Interwebers

A segment from Bob Costas’ HBO show Costas Now, a program discussing the sports media landscape, tackled a big web 2.0 issue. The heated back and forth argument seen on Costas Now is reminiscent of any classical purist vs. liberal debate. Buzz Bissinger, a renowned Pulitzer Prize winning author, hates bloggers like Will Leitch; founding author of the popular sports blog Deadspin.com. Understandably so – Buzz has dedicated the last 40 years of his life trying to perfect the art of the written word. Meanwhile, many bloggers have sub-par writing skills – yet they are becoming more widely read as mediums such as newspapers disappear with older generations. But this post isn’t about bloggers who suk @ righting. As Costas noted, one small measure that would help elevate Deadspin’s overall credibility is monitoring the nastiest user comments left on his blog. This, in my opinion, is just as serious an issue: the abuse of internet anonymity.

As interwebers, we all start on the same playing field….er….web. We have the same uniform and the same haircut and we choose how we’re going to dress ourselves. That’s when good interwebers start to build their brand, image, and network. We sport the hairstyle we want and wear the clothes we want. We become our legitimate selves on the world wide interweb.

But there are those who keep the uniform and the standard haircut and use their anonymity to trash talk on the internet without any distinguishable trait, name, or reputation. These are the intertrashers intertrashing on the interweb. And they are one of the biggest problems facing web 2.0.

Intertrashers take advantage of their faceless identity to spew hateful, uneducated, and un-constructive digital jeering. And they do it all through the power of anonymity. In person, they may seem perfectly decent. But when they detach their name and their face from their words while having an audience in front of them, they become different people – as seen below on John Gabriel’s Greater Internet ****wad Theory

In Andrew Keen’s article “How Vital is Anonymous Speech” he writes, 

“Today, too many anonymous Internet users are posting hateful content about their neighbors, classmates and co-workers; today, online media is an increasingly shadowy, vertiginous environment in which it is becoming harder and harder to know other people’s real identities.”

The way people conduct themselves in person with nothing to hide behind and how they do so on the internet is sometimes so conflicting and dissimilar, it almost makes you pass judgements on the human mentality as a whole. It begs the question: when are people putting on a front? Are they putting on the mask of a respectable, decent human in front of real people, only to reveal their disgusting, disfigured face on the internet? Do they say these terrible things regardless of a digital or “in the flesh” audience? Is it for their own personal amusement? What’s going on here?

We’ve come to a fork in the digital road. How are we going to use our voice on the internet? We can use it for good or for bad. Intertrashers refuse to take personal responsibility for themselves and their words – something they’re forced to do in physical life when their face and (real) name is associated with their words and actions. Good interwebers are eager to put our identity on the interweb because we choose to use it as a powerful force in bettering ourselves and others. 

Of course, people are entitled to their privacy. As Andrew goes on to say, 

“This isn’t illegal…because online speech — anonymous or otherwise — is protected by both the First Amendment and by the Supreme Court’s much-cited 1995 McIntyre vs. Ohio Elections Commission ruling protecting anonymous speech.”

This is about the abuse of the internet. The abuse of anonymity. I think most interwebers, opposed to intertrashers, are willing, able, and enthusiastic about putting their name and their brand on what they say on the internet. But like all good things, this medium can be used for the wrong reasons. Hence, intertrashers.

So what are you? An interweber, an intertrasher, both? Contrary to what Andrew says, I believe the internet is becoming more transparent. Lawmakers are starting to take notice. And whether or not you can hide behind a wall of anonymity forever, I think more (much more) is to be gained by openly being you with your ideas attached to your name.