What harm does public data have to you? Couldn’t one just ignore the ads? You can’t see anyone watching you, is public data good for public records? (I’m just curious). I know this sounds weird but is public data good for historical preservation and knowledge increasing the importance of the individual? And does public data lead to better products?
We need to target the hate problem at the root. Hateful speech comes from a hateful heart. How can we heal a heart problem if we can’t even ID the patient?
And on the topic of healthcare how do we accomplish contact tracing without complete records? Do you want to risk bumping into unvaccinated RFK?
Yes
Having the ID of every single person on a forum is not going to lead to mental health resources or familial interventions for them. It just leads to overreach by LEO. Trust me dude, I really am more on the same page with you than you think. But this is not the solution. You want to get at the root? Cut off the Alex Jones’s of the world from the platforms and better educate our people.
Contact tracing I have less of an issue with.
Deplatforming is not a stable long-term solution. It’s already a game of whack-a-mole. Cut one head off the hydra, two grow back. And the platforms themselves evolve or get bought by the next zillionaire. We need a more grass roots level of accountability, and that starts with authentication verification. Unique device identifiers are a big step in the right direction. And law enforcement has to follow the law. Just make it illegal for police to use the secure databases. Only federal agencies like CISA and the FBI/DoJ can access.
Mandating state ID’s to browse the internet is not a grassroots solution.
Are you familiar with the NSA and what they were caught doing? Have you heard of the Patriot Act and the myriad of civil rights violations it has wrought?
The past is the past, I have to believe we can learn from our mistakes and develop a smarter system, probably integrating AI to regain control of the public narrative, totally eliminate misinfo, and foster a more cohesive society. I suspect a lot of our division stems from the easy pseudo anonymity afforded by the net today. Don’t you think extremism would evaporate if we had to communicate with our real identities?
The problem as I see it is you seem want fast, easy/automated solutions that remove the human touch as you call for an end to hate and hateful hearts. These seem like somewhat competing impulses and require too much trust in agencies that have a bad track record with mass surveillance, going so far as to violate their own mandates/country’s laws at the system level. Not rogue individuals, the whole agency. And this is recent stuff. I am not a “OOOO THE DEEP STATE” type. The government is rightfully and fairly prosecuting people like Trump. But our history with law enforcement/surveillance is incredibly dicey.
Our society needs some level of trust. We can’t put a metaphorical - or literal - camera on every person and expect a good society.
Statistical analysis gives us a pretty powerful understanding of identity through the veil. Intelligence agencies and corporations can identify anonymous users based on very short writing samples and analyzing the language. If they need to identify someone, they can and will. Computers were invented in WWII to spy on the nazis. The more I learn, the more I’m convinced nothing is private or anonymous, and anything that is only entrenches the power of the ruling class or facilitates petty criminal activity. What do you think about the reality of privacy and anonymity? Do you believe in it?