I wrote them a longish email about how I thought pseudos isn't the problem, but that lack of community and ineffective moderation WAS the problem.
Indeed. The whole Google+ name debate has resulted in a lot of blogging about this issue. In fact, the other day a flist member linked to a comment by Kathy Sierra, where she said exactly what you said, and that she wished she's used a pseud from the beginning, not for herself, but for her family and friends who ended up taking a lot of damage as well.
The best semi-political blog comments section I know is Ta-Nehisi Coates' blog, and because it's moderated and there's a community built up, it doesn't matter what name I post under, so long as it's consistent. Whereas most other political blogs, the comments are unmoderated and it's a swamp of unpleasantness. And that's got nothing to do with real names.
The worst-behaved person I know on the internet, someone who appears to be having a slow psychological breakdown and who exhibits seriously threatening/stalkery behavior to a number of women he's fixated on, is a man posting and commenting under his legal name.
The cafe downstairs sells a cranberry flaxseed bagel. What is that, even? And no poppyseed.
There's a word for this in English: Kerfauxfle.
'Course, that's a marriage of a Scots word and a French one, so not really English, so much.
That's no bagel.
It is the thing that wears a bagel like a cloak.
That's no bagel.
I see this, and I hear it in Harrison Ford's voice: That's no asteroid...
I suspect that getting past the Secret Service this evening will be a pain in the ass.
Consuela,
I used TNC as an example in my email, but I also used TWOP. TWOP is not without its faults, but they certainly manage their business.
TWOP is not without its faults, but they certainly manage their business.
Indeed.
I'm all pissed off at ThinkProgress for switching to the Facebook comments, because my work disables Disqus and now with the FB comments, I can't comment at Alyssa Rosenberg's blog. Like you, I won't comment on politics (or really anything) using my real name.
I'm reduced to hunching over my smartphone during lunch to read the discussion at TNC's place, it's such a hassle. Don't the IT guys know I need my Horde?
On a related topic: EFF has a nice post on the hazards of insisting on legal names:
[link]
TWOP over manages its business. Moderation is personality driven in the places I've frequented, and if you don't kiss ass and follow the party line, you get booted. I think it's an example of moderation gone wrong, whereas TNC is moderation done well and for the benefit of the community.
