joe
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Tork on Friday January 26 2024, @05:55PM
I cannot remember any time anyone ever gave a shit about insults thrown at Brandon. This meme [reddit.com] pretty much sums it up, albeit indirectly.
🏳️🌈 Proud Ally 🏳️🌈
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday January 27 2024, @02:09AM
Everything your kind bitch about is a confession, a projection, or both. Newsflash, snowflake: the people you call "shitlibs" are almost certain to be better examples of humanity than you. Stop assuming they'd act the way you'd act.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 5, Insightful) by tangomargarine on Friday January 26 2024, @03:04AM (7 children)
You can't cancel Anonymous Coward because they are everyone and no one.
Not having RTFA, I wonder how much of this is about anonymity vs pseudonymity. Being completely anonymous online encourages shitposting, which is why not many sites do it. At least if you have a pseudonym you have to stand by your reputation.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 26 2024, @04:48AM (6 children)
Yes, but, you can generate a new pseudonym repeatedly. And, those pseudonyms can be pretty damned anonymous, with the proper use of throwaway email accounts, VPNs and proxies, and careful configurations of browsers. We have a member right here on SN who wants to be unidentifiable, when he posts. His problem isn't lack of means to register an anonymous, unidentifiable account - his problem is he insists on posting the same rants over and over from each new account he creates. You can, in fact, be banned from Facebook, or Twitter, or any other platform on a daily basis, and be back posting in a matter of minutes. You can stay pretty damned anonymous, unless and until you slip up, and somehow tie your anonymous account to an already banned account.
If the NSA wants to find you, they'll probably find you. If you're really good, it will take them some time and effort, but they'll find you. Google and Facebook are the hardest to trick of the social media, but you can beat them.
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday January 26 2024, @11:20AM (4 children)
>Yes, but, you can generate a new pseudonym repeatedly
Says the four digit user ID to the three digit user ID....
>You can, in fact, be banned from Facebook, or Twitter, or any other platform on a daily basis, and be back posting in a matter of minutes.
My primary, and all related accounts were permanently banned from YouTube 6 years ago, no chance of appeal.
I suspect if I were a real nuisance rather than just a guy who let his kid post a few videos that pissed off PBS, they would be able to permanently ban a much wider circle of "related accounts."
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Interesting) by tangomargarine on Friday January 26 2024, @11:24PM
Yeah, I think I waited about a week after the Exodus to make an account, otherwise I could've been like first 200 :P
Good times. Well, not good times exactly, but...well, you know ;)
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Thursday February 01 2024, @02:47AM (2 children)
My sister got permabanned from posting on Twitter without having ever made a post. And she got two notices to that effect about a year apart.
Shadowbanned too -- her account cannot be seen, tho it was not (per their notification) removed.
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Thursday February 01 2024, @03:01AM (1 child)
No doubt she was algorithmically associated with undesirables, banned by the pre-crime unit.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by Reziac on Thursday February 01 2024, @03:10AM
That's all we can figure. Followed the wrong one at the wrong moment.
However, I'm almost entirely following undesirables, and I'm still there. (Tho post only a little less rarely than never.)
And there is no Alkibiades to come back and save us from ourselves.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by tangomargarine on Friday January 26 2024, @11:34PM
True, and I would rather come down on the side of "too hard to identify someone" than "everybody locked to verifiable IRL ID at all times". Social credit score and doxxing death threats and other scary stuff. There have been enough dystopian future movies already about The Man knowing exactly who and where you are at all times. With smartphone GPS we're most of the way there already, of course...but I wonder whether it won't be another 10 years, and somebody will be trying to convince us that everybody in the country needs an RFID tag surgically inserted in their neck or something.
Hail Eris
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @01:32AM
What about fear? or just privacy for the heck of it.
(Score: 4, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @01:32AM (3 children)
They left out privacy. Some folks just don’t want to be recorded all the time. That’s what trackers do, and some of us (the wise and smart) don’t want it.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Freeman on Friday January 26 2024, @02:50PM
This is the key point. A person should be able to feel secure in their own home and a right to privacy is key to that. While some people feel comfortable sharing their name and SSN online. That's their decision. Privacy should be expected and welcomed.
Joshua 1:9 "Be strong and of a good courage; be not afraid, neither be thou dismayed: for the Lord thy God is with thee"
(Score: 5, Insightful) by number11 on Friday January 26 2024, @07:22PM (1 child)
Exactly. I don't know to what use info about me can be put, but don't see any potential upside to making it easy to correlate info about myself. There are definitely potential downsides. So I use different emails, different nicks, VPNs, sometimes different browsers, on different sites. I want to make correlating that info as difficult as possible. I assume the worst, because sometime, somebody will probably try to do it, In the 1930s, the Netherlands had a very complete registration of citizens, including their religion. No problem, until WW2 occupation by Germany. Those records were very useful in identifying Jews. You can't predict how data will be used.
(Score: 2) by Ox0000 on Friday January 26 2024, @08:37PM
Oh... but you can! It's just that it's so horrible to contemplate that one chooses not to, in the interest of keeping one's sanity!
Remember that big data is not about ads, ads and big data are both about control.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by istartedi on Friday January 26 2024, @01:46AM (8 children)
I frequently post AC so I can be a little more loose on fact checking, take a bit more risk with a controversial PoV, and in general not have to deal with quite so much shit. Sometimes it's also better to have the argument stand on its own as opposed to having to deal with a bunch of rebuttals that will be biased because of your reputation. Sometimes you just want your thoughts to be appreciated for what they are, not who posted it.
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 3, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @01:48AM (1 child)
Dude. We're not biased. We just love fucking with you.
(Score: 2) by Gaaark on Friday January 26 2024, @03:25AM
So, you're the anti-Tim-Scott?
"I just love you, Donald"... man, can his nose get any browner? :)
--- Please remind me if I haven't been civil to you: I'm channeling MDC. I have always been here. ---Gaaark 2.0 --
(Score: 3, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Friday January 26 2024, @01:54AM (1 child)
If you expect me to check my facts, I need a raise.
I do sometimes check facts, but only when I am interested for me, readers of my pseudonymous ramblings do so at your own risk.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 2) by istartedi on Friday January 26 2024, @10:04AM
If you expect me to check my facts, I need a raise.
On some occasions, I've replied to valid criticism of such errors with something along the lines of, "You're entitled to a full refund of what you paid me".
Appended to the end of comments you post. Max: 120 chars.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by tangomargarine on Friday January 26 2024, @03:01AM (1 child)
Until we generally strangled the ability of certain poster(s) who shall not be named to post, sometimes I'd post AC so as to avoid adding myself to his list of weirdo stalkery obsessions.
Or when I just want to make a dumb joke or call somebody out but have a strong suspicion a certain demographic will miss the humor and start pounding the downvote button because I insulted their favorite political party or something.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday January 26 2024, @07:26PM
>have a strong suspicion a certain demographic will miss the humor and start pounding the downvote button
Hmmmm.... the way I "play the game" any reaction is better than no reaction. Upvotes, downvotes - they're all votes for me. Downvoters may not like what I said, but they still took the brain cycles to process it enough to get to that reaction.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @08:04AM (1 child)
Agreed. Even though I have registered here, I frequently post as AC when I have controversial content.
I may not agree with my own post.
I am trying to do a reality check by running a concept up the pole to see the reaction, without identifying myself as a proponent or adversary, nor do I want my avatar name to influence any reaction. I value an honest reaction.
Also, I know data aggregators are busy recording and saving everything I do, all neatly sorted for the convenience of those who desire to influence (marketing) ,to compel (blackmail) me, or to mislead (deception) me.
There exists a faction out there who insist on "controlling the narrative" by orders of obedience, not pursuit of truth. When money and ego are involved, truth is often suppressed by those pushing a profitable (to them) narrative. Part of that suppression involves keeping track of those who care enough to research to ferret out other narratives.
Just posting one's position can lead to being ostracized these days. It's like being in a micromanaged company...can I admit to leadership that I am releasing half-baked stuff, gambling in hope that it won't disappoint our customer, as time constraints take precedence over quality control and testing. Standing up for one's belief will likely result in job termination with mentions of bad attitude being placed in my permanent record.
But then, even Galileo, whose narrative of celestial mechanics differed from those of the Church, paid the ultimate price for stating his interpretation.
What that did for me was give me the peace of mind of differentiating God from Religion, and knowing that robes, theater, and fish-hats do not imply Truth or God.
No more than suits, podiums, microphones, seals of the office, and fanfare gives credence to Truth.
No wonder a lot of others have lost trust in leaders who try to compel obedience to a Lie.
Posted anonymously. Enjoy your pie - no use throwing it at me.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by phantomlord on Saturday January 27 2024, @06:03PM
I've been around on forums, including the green site, forever... Many forums have a form of group think, and often, it needs to be countered by actual reality. Post under your account and watch your karma die until you're pretty much hidden from everyone.
I'm not talking about trolling, I'm talking about pointing out the emperor has no clothes.
Back in the usenet days, I posted under my real name, even controversial things, because we just seemed to have a more sincere, higher quality average person on the internet back then. The rise of the web, along with eternal September, enshittified the whole thing. There's still good quality content out there and great discussions can be had, but if you post under anything that can be traced back to you, you could lose your job, have people stalking you outside your home, get swatted, etc.
My fiance was on a reality show a decade and was painted as the villain, and the number of stalkers (and simps) she gets for that is crazy. She was contractually obligated to say and do certain things for the show, and then editing happened on top of that to create a narrative for dramatic purposes. Unfortunately, she used her real name since she was pursuing a career in modeling and acting at the time. She's seriously considering changing her legal name (and having the records sealed) now because of it.
Whether in her scenario or whether we're just talking about online forums/discussions, the world is so interconnected now, that anonymous / pseudo-anonymous speech is more important than ever.
(Score: 4, Funny) by Runaway1956 on Friday January 26 2024, @01:47AM (3 children)
Seriously, sign into everything on the interwebs using your Google account. And, you're actually SURPRISED that Google knows what color underwear you have on? Do you really want Google to edit your meetchicks.com profile to make it accurate? "Fat balding dumpy asshole with bad breat and body odor wishes he could meet a hot chick." Or, for the other gender, "Obese grandmother who farts horribly wants to meet a young fit sugar daddy."
The less Google knows about you, the happier you will be. Look what they did for that toe jam eating old dude.
“I have become friends with many school shooters” - Tampon Tim Walz
(Score: 3, Insightful) by JoeMerchant on Friday January 26 2024, @02:17AM (2 children)
My Android phone has a Now Playing feature that keeps the mic live even in the lock screen and identifies (and notes the title, artist and time of) songs it hears vs what they say is an local database on my phone. It doesn't recognize everything it hears, but it recognizes a lot. Realize: voice recognition transcription is just as easy, easier maybe.
What you say, what people reply, where you are when it is said, all day long, every day, transcribed into a massive database that is likely shared across the Nine Eyes or whatever they call themselves these days, archived for decades.
We don't need genetic mutants with telepathy to implement a pre-crime interdiction unit ala Minority Report, just criminals who are careless enough to talk in earshot of live microphones. In their phones, home assistants, on public streets, restaurants, in police cars that run IR laser reflection systems on their windows, in devices carried by police working as package delivery drivers...
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Insightful) by tangomargarine on Friday January 26 2024, @02:57AM
I remember it was rather creepy when I first walked into a grocery store with my smartphone and it asked me to rate the establishment online; that was rather creepy. (The moment was somewhat undercut by the fact that it thought I was in the Taco Bell a half-mile away, though.)
I don't remember if I figured out how to turn that off somehow, or our Definitely Not Evil Google Overlords decided it was freaking people out so knocked it off themselves.
"Is that really true?" "I just spent the last hour telling you to think for yourself! Didn't you hear anything I said?"
(Score: 1, Informative) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @05:16AM
> keeps the mic live
No mic, no problem:
I don't have a cell phone, the once or twice a year that one is "necessary", I can borrow a flip phone from a relative who rarely travels.
For my laptop, I've tried hard to get the internal mic to work with conferencing software. As long as normal (3-terminal) headphones are plugged into the headphone jack the mic doesn't work. It seems that using that jack disconnects the built-in mic, because it's expecting to see a 4-terminal plug which comes on a headset-mic combo. Unplug the 3-terminal headphones and the internal mic works fine (so I do that when conferencing, only).
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @01:52AM (2 children)
Nobody can have legitimate preconceptions about who or what an anonymous participant is. Conversations where everyone is anonymous lack the cliquishness and signalling that comes about when everyone knows each other, and are much more interesting than non-anon conversations. Nobody has to waste time catering to special snowflakes or trying not to offend and can express their true thoughts and feelings.
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @02:22AM (1 child)
>are much more interesting than non-anon conversations
Says you, you self projecting snowflake ❄️.
Now, whose mother loves big black dicks penetrating her three at a time?
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @02:53AM
Disregard that, I suck cocks. -AC
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @02:27AM
Sometimes you're commenting against the majority. Like, "Republicans are good!"
Sometimes posting anonymously allows you to get a point "out there" without the strike to your karma, the insults and personal attacks, that *you expect* (and have likely at times experienced, or seen others go through).
But hey that's just toxic behavior, right?
(Score: 4, Interesting) by NotSanguine on Friday January 26 2024, @02:30AM (1 child)
I'm fine with pseudonymity.
News Flash! NotSanguine is *not* the name on my passport.
I used that handle on the green site and moved it over here. Otherwise, it isn't used (at least not by me) anywhere else.
On this site, you can be pretty sure it's the same person when a comment/submission/journal is posted under that pseudonym.
Elsewhere? Not so much.
No, no, you're not thinking; you're just being logical. --Niels Bohr
(Score: 3, Informative) by JoeMerchant on Friday January 26 2024, @07:32PM
Joe Merchant is the protagonist in a Jimmy Buffet novel... as such, a fair number of people around the internet (coincidentally with similar background profiles, speech patterns, etc.) use the name as their pseudonym as well.
Plausible deniability.
🌻🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 3, Funny) by ElizabethGreene on Friday January 26 2024, @02:44AM (3 children)
I rarely anonymize online, usually only when I want to convey data without creating the possibility of negative employment consequences.
I do donate to Zlib quasi-anonymously, but that's because it's only what the tech allows.
(Score: 5, Informative) by liar on Friday January 26 2024, @02:53AM (1 child)
I always use a VPN, & Disconnect and disable 3rd party cookies at the browser level. I periodically change my location through the VPN. And mostly I do this 'cause I just don't like being *watched* ( it creeps me out).
Noli nothis permittere te terere.
(Score: 1, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @07:34PM
>I always use a VPN
Check the username. I believe him.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @03:54AM
And yet, the dilemma you presented in your last journal entry (covid vaccine booster) would be easily solved by anonymity.
Not that it’d be desirable in a work environment, but in general…
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Zinho on Friday January 26 2024, @04:12AM
No worries, I've got you:
John Gabriel's Greater Internet Fuckwad Theory [penny-arcade.com]
Also, meta-commentary [penny-arcade.com] by the co-author:
I don't normally use coarse language, but I quote it here out of respect for the author, and the awesome acronym.
"Space Exploration is not endless circles in low earth orbit." -Buzz Aldrin
(Score: 2, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @06:44AM
Title says it all.
(Score: 1, Interesting) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @07:11AM
-Lorde, Tennis Courts
Whatcha gonna do when you don't really want to be here but still aim to help? I do all my charity anonymously.
-nostyle
--
-Stealers Wheel
(Score: 3, Funny) by Anonymous Coward on Friday January 26 2024, @07:39AM
I never write things anonymously online.
(Score: 5, Insightful) by Opportunist on Friday January 26 2024, @09:14AM (1 child)
Everyone has, at some point in their life, done something they're not exactly proud of. Usually as a teenager, sometimes later. Generally, people will sooner or later do something they are, at least in hindsight, not very happy that they did it.
Fortunately, people generally don't have a perfect memory. They forget stuff. The internet, though, does not.
Ponder for a moment this is you will. Someone does something, and you think it's a good idea. And, objectively, it may even be. Some technology that helps a lot of people. And you endorse that technology and the person that invented it, because it's a good technology and a good invention.
Fast forward 10 years and that person gets caught with his dick in an underage girl. And the next day, someone digs up your old article and cries that "This guy endorses a pedo!"
And then there's stuff you do and enjoy. And what is acceptable changes. Fast. Do you think that what you do and enjoy doing will still be socially acceptable 10 years down the line? And you can claim a hundred times that you don't engage in a particular behaviour anymore, we know you did, and why should we expect you to no longer wanting to do that despicable thing you were defending so valiantly back then?
(Score: 2) by Mojibake Tengu on Friday January 26 2024, @01:37PM
Forgetful Internet is as easy as it was for forgetful Libraries: burn the Archives.
Never Mind. Some of the future generations will do, no doubt.
Who remembers now why Sokratés was sentenced to death by drinking a cup of hemlock?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Asebeia [wikipedia.org]
Social prejudice never changes.
Rust programming language offends both my Intelligence and my Spirit.
(Score: 2) by https on Friday January 26 2024, @04:47PM
Answering that question truthfully is an opsec failure.
Offended and laughing about it.
(Score: 2) by sgleysti on Friday January 26 2024, @09:02PM
I think anonymous and pseudonymous accounts should be allowed because shitposting is a human right. I'm going to phone the UN to see if I can get that added to their charter after I hit submit on this post.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Saturday January 27 2024, @02:02AM
Here? Because several people who constantly post AC or use pseudonymous handles know if their identities were made known, there's a nonzero chance they'd get a well-deserved broken jaw or worse.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Saturday January 27 2024, @03:09AM
Some people can learn from other people's experiences. Like from those who are SWATed or had some lunatic travel hundreds/thousands of miles to try to threaten/kill them. Or had anthrax mailed to them
(Score: 3, Interesting) by Magic Oddball on Saturday January 27 2024, @08:13AM (1 child)
The first reason that I started only posting pseudonymously almost 20 years ago was that I was tired of being tracked down online and harassed by the obsessive jackass I'd dumped. I discovered a few years ago that it's still an issue, too; I'd used my real name once on an email discussion group that didn't have public archives, only to have it turn out that Google could still access & index them — as I learned after my ex sent email to my now-former email account again.
The second, more recent reason is that I don't want my open belief that biological males can't be women (and thus do not belong in women's rape crisis centers, prisons, etc.) to potentially result in repercussions for my family members.
(Score: 2) by Azuma Hazuki on Sunday January 28 2024, @11:23PM
Can biological women be men? I ask this because I have known a lot of transmen, way more than transwomen, and something tells me you wouldn't want your daughter sharing a locker room with them. Or take Buck Angel for example, who looks manlier than most cis men I've seen. Why someone would want to be a man is completely beyond me, but I have to take their word for it that it fits better.
How do you define "man?" Because what I see coming from all the panic over transwomen specifically is an unspoken (and unintended!) confession that men, qua men, are the problem, full stop.
I am "that girl" your mother warned you about...