Nick, On Aug 3, 2011, at 2:29 PM, Nicholas Crown wrote:
Hi John:
[…]
Nicknames are valid in human life. I don't see anyone who uses a nickname as dishonest by definition. And humans are inclined to "trust" people who act in a consistent way, regardless of their name - I think that works even online, and is context-dependent (the amount of trust varies according to the context within which it is needed). Nicknames are sometimes useful in preventing abuse (or easy correlation) of someone in one context because you know them in another context (imagine if Kathy Sierra had used a pseudonym not publicly associated with her "real name" or address - perhaps she might still be writing publicly?)
This is helpful. What Heather said about not forcing one model over the other is one of the challenges that we are left to solve. So, the responsibility is on us as individuals participating in "networked interactions" to evaluate the context and information available at the point of interaction in determining whether or not to engage in an interaction.
What if the system offered via some labeling technique some additional context that indicated whether or not the person on the other end is using a pseudonym? If interacting with someone who has been "verified" (getting back to the assurance level) , their profile looks different. If it's a pseudonym, you would know it and that could aid you in determining whether or not you should engage. Or, is this vetting process best left up to the community as a whole?
I can imagine my bank making an assertion that my DBA business account name is "Binary Art". I can imagine that someone can register a trademark and have a lawyer or the gov't assert that the trademark name is "Identity Woman". I can imagine the gov't asserting that my legal name is "Johannes Kempes". All of these are useful in certain contexts (bank when someone wants to pay me or accept payment from me, gov't when checking that my passport is valid, trademark when resolving a trademark dispute). So yes, there are various situations where "verified names" carry some weight. There are a lot of other human contexts where people just need a way of referring to "that person who writes about issues of identity at this blog URL" or "that man with the blue eyes, dark beard and Australian accent" - in such cases, they assign a name - sometimes merely by accepting that name from the person asserting their own name. And in such cases, it often doesn't matter what the actual name is - the (consistent) behavior of the entity claiming that name is more important in determining trust than the name itself. Regards, - John
Nick
- John
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