Discussion culture

[Bantari]

Robert - I think there are two very important points you need to understand:

Point 1.
I don't think anybody wants to ban you or suppress your opinion, or anything like that.

Personally, and I think many people share my feelings on this - I find what you write very valuable, and your opinions interesting. You research is (or might be) groundbreaking, and I think eventually it might lead to a brand new way of looking at Go, and so your voice should be heard, absolutely. I consider you one of the most valuable contributors on this forum, and it will be a sad day for L19 when you get banned or restricted. Unfortunately, from the serious posters, you are also by far the most controversial and polarizing one. Which is not necessarily a bad thing per se, but in your case it leads to trouble.

Point #2.
Its not what you say, its how you say it.

The one thing you need to understand is - all you need to do is make a point and give the reasons you think this point is valid. On a forum like that, it is given that not everybody will always agree, but you don't need to argue with every detail. Who cares... Except in rare cases, such arguing degrades discussions to slap-fest of 'i am righter than you', and nobody needs that. And when you need to argue, argue with the *core* of the opposition, with the important stuff, not with every minor detail.

One of the issues here is the idea of you pulling people into 'your world' (as Cassandra calls it) or 'your framework' (as I call it.) Again - by itself there is nothing wrong with that, but you also need to at least try to meet people in their worlds occasionally, just to be fair. Otherwise you make everything too one-sided, with you as the sole arbiter of which side is right and which is wrong. Rubs people the wrong way.

So when i doubt - just make your point. If it is well made, and if your supporting reasons are good, even when people post disagreements - those who read it will either agree or disagree, and further arguments might just be counterproductive. From experience - you know that you can very seldom convince anybody by arguing every detail forever. More likely - you just make enemies and bring the whole thread to premature death as people start withdrawing from the discussion in fear of you taking the verbally apart.

PS>
Let me leave you here with a semi-serious example. In one of the recent thread, I started a tongue-in-cheek argument with DrStraw about why wars are fought. After making my point, and his response, I 'resigned'. I could have argued further (and I assume you would have, which is the problem) as I still believe there are many wars fought over other stuff than conquest. But further discussion would add little to the thread. I made my point, and people who read it will think about it. That's all. The fact that I did not press and argue does not mean my point was not valid or that I realized my error or something. I think this is what you need to understand.

[Boidhre]

In spite of that, you're among the people whose name I didn't already know, Boidhre/Padraig.

Sure. My point is, yes, if you just casually read my posts on here you won't know who I am, but with a few minutes of digging you'll figure out an awful lot without doing anything more than looking at my KGS profile and searching the EGD. I make absolutely no effort to hide who I am, I just don't advertise it on here since I don't think it adds anything useful to the conversations.

I mean, really, why would you want to know my name? Unless you're planning on turning up at Irish tournaments, it's not going to be hugely useful to you. I don't know your name or who you are, I don't really feel any need to find out though. So I don't care. If you were claiming to be someone, e.g. authors like John or Robert, then yes it's very different.

[Bantari]

In spite of that, you're among the people whose name I didn't already know, Boidhre/Padraig.

Sure. My point is, yes, if you just casually read my posts on here you won't know who I am, but with a few minutes of digging you'll figure out an awful lot without doing anything more than looking at my KGS profile and searching the EGD. I make absolutely no effort to hide who I am, I just don't advertise it on here since I don't think it adds anything useful to the conversations.

I mean, really, why would you want to know my name? Unless you're planning on turning up at Irish tournaments, it's not going to be hugely useful to you. I don't know your name or who you are, I don't really feel any need to find out though. So I don't care. If you were claiming to be someone, e.g. authors like John or Robert, then yes it's very different.

I agree with that.
And for me the same - I never made it a secret who I am (can find my name easily on my website or on SL, among other places) - but I find it convenient to post under the 'Bantari' name since this is how I was posting forever.

A curious thing - this forum, in the profile, does not seem to have provisions to enter your real name. You can put it in the comments, of course, but...

Anyways - who cares.
In general, a discussion point is either a valid one or not, regardless if it is made anonymously or not.

By the way - who is it now that derails and hijacks the thread, eh?
Can we get back to the topic?

[Boidhre]

By the way - who is it now that derails and hijacks the thread, eh?
Can we get back to the topic?

I think hyperpape makes a very relevant point here. I'd make the other one, that the regulars are known to at least some of each other, but if people feel anonymous they are more likely to be nasty or cruel to other people (or if they don't know the person they are talking to).

[wineandgolover]

I'm on other boards with a real-name policy, and it probably helps the civility. A little. Maybe.

I doubt it's the root of any problem here, though, and suspect it wouldn't help much.

I'm Brady, by the way. Damn glad to meet you.

[Bartleby]

What is the topic? I'm just curious because it seems to have deviated from the original post somewhat.

Bantari, I like your one post because it has multiple colors.

Other than that, this thread just makes me blue.

[John Fairbairn]

Anonymity is not of itself bad, nor is it usually a problem on L19. But it does obscure certain cues that people use or even rely on in conversations, typically as regards sex or age or origin. It is not discriminatory but rather polite to use such information to refine your answer. However, that aspect is trivial compared with the licence it gives some people to be abusive or profane. See KGS for an obvious supply of sewer rats.

If you choose to wear the uniform of anonymity, I don't see how you can be surprised that some people will put your application to be treated as a normal person in the pending tray. The fact that on L19 applications almost always get approved does not change the case for a screening process, no more than the fact that most of us are not terrorists means we should not go through airport security.

The prompt and impassioned defences my frequent references to anonymity elicit actually makes me think there is some unease about the practice by those who take advantage of it.

As regards using PMs, they are likewise fine and useful in themselves, but they can easily be bad or manipulative. If you are trying to have retracted or modified a comment already made in public you are probably being underhand, not discreet. If you see something mentioned in a PM, the polite laws of confidentiality demand that you do not refer to it in public. You are therefore hobbled in the discussion. There are people who deliberately try to use this tactic. That is what I mean by manipulative. Although I turn off my PM access it can be overridden, and I have actual examples of what I refer to.

Good discussion culture is best posited on openness.

[Bantari]

Anonymity is not of itself bad, nor is it usually a problem on L19. But it does obscure certain cues that people use or even rely on in conversations, typically as regards sex or age or origin. It is not discriminatory but rather polite to use such information to refine your answer. However, that aspect is trivial compared with the licence it gives some people to be abusive or profane. See KGS for an obvious supply of sewer rats.

If you choose to wear the uniform of anonymity, I don't see how you can be surprised that some people will put your application to be treated as a normal person in the pending tray. The fact that on L19 applications almost always get approved does not change the case for a screening process, no more than the fact that most of us are not terrorists means we should not go through airport security.

The prompt and impassioned defences my frequent references to anonymity elicit actually makes me think there is some unease about the practice by those who take advantage of it.

As regards using PMs, they are likewise fine and useful in themselves, but they can easily be bad or manipulative. If you are trying to have retracted or modified a comment already made in public you are probably being underhand, not discreet. If you see something mentioned in a PM, the polite laws of confidentiality demand that you do not refer to it in public. You are therefore hobbled in the discussion. There are people who deliberately try to use this tactic. That is what I mean by manipulative. Although I turn off my PM access it can be overridden, and I have actual examples of what I refer to.

Good discussion culture is best posited on openness.

Good post, good points. I also like openness better than anonymity.
The only thing to add is - the lack of anonymity does not prevent obnoxious behavior. We have plenty of examples on L19 alone.

[hyperpape]

My supposed anonymity is in your mind, not mine. My name is Justin Blank, and it's easily enough associated with this forum handle, via Senseis, via Twitter, via my defunct blog, via a code library I posted on GitHub on these forums, etc. I can't remember if I ever posted it in my profile on KGS, but I did post my undergraduate major and university, my graduate school and the club I played in. Are you saying that because you don't know my name, I am going to act differently, in spite of the fact that plenty of information about me is out there?

I don't mind that you don't like anonymity. It certainly gives a nice cover for a lot of trolls, and I don't know if a go board is a context where it has a lot of balancing advantages. However, I get annoyed by you willfully grouping people together as "hiding behind a pseudonym".

Edit: PS, Boidhre, my point earlier was that even the people whose names you or I don't know, it's often just by chance. It'd be easy enough to find them out.

[jts]

I agree with the general position endorsed by Bill Spight and Boidhre that this is a problem that has gotten to a point where it should be solved by moderation. Specifically, I like this as a starting point.

I would like to make the following suggestion, based on my experience. Grant the person who starts a thread the right to have posts removed that, in their judgement, are off topic. They can't remove the posts themselves, but say that the administrators would honor such requests as a matter of course. Let the admins send the removed note to the author's inbox, in case the author wished to use it in a different thread.

I think it's unfortunate that we have come to this. It can't contribute to good feeling and camaraderie on the forum. I am (as many others in this thread apparently are) extremely inclined towards Robert Jasiek's apparent style of thought. I like formal definitions, I like classifications into types and sub-types, I like analyzing concepts into their elements, and I am generally happy to twist an ordinary-but-fuzzy term to have a narrower and more useful meaning. So I've been hopeful, but disappointed.

The prompt and impassioned defences my frequent references to anonymity elicit actually makes me think there is some unease about the practice by those who take advantage of it.

This is sweet-natured, but I assure you that you are incorrect. Most people I know use pseudonyms for any online activity outside of Facebook; perhaps this is a generational divide. It's simply not very prudent to have your personal life available for scrutiny to any stranger who knows how to use Google. I do not want everyone who has my first and last name to know what computer problems I'm having, what medical worries I have, my financial status, what I do to relax, how I feel about John Boehner, my religious commitments, and so on.

At best, having your personal life online could be comparable to meeting someone at a cocktail party in 1940 (maybe a new neighbor, a friend of a friend, or a professional contact) and, without giving him a chance to get a word in edgewise, immediately blurting out every detail about yourself that you can think of. My grandmother only has a weak understanding of the Internet, forums, pseudonyms, the Google, and so on, but she understands quite well how this sort of over-sharing shows bad taste and bad judgment. You have to show discernment in deciding how well you should know someone before you can invite him to join you for tennis, hint at liberal sympathies, or reveal that your son is disabled.

If you feel that you no longer need to show any discernment of this sort because you just don't give a damn for social niceties anymore, good for you! But that's no reason to be critical of people who are just showing basic good sense in the year 2013.

Moreover, as several people have said, pseudonyms are just closed doors. If you turn the knob, they pop open. I happen to know you have my full name somewhere in your email inbox because we have corresponded in the past, but I think it's true of just about anyone who posts frequently on this forum that if you were willing to poke around and ask questions, you could be standing unannounced on their doorstep within 24 hours.

At any rate, to the best of my knowledge the three most disruptive posters on this forum were all using their real names (and were quite proud of who they were and the ruckus they caused). The basic premise that if you're new to a forum you should trust "John Fairbairn" and mistrust "jf2239" doesn't seem borne out by the evidence.

[John Fairbairn]

My supposed anonymity is in your mind, not mine. My name is Justin Blank, and it's easily enough associated with this forum handle, via Senseis, via Twitter, via my defunct blog, via a code library I posted on GitHub on these forums, etc. I can't remember if I ever posted it in my profile on KGS, but I did post my undergraduate major and university, my graduate school and the club I played in.

Just like RJ you are assuming I live in your world. I would never think of using SL for that sort of information (or much else actually), I have no idea what Twitter actually is (or Facebook). If your blog is defunct then I have to assume "It's not pinin'. It's passed on. This blog is no more! It has ceased to be. It's expired and gone to meet its maker. It's a stiff! Bereft of life. It rests in peace! Its metabolic processes are now 'istory. It's off the twig. It's kicked the bucket. It's shuffled off its mortal coil, run down the curtain and joined the bleedin' choir invisible! This is an ex-blog." I may be from another world but I have no powers of communicating with the dead. I have only a vague idea what a code library is and the only thing a git means to me is a rather rude word which I assume (more so because I now know your name) was not directed at me as a term of abuse. I also don't see these pictures of people on L19 that other people sometimes mention.

Are you saying that because you don't know my name, I am going to act differently, in spite of the fact that plenty of information about me is out there?

Don't really understand the question but I think the answer's No. I am saying that before I know you I don't know how you are going to act. Also, if you are abusive and anonymous I will probably regard what you say in a different light compared with whether you are nonymous and abusive, and my response, if any, may (or may not) differ. Having more information is usually deemed useful.

But you're saying there's plenty of information out there about you on google even though you use a pseudonym, yet jts is telling me that people like him and you (2013ers) use pseudonyms precisely to avoid people googling you. Could you please get together and sing from the same hymn sheet?

I don't mind that you don't like anonymity. It certainly gives a nice cover for a lot of trolls, and I don't know if a go board is a context where it has a lot of balancing advantages.

So you seem to understand even if you disagree and you confirm there are downsides.

However, I get annoyed by you willfully grouping people together as "hiding behind a pseudonym".

Well a pseudonym is a false name. What other purpose does it have other than hiding? Or do you have special connotations for hiding that I haven't got? Just a useful descriptive verb most of the time as far as I'm concerned - opposite of Show on L19 usually. But if you think it's a bad word, where did I group people as (bad) hiders? I made a reference purely in the context of one person as being a non-hider. And where does the wilfulness come from? You've already mentioned avoiding trolls as a good reason, and other people have mentioned that whole forums have real-name policies (like airlines, banks, tax inspectors, schoolteachers and a million other people - American train ticket sellers even demanded my passport to go from Chicago to Milwaukee). So it's not just me being wilful surely.

Jts: You and I haven't been introduced but I still talk to you (we need an icon for tugs forelock), and you graciously talk to me. But your Great Gatsby world of cocktail parties and its modern counterpart of country clubs and tennis clubs are Gone with the Wind as far as I'm concerned. And I don't give a damn.

[daal]

Well a pseudonym is a false name. What other purpose does it have other than hiding?

You're right, but we're not hiding from you or other real human beings, rather we prefer to conceal our private life from army of cyber-robots aimed at presenting our lives on a plate to be picked at by unscrupulous corporate hens. This may or may not be a real threat, but it is certainly one that has given many of us the creeps.

[DrStraw]

Well a pseudonym is a false name. What other purpose does it have other than hiding?

You're right, but we're not hiding from you or other real human beings, rather we prefer to conceal our private life from army of cyber-robots aimed at presenting our lives on a plate to be picked at by unscrupulous corporate hens. This may or may not be a real threat, but it is certainly one that has given many of us the creeps.

Don't worry. It doesn't matter how many layers of anonymity you put in place. If it goes through a server in the USA then the government knows who you are. Probably true in many other countries also.

[Bantari]

Well a pseudonym is a false name. What other purpose does it have other than hiding?

In the internet, and generally in game world it is more often called 'handle'. Just to keep things straight.

Since I am one of the people not using my real name as the 'handle' here, I feel addressed by your remarks, and in need of explanation.
So there are basically two main reasons for me to use 'Bantari' instead of my name:

1. Continuity and tradition

• When I first started posting, way back when, this was pretty much standard. Some services only allowed a certain number of characters as your 'handle', and I have a rather long-ish name, so for consistency's sake it was necessary for me to come up with something shorter, which I could use across multiple places.
• I admit that 'hiding' was a small part of that too (you might remember the old 'server wars' and so understand why I thought it might have been 'convenient' not to parade my real name out there) - but this reason was short-lived and I allowed the association of my 'handle' to my real name almost immediately.
• In any case - I have been knows as 'Bantari' on the internet for many many years now, in quite a few circles, and to change horses mid-stream might create more confusion than it is worth.

2. Organization and convenience

• I know people who like to organize their activities in various ways - for example, for professional contacts they use LinkedIn and for personal contacts Facebook. I think in general, as world becomes more and more of a 'global village' having various 'handles' for various purposes is an extension of this idea, and I see nothing wrong with that. There might be good reasons not to mix the various aspects of your life too much.
• Personally, I use 'Bantari' for my leisure-related activities (computer games, Go, books, etc) and when I contribute in those fields, this is the handle I use. It has a set of dedicated email addresses, and so I can keep this part of my life separate.
• For professional reasons, I am thinking of creating another handle and set of email addresses, just to keep it straight. I am not sure if I will do it, ultimately, but I am certainly playing with the idea and can see the advantages of such approach.
• Whatever I do, both sets of 'handles' will be easily associated with my real name via a website I will be linking to (Bantari.com on the leisure side, and something else on the professional side.) You can see the link in my sig here. This kind of approach makes it very convenient for me to keep the various aspects of my life compartmentalized, which is nice.

Over all, while I agree that being open about who you are is a good thing, I cannot really condemn those who prefer to be less open - they surely have their reasons, and it is not my place to judge them. The most important thing for me is consistence - if you pick a way you present yourself, stick to it. Bad things happen when a person changes handles, especially when this happens repeatedly. Even when this person does not misbehave, it creates confusion and sometimes mistrust.

[Boidhre]

Well a pseudonym is a false name. What other purpose does it have other than hiding?

There are many thousands of Padraigs. As far as I can tell, no one else uses Boidhre online. It's the opposite of hiding really.


The second point: I can change handle, I can't change my name (easily). I've done roles and been involved with communities where I really don't want them following me around everywhere because they have some nutters amongst them. Being able to switch to something like Boidhre for the more "personal" stuff and use something else for when I do actually want to hide because, well, you don't put up your mobile number, a picture of yourself and home address up in the newspaper for a reason.


Finally, if you're a woman, in many online communities you may not want this public knowledge because of the crap women can get online.