Good rant from Rich Persaud about the speech-chilling effects of enforced identity online. Some people think that the way to build reputation systems is to put measures in place that ensure that you can reliably identify people across different systems — i.e., the Cory Doctorow of Boing Boing is the doctorow of eBay is the mouthbeef of Slashdot and the mouthbEFF of #infoanarchy — and so drain the bottomless reservoir of identities we can assume in different online contexts. Rich sez:
100% transparency does not lead to loss of privacy. 100%
transparency leads to loss of speech. All speech and action becomes
part of a continuous game of posturing, creative writing and mediocre
(not even amateur) performance art.Community boundaries segment risk, define topology and vary
feedback. They are necessary for evolution, learning and behavior
change (historical role of reputation systems).
(via Hack the Planet)
