Journal Misou's Journal: The Kathy Sierra Hype

I have been following the Kathy Sierra outrage over the last days and just read Kathy's joint statement on what she feels was sexual harassment and death threats. I do not want to burn my fingers on the question if Kathy is overreacting but the case brings up another interesting question: Should online anonymity be restricted or not?

The threats against Kathy Sierra were sure not done under real names. ZDNet blogger Andrew Keen takes it as a chance to point out that the "culture of anonymity has spawned a contemporary Internet of social deviants, loonies, perverts and get-a-lifers (not to mention weird Second Lifers)" who do not anymore see the reality and other people's rights.

CEO Blogger Debbie Weil adds to that " Anonymity breeds the worst, foulest behavior in the blogosphere." while another voice from the blogosphere, Seth Godin, chimes in: "Virus writers are always anonymous. Vicious political lies (with faked Photoshop photos of political leaders, or false innuendo about personal lives) are always anonymous as well. Spam is anonymous. eBay fraudsters are anonymous too. It seems as though virtually all of the problems of the Net stem from this one flaw, and its one I've riffed on before. If we can eliminate anonymity online, we create a far more civil place."

So maybe online anonymity should be restricted and real name registration required at least with some social networking places? Cluetrain co-author and fighter for social networks, David Weinberg, joins others with a more liberal stand:

"... transparency is generally a good thing, even if it isn't an absolute. It is especially good -- in fact, it's becoming a requirement -- in those elements of the business most used to subterfuge and manipulation. (Hint: Marketing and PR.) In a culture built by open and honest conversation among customers, techniques such as astroturfing are especially despicable because they abrade trust. It's bad enough when messages from people within the business pretend to be personal when they're in fact written by the PR department or generated by marketing bots. We've learned to expect such communications to be lies. It's far worse when messages purporting to come from customers are lies because now we can't even trust one another."

I am with those saying that the problem is that anonymity is abused by those with a hidden agenda or driven by lies, who in consequence, as Weinberg says, "abrade trust". And I think that the only possible way to reform trust-based markets such as Wikipedia is to implement some minimum requirements. I can think of two:

1) Real name and date of birth needs to be registered together with a verified legal address.
2) The Terms of Service are to include a clause stating that the editor-to-be is a) not paid for any activities he is planning to do on the site and b) does not receive any other commercial advantages or profit out of him/her editing on the site and is not working for someone who does.

This would reduce anonymity in the most abusive places.

Sources:
http://headrush.typepad.com/creating_passionate_users/2007/03/as_i_type_this_.html
http://www.rageboy.com/statements-sierra-locke.html
http://blogs.zdnet.com/keen/?p=119
http://www.blogwriteforceos.com/blogwrite/2007/03/brilliant_blogg.html
http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2007/03/misogyny_and_an.html
http://sethgodin.typepad.com/seths_blog/2004/02/the_problem_wit.html
http://www.cluetrain.com/
http://strumpette.com/archives/162-Cluetrain-author-dispels-absolute-transparency-myth.html
http://www.misou.info/2007/04/kathy-sierra-hype.html