Assuming anonymity

It turns out that sometimes, everybody knows you're a dog.

Whatever did people do with all their pent-up opinions before they could express themselves anonymously on the 'net? But taking that presumption of anonymity too far will get you in trouble.

We've often seen lazy thinkers trip themselves up with sloppy habits and tissue-thin perceptions. Former Hoboken Councilman Tony Soares spent years on NJ.com forums slandering opponents under various pseudonyms during his work hours. Confident of his anonymity, he started a string of nasty accusations on Scott Delea's blog during the last election. Soares didn't understand that, because Delea was in charge of the forum, he could see Soares' work address. When Delea got sick of the rants and identified him by name, Soares scurried off.

It's almost impossible to run a blog that expreses strong opinions without getting anonymous threats and hate-mail. Unlike real-life confrontations, there's no danger of repurcussions, so people get pretty fearless. Some try to work out issues in email that they can't deal with in everyday life. But because email is so mindlessly easy to do, lazy assumptions of internet invulnerability can lead to big mistakes.

Case in point: this email, posted on Michele Mankin's site:

X-Originating-IP: [216.105.154.202]
From: "Mitchell, Patrick" Patrick.Mitchell@ogletreedeakins.com
To: "'malkin@comcast.net'"
Subject:
Date: Thu, 11 Aug 2005 11:41:22 -0400
X-Mailer: Internet Mail Service (5.5.2657.72)
YOU STINK you nasty CUNT! Eat Shit and DIE bitch!!

Mr. Mitchell was too thoughtless to get himself an anonymous email account. So Mankin posted his employer's web site address.

Two hours later:

I have just received an e-mail and phone call from
Gray L. Geddie of the L.A. office of Ogletree Deakins. Here's the e-mail...

Dear Ms. Malkin,
I am the Managing Shareholder of the law firm of Ogletree Deakins with offices located across the country. I was very disturbed to learn today that a legal secretary in our Los Angeles office sent you the vile e-mail referenced on your home page. Such remarks are clearly inappropriate in any context and an e-mail such as this certainly should not have been sent during working time using our firm's equipment. The comments of this employee are not reflective of the views or opinions of the firm and are directly in violation of our e-mail policy. As Managing Shareholder, I wanted to extend to you our apologies and let you know that this serious violation of our firm's work rules has resulted in the discharge of this employee.

Once again, let me offer you our deepest apologies for any discomfort that the referenced e-mail has caused. It will not happen again.

Sincerely,

Gray Geddie

We wonder what sort of day Patrick Mitchell is having. (No we don't.)

Categories: Internet+culture