Today at work, a woman I barely know came up to me after a seminar and said, “I’d like to talk to you about something.” We were quickly alone in the room and then she laid it on me, “Do you have an anonymous blog?”
!
It turns out that through a complicated series of facts she learned from this and other blogs combined with some reasonable assumptions, she strung together my identity. Can you believe it? She didn’t even do any major sleuthing or google stalking. And our blog circles don’t overlap all that much (we compared notes).
I think it’s pretty cool to have learned this person is a blogger. We had a wonderful conversation about blogging, which developed into a two-hour discussion about grad school, careers, etc. I hope that we have more like it.
I have to admit that there are only a handful of blogs that I regularly read that I think are truly anonymous, i.e., I think there is enough information in most of them to develop a pretty good hypothesis about the author’s identity. I don’t have any false security about my identity either. My location is just short of obvious and I bet it would be pretty easy to figure out the rest of me, too. It was just a shock to have someone that close to home put it together.
I’ve said before* that my main reason for being anonymous is to keep this blog from coming up in google searches of me, my departments, etc., and that I don’t mind other bloggers knowing who I am but I don’t want people in my real life to know about my blog. There have already been things I decided not to write because I didn’t feel I was anonymous enough. I try to write posts that I wouldn’t be devastated to have real life friends/colleagues read, but also that wouldn’t devastate my friends/colleagues if they read them. I know it’s a real possibility that I will be found out someday (well, I guess I’ve already been found out, but I mean more broadly).
The moral of the story is, if you’re an anonymous blogger and you really don’t want anyone to know who you are, be pretty damn careful what you write. Anyone around you could be an anonymous blogger, too!
*I haven't actually said all that before. But that post I linked to has some great comments discussing this issue.
13 comments:
I guess the good news is that the people who find the blog are usually bloggers themselves, which makes inherently less awkward/scary/weird. I know that people have figured out who I am, and for the most part, I've also stopped writing anything that I'd really be horrified if my colleagues read. I also don't have archives, so after a week or 10 days or whatever it is, the post is gone--poof! No google indexing or archive.org, either.
I certainly don't care if most people figure out who I am. I'm most worried about the people in my field, who are, of course, the people most likely to figure it out. But again, if they're bloggers too, then I don't really care that much.
I'm not anonymous, and not super-happy with it, but then again, how many German girls in lifesciences in Barcelona are there... I'd have to hide a lot if I wanted to be anonymous, and I want to share some of those parts of my life, too.
I'm glad it all turned out well for you today.
I would like to think that I am anonymous, but I know that that will someday not be the case. Or maybe it already is?
Either way, I try to write about things that will not upset my family, friends, or colleagues. Somethings are borderline, but perhaps these iffy topics are the most important to discuss.
true, very true. I too try to be careful about what I say but I also don't want it coming up easily.
Wow, I think I'd feel a little freaked out if someone in the "real world" found me out like that. But then again, I (like you and many of your commenters) try to write posts that won't leave me too embarassed if someone I know *should* find me out. Like you, I'm anonymous mostly so a Google search won't find the blog and destroy any chance I might have for a job, should I ever again decide to seek out a "real" job in science.
Yeah, I'm mostly anonymous for the whole google search thing. My friends all know about my blog and a lot of them read it. But this is part of the reason why I haven't disclosed my industry yet.
That is a strange situation. I know I'm not really anonymous, but I'm not sure I care so much. I'm like ianqui, no google index etc. I struggle with the archive notion because I like some of my old posts but the more posts present, the easier it is to figure out the back story. Bloggers that have stat counter can figure things out - it isn't hard when you have ip addresses, but what's the point. If you want to know who I am, just email and ask, I don't really care that much.
Anyway, I'm glad it was such a positive outcome today/yesterday/ugh when.
"and that I don’t mind other bloggers knowing who I am but I don’t want people in my real life to know about my blog...//..I try to write posts that I wouldn’t be devastated to have real life friends/colleagues read, but also that wouldn’t devastate my friends/colleagues if they read them."
I recognize this. I am anonymous mainly because I talk about work and have no intention of "regular" people knowing which Institute it is, since I don't think that is important really. On the other hand, I think who ever reads the blog and is from the city would probably know who I am..
And yes, the suggestion not to write everything down is a good one. You never know when it will back and haunt you.
fun blog to read!!
I'm anonymous for reasons similar to yours - I don't want to be googled, especially by students or potential employers. However, as you know, I'm totally open about who I am when approached by other bloggers (hell, I've met tons of them and we're now friends IRL). Despite that, I still would be a little freaked out if someone at work approached me like that!
That would totally freak me out. But then again, I don't know after blogging for this long how upset I would be if someone just asked who I was, etc. If someone had figured it out I guess I'd rather know.
I guess my worst fear is someone at my school finding out. I never have anyone from my city on my stat counter though, and my blog will self destruct if I do (and it has once before.)
My general rule for blogging is that I don't blog about anything I've told someone in person (other than my husband or best friend.)
I frequently get hits from my city, which feels a little weird. I know a couple of readers/bloggers who live here, but obviously I wasn't aware of all of them. I also get occasional hits from nearby places where I know people, which is more weird since they are smaller towns. After this encounter, I'm super curious who these readers are.
meh. I don't really care if someone figures out who I am. I leave some information here and some there would be kind of flattered if people would show so much interest that they would actually puzzle all the pieces together and drop me a comment. Quite a few friends and colleagues knows my blog so that means I don't write about issues I wouldn't have discussed openly with them.
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