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When i am home alone ( happens alot now that the MIss's works) i ponder.

why do people want to be anonymous ?

DO they feel better knowing that they think no one knows who they are?
Are they afraid of saying something to someone online they would not say in Person?
Fear of posting and 2 , 3 years or more down the line being called up on it.
You all meet up so everyone sees who you are so why the need to be anonymous online?
What are you afraid of???

I for one, use my name, i am not afraid, paranoid or worried someone knows who i am
Have no reason to hide behind a login name and would
NEVER say anything online i would not say in real life.

Is this new social media dehumanizing us?

Opinions???

I think when people from an internet forum get to know each other in person, it is pretty much the end of real, open and honest conversation. People will inevitably hold back some views or opinions they feel may portray them in a negative light. Anonymity is good for discussion. I don't have to care about what you all think of me. It's not hiding.

ok;
but they get to know u online and than later they meet you in real. I am sure everyone you meet, you tell them right away who you are online or they figure it out anyway.

why cant u be the same person? and why would you not care how some one sees you? or would you prefer to never meet anyone you deal with online?

If they accept you, they accept you for who u are, opinions and all.

I prefer honesty and openness

Not looking for a fight, just trying to figure this all out. Perhaps those of us that are older, (ie pre internet) are more honest and open?

But that's my point, I bet most people are NOT honest and open about many things in person for fear of the opinions and personal comments/attacks from others. You may be honest about some things, but not about others, depending on the group dynamic. I will never meet any of you in person. I can be totally honest. I don't have to hold back anything. You may think you are being yourself when you meet up with other posters, but there are always things you keep to yourself in a social situation....and that inevitably spills over into forum discussions.

In my case, it wasn't anything sinister. K440 was the first forum I ever joined and everyone seemed to be using "handles", so I just thought it was sort of the thing to do. I used to regularly sign off a post with my real name also and try to promote my business (obviously under its real name), so it wasn't like I was ashamed or afraid for people to know who I was either. I think that sort of thing may be the norm, rather then people actively trying to hide their true identity ?

Why do you think Facebook and many other sites give you the option of having the invisible mode option? Simply because they don't want others to know that they are online most of the time afraid being labeled such and such. And from my observation an experience, the invisible ones usually have the edge over the visible ones in online debates/fights, especially from the public perception.

not showing ur offline is not the same as posting under a handle .

What i am trying to figure out is why people feel more apt to be truthful or deceitful or act like sock puppets,( ok the sp one i can get as who wants anyone else know their an asshole there just being chickens.) if their name is not visible
or
why is this? invisible ones usually have the edge over the visible ones in online debates/fights, especially from the public perception.

This i agree with 100%; Great LINK

Anonymous communication is seen as the cornerstone of an Internet culture that promotes sharing and free speech and is overtly anti-establishment. Anonymity, so the argument goes, ensures that governments cannot spy on citizens and thus guarantees privacy and free speech, I believe this view is fundamentally mistaken and that by allowing anonymous communication we actually risk an incremental breakdown of the fabric of our society. The price of our freedoms is not, I believe, anonymity, but accountability. Unless individuals and, more importantly, governments can be held accountable, we lose all recourse to the law and hence risk our very freedom. The following sections argue this in more detail and suggest that the only real solution is more openness, not less.

By posting Anonymously ur not accountable

If you all are interested sign up with Tor (really the best way to be anonymous) and go on Silk roads and read the forums there. Mind blowing

That's an interesting thread, and I think both anonymity and using real names have their merits (and drawbacks).

I don't get the whole sock puppet thing and people probably shouldn't spend too much of their free time on forums anyway (preaching to the choir?). I think it's better when posters are "authentic" instead of creating something that is often called an "online persona" that isn't really them. That said, I wouldn't go as far as posting under my full name or linking to a personal website (I don't have one anyway), because there are just too many weirdos out there. Being able to keep them at bay, by limiting potential abuse to the forum and PMs, does make sense I think. That doesn't mean that you cannot meet/befriend some posters in real life as well.

You do not seems to grasp the characteristic of a forum and why anonymity is the safe option.

- nothing is deleted unless done actively, even if a message is deleted there is not guarantee that it has not been copied, believe it or not their is a market for this, especially on professional forum. I would say that this one is not an exception given the concentration off NGO and Expat in the country (not to mention their high risk profile activity) you can be pretty sure that every thread of this forum and the two other are read regularly and recorded.

The not deleted can be problematic, as what you said openly and confidently today can come back and bite you in the ass 10 years later.

- You do not control who read you ( the who in question potentially reading you several years latter).
If you post regularly you let slip quite a lot of detail on your personal life, habit, pattern of activity, taste, personal history and such
Here people think about government surveillance ( paranoia) but me personally I would be more inclined as seeing that as a problem for future career, social relation or potential social engineering threat.

This is quite a new situation. We went from on Internet nobody know you are a dog, to what you put on the Internet ( even on closed forum and under a pseudo) must be considered like being put in the public domain permanently.