Letters to the Editor
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I'm looking forward to this
The drive-by hit and runners have been a problem of late, and it is even obvious that some of them post several letters of the same ilk under different names. It's an irritating practice, and a waste of bandwidth. I hope that the new changes will help cut down on this and keep the forum to a certain standard of reasonable discourse.
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Thanks - it's about time
I'm a bit disappointed, however, that you will not be requiring the use of real names.
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Thank you.
I'd still remove the option for "Publish Anonymously", period, though.
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Excellent Idea
I'm surprised Salon hasn't always done this. As a long supporter and believer in "Premium Membership", I believe that non-members should be required to provide a real name, as an incentive to become a premium member. Keep up the good work!!!
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I just like that you'll be able to see non-subscribers' posting history
Now when I have something profound to say about Eric Shaeffer or American Idol, you all can appreciate my wisdom in the context of my oeuvre! Fantastic.
(Seriously, if this had been the letters policy at the beginning, it would've made sense to me. Good luck with it.)
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Great idea!
Thanks.
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Good Idea!
I like it!
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If you're keeping score...
...I vote against anonymous letters, also.
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great idea
This should at least limit the vile output of the anonymous jerks who live to destroy Salon's writers. About time.
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So that there's no mistake...
...I'll test this.
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Terrific!
I've noticed that almost without exception, the A-holes and Trolls post anonymously. It's nice that the non-premium users can participate as registered users. I don't understand the point of the "Publish Anonymously" option though. It's not like your screen name isn't anonymous if you want it to be, it just means you can build a rep as someone worth reading or not and no one can spoof you.
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I think it's good
This should at least reduce the level of trolling. I like that you've kept the anonymous option. I generally post under my user name, but occasionally I want to write something personal and I would rather it not be associated publicly with a name that might be connected to me.
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Wonderful Idea!
Thank you! I'm sick of the drive-by attacks from people who obviously just enjoy pissing people off. I think you should also remove the Anonymous option as well.
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Hooray!
I look forward to reading the letters again--I had stopped when the trolls seemed to outnumber everyone else. Thanks!
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totally good idea
sweet, i've been wanting to track my letters. i like to compare my own development over time. thanks salon.
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Excellent decision
Thank you
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Publish Anonymously
I am here to defend the ability to publish anonymously.
While it may, prima facie be taken as cowardice, or an excuse to post insults, I cannot start to tell you the horror stories of on-line stalking and even real life stalking that may grow out of an animated political exchange with some of the lunatics that frequent these pages.
Not to mention that Free Speech at least is still present in the paper where the Bill of Rights was written, but the exercise of such right is highly qualified and subject to capricious interpretations these days. no one knows if some one will be knocking at your door at 3:00 am one fateful day to throw you in prison as punishment for your opinions expressed in here. . .
Or put you on some list. . .
Or take away your job. . .
has happened before.
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Well that's annoying...
You force premium members to register again or they get the ad-pages.
Nice.
O-gins
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Sorry, Anonymous, But...
...NO ONE should be allowed to post anonymously, irrespective of whether Salon can track the person by other means. Joan Walsh's article about on-line mysoginy got nearly (has?) 700 letter responses. At the time the thread was still live, other threads were hitting numbers of 300 and 400. I think there were 3,000 total letters. There is NO WAY Salon staffers can keep up with all that, which means the "Anonymous" option will allow for continued abuse. Bet on it.
So I agree with the others here: NO on Anonymous.
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good move
because there really are smart, thoughtful people in here, and they shouldn't have to share the space with psychos.
I also vote for deleting the anonymous option. For the internet-paranoid, it really doesn't take that much effort to come up with something that can't be "traced." If you have something to say, you ought to have guts to say it under some kind of name.
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Nice Change
There are some posters here who are not members but have some interesting things to say. This should encourage that.
My question know is, what about joe?
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Ha ha
I always thought I didn't get a star next to my name next to all my comments because I wasn't special enough and deserving of a star. Now I know those are Premium members. Alas I am special and a good commenter.
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True names
I'm all for registration, but Sean, you have to realize that not everyone has an ordinary name like "Sean Donahue" that returns over 5000 hits on Google. Some of us (me for instance) have names are unusual to the point of uniqueness, and we'd rather not have to worry that our opinions will be available to all our family, our prospective employers and the prosecuting attorney.
On another point, the new layout is terrible--the old narrow one was much more legible.
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I agree about anonymous not being allowed...
Anonymous letters should not be allowed. Anonymous does not equal posting with your actual name. I'm posting as designated_knitter -- presumably, none of you know who I am, where I live, my gender, my political persuasion.
Hopefully cutting down on anonymous posts would cut down on the drive-by Drudge readers who come over when Paglia is let out of her cage. (ok... I guess you now know my political persuasion).
Finally, if you think posting anonymously is going to protect you, unless you are using some IP anonymizer etc, you are still traceable. If you are truly that afraid, then posting on a public website probably is not really a good idea.
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Good stuff
I love reading the letters section. Thanks for making the experience even better.
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Nicknames unique?
What happens when someone uses a well known nickname of another poster?
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You Facists!
Just kidding, this is fine.
However my letters page looks kind of weird today, looks like somebody adjusted the CSS too much, letters are kind of close together. (Need more vertical white space)
Publish anonymously is a bit odd...these are screen names already after all.