Musings on privacy and communication

[azekeil]

Going on a theme from my last post and another article following on from the last one, I have a theory. People don't normally tell strangers about their sexual habits for all sorts of reasons, but mostly because of privacy and the thought of what they may think of you in return (of course, sometimes people want them to think those things). People post private stuff like their sexual habits online precisely because they are not accountable.

In a not so stunning revelation, then, people who post private stuff online do not generally feel that the people they are revealing this information to are important. I guess the next question is, is this because of the medium affording an illusion of anonymity and/or insulation from others ("they're only words"), or is it simply because interaction online is 'worth less' or even 'worthless'?

I still wouldn't hand someone on a bus a piece of paper with my sexual habits written on, nor would I tell them over the telephone. I also wouldn't online, but I'm not sure that's always been the case. If I were writing on a site I didn't also use to organise my social life, where I had better anonymity, perhaps I might. I guess this is the reason people create second journals, to feel more freedom. But don't be fooled. They write for them, they don't want to hear about you.

Comments

[reindeerflotila.livejournal.com]

I haev a second journal, which tends to contain irritable rants and the odd bit of terrible poetry.

I rarely say anything of any real menaing to myself let alone in a journal, but sometimes I do. Just to prove I can, and that I am not all 'whheee coffee coffee coffee OMG' etc. At least, not 100% of the time :P

[gerald_duck]

My first introduction to this was in 1989: I got to university, and got to know a variety of postgraduates. Soon, I discovered that a lot of stuff said by various of them on a Cambridge BBS while they were undergraduates was archived from 1986. I wondered when that information was likely to become unavailable, and decided the most plausible answer was "never".

Of course, global internetworking has made the problem orders of magnitude worse, but the basic principle stands. When I applied for my current job, my now-boss rummaged Google Groups and reminded himself of various conversations we'd had in comp.sys.acorn.* a decade earlier.

I've been saying stuff online in public forums now for seventeen years, and I know people will be able to read it all forever. That's OK; I'm not an especially private person, and I know very precisely where the boundaries of my desire for privacy lie.

I think the main thing that worries me is organisations such as banks thinking that some fact like my first school or grandmother's maiden name is in any sense a security question.

[azekeil.livejournal.com]

In the story it mentions a site called ClaimID, which completely baffled me as to it's purpose for some considerable time. Why would I want to tie together all my separate identities in one place? My privacy is enhanced precisely because of separation. Furthermore, I have never used my full name knowingly on a public article on the internet. So it baffled me as to why this site might exist.

However, I understand that other people may have a wish to tie these things together and 'claim' stuff that's out there as theirs, for precicely the reasons you outline above. I'm not really sure how I feel about the concept, as making 'me' more findable goes against everything I stand for.

I prefer the more personal approach - I'm happy for people who I already know to read more about me and be able to correlate that with the person they already know, or for people to read stuff about me then tie that to a person they get around to meeting finally, but I dislike the idea of being 'searched' for and having my 'real' identity tied to my presence online, which seems to be precicely what ClaimID, er, claims to do.

[gerald_duck]

My only concession to that kind of concern is my appreciation that initial impressions sometimes count for a lot.

I can't think of anyone offhand that I wouldn't want knowing about my sexual proclivities, but I'd much rather people only found out about them after they knew me fairly well, so that they see them in context and realise I'm a rounded person who's merely quite open and frank, rather than a sex-obsessed debauched creep.

To this end, there's intentionally a very slight identity "diode" between me and my livejournal. If you know me, you can't easily find my Livejournal, but if you find my Livejournal, you know whose it is. That works for me.

[azekeil.livejournal.com]

Yes, that's almost precisely how I wish it to be for me also.

[bex-sgs.livejournal.com]

Interesting points. I don't post about those kind of details on here, because I am selective about who I tell and also because I know the majroity of people on LJ "in real life". I wouldn't tell them if I were there in person so I won't tell them on here either. I think it's all linked into the idea of what kind of "community" the online one is.

[azekeil.livejournal.com]

Quite - I think you see LJ in the same way I do - a kind of social organiser and interaction tool. Not really a playground for your primal nature, but certainly flirting is OK as part of normal social interaction!

[bex-sgs.livejournal.com]

Flirting is OK from time to time - don't tend to even do that much any more! I use LJ to record my life in parts, and keep in touch with friends who I otherwise wouldn't do so easily. There is so much more to life than primal nature! And I wouldn't really write about it anyway, even if I had or created the opporunity - I'm not sure what the point is of it?

[azekeil.livejournal.com]

It all depends on your personality I suppose, and how you view the medium through which you're communicating. Certainly other people find a use for it, although that has it's own dangers.

[bex-sgs.livejournal.com]

I'm torn between saying "Muh-ha-haaa, serves her right!" and "Shame, that's pretty harsh." ....

[azekeil.livejournal.com]

Well, yes. It's interesting because it's not strictly erotica - it's just the experiences of a highly-sexed city worker. It's interesting to lots of people, particularly men who get an insight into the workings of a woman's mind on sexual matters (always of interest to men *grin*). There is certainly a purpose to this, and it's certainly popular as her subsequent book deal goes to show.

Human nature always likes reading 'secrets' and things that go on behind closed doors. It's the ability to separate the event from the person that empowers people to do this. For example, you might keep a separate journal that nobody can tie to your main journal with your exploits which you document for your own posterity, for feedback, for advice.. all of which you can do because of the power of the internet to provide anonymity - although clearly people are not paranoid enough in some cases. But in all these 'alternate journal' (sometimes they can be the only journal) cases - the person doesn't want to meet up with anyone or take things further - it's an outlet, a means of expression without fear of reprisal, the purest form of freedom of speech.

[serena-lesley.livejournal.com]

Gosh, would you feel that way about a friend of yours having their password found trust breached and their sexually explicit LJ read? *Ponders*

[bex-sgs.livejournal.com]

I said I felt torn between the two feelings, and it's her choice what she writes in her journal, of course it is! And it's not like she thought anyone ELSE would be able to read it. That's exactly what it was, a breach of trust, so why should she suffer because someone else was a cock?!

[serena-lesley.livejournal.com]

it's her choice what she writes in her journal, of course it is! And it's not like she thought anyone ELSE would be able to read it.

No, she took steps to protect it. (Keeping anonymity, password protecting entries, these are all steps to protect yourself.) Her safeguards failed, in the same way that the girl which the sex journal who was outed by someone had hers fail. Why should she suffer because someone else was a cock?!

I'm simply pointing out that it's a very similar thing.

[serena-lesley.livejournal.com]

I know of a girl who is very frank in her LJ and won't meet anyone IRL because they'll know more about her than she ever would have told them IRL. You (Bexie) know her too. It's a shame, but it's the way she's chosen to use her online presence. Although it's her, it's a different side to her, one that she'd be very upset about people IRL reading, and in fact that did come up as an issue recently and was devastating for her. Does the fact that she shares so much of her 'primal nature' make you wonder what the point of her LJ is? I'd say, from comments left there, that quite the opposite is true

I don't put stuff in my LJ that I'm not OK for people to know about me. I don't put unlocked stuff in my LJ that I'm not OK for the general public to know about me. If I have a second journal it is eiether completely anonymous or known about only by a very few people that I had selected, and it's linkable in any way to my main online presence. It's only private because it's quite depressing, and I don't feel that it's fair to post that type of stuff to the people who only added me to keep tabs on my social life in order to be included on the things that interest them.

Basically, the more open a person, the more open their online presence. Private people should of course be private online. People who are happy to be used as an example of a different lifestyle, or as an insight into dealing with disablilty, or as someone who writes things that many people feel but aren't comfortable articulating, should write accordingly.

I do very much feel that interactive blogging provides a different avenue for people who communicate better through text. Using LJ as a diary only is great if that's what you want, but slating people who use it for more than that seems very judgemental and closed minded. You're basically saying that you're only comfortable sharing a little of yourself and therefore so others should stick to your limits too. Um... why?

The main thing to remember is that your online presence isn't seperate from your real life, and even if you think it is, you should still remember that it might not always be. As long as you do keep that in mind, then you, and others, should write about whatever the hell you like.

[serena-lesley.livejournal.com]

Obviously I meant not linkable in any way to my online presence, though as I pointed out further into the comment, this is still tenuous, since nothing is guaranteed. It's not findable using any serch terms that anyone that didn't know about it would be know to use, but even if it was linked by somebody else to my LJ presence, it wouldn't be anything that I'd hate having made public.

[bex-sgs.livejournal.com]

You're basically saying that you're only comfortable sharing a little of yourself and therefore so others should stick to your limits too. Um... why?

Where on earth did I say that?? I think you misunderstand me.

[serena-lesley.livejournal.com]

You're saying what is OK (flirting is OK from time to times, apparently) which implies that other things are not OK. I think mainly I'm referring to the general tone of comments similar to the ones on this post where you chide people (in the form of 'wondering why they do this') for being quite open. And your later comment about the girl with the sex journal implies that you feel that she deserved her punishment for overstepping this.

[bex-sgs.livejournal.com]

Surely I am allowed to express an opinion, which is what I'm doing. I'm not dictating. Yes, I think other things are not OK, but that again, is my opinion. What's wrong with saying what I think?

When I said I 'wonder why they do this', I genuinely AM wondering. I'm not condemning them, you misinterpret the way it should be read (another weakness of the internet!)

I said I partly felt like she deserved it - how on earth did she think if she wrote a book, her identity would not be discovered?

[serena-lesley.livejournal.com]

Of course you're allowed an opinion, everybody is. Everybody is allowed to choose how they use their online presence, how much they share with others, how they live their life. They be should able to do this without people judging them by what they write, what is apparent between the lines, and what they choose to write about. If they're sharing things and they're comfortable sharing them, then that's their concern and nobody else's. That's exactly my point.