gethro

amen...that and people who don't hide behind anonymity are going to engage in a thoughtful level of discourse instead of the current insult-filled tirades that are launched on a lot of popular message boards.

So you're saying that name-calling over the internet isn't as hurtful as in person? Or are you saying that, in general, "names will never hurt me." I would agree with the former but also add that internet message boards hardly ever offend me. But I'm old(er). I didn't grow up with Facebook and MySpace accounts and conduct 50% of my social interraction on the web. Kids these days do, however, and it does have an emotional impact. Sometimes, tragically. It will only get worse as people spend more time on these kinds of sites.

Anonymous comments are like road rage. Because you can't identify with an anonymous commenter it makes it easier for them to be cruel and vicious. The same way a person driving the car that cut you off is easier to flip off and scream obsenities at. Would you do that if that person wasn't protected by an anonymous car and merely cut you off walking? Once you begin to recognize the user name, it makes the interraction more personal, more face-to-face, more civil. Now, obviously there's still a veil that exists between commenters...it's called computer monitors. And it won't doesn't necessarily stop some commenters from being really mean-spirited. But having that commenter's information, a web master can simply block that user for improper conduct if they have shown themselves to be overly-offensive.

they're not giving out phone numbers and home addresses. They're including their name, which doesn't even have to be real. It just needs to be registered with the website so the site managers have email addresses of their commenters.

I definitely disagree that the comments are more "interesting". "Frank" I'll give you, but only because it's a glorified way of revealing the hateful and mean-spirited nature of the people that post behind their anonymity.